… most analysts agree that at least part of the rationale behind Russia's invasion of Georgia, reigniting fears of a new Cold War, was its confidence that, with America's armed forces preoccupied with two failing wars (and badly depleted because of a policy of not replacing military resources as fast as they are used up), there was little America could do in response. Russia's calculations proved correct. - Joseph Stiglitz
THE AGE / /Business Day: The war in Iraq has been an expensive lesson for the US Government.
THE Iraq war has been replaced by the declining economy as the most important issue in America's presidential election campaign, in part because Americans have come to believe that the tide has turned in Iraq: the troop "surge" has supposedly cowed the insurgents, bringing a decline in violence. The implications are clear: a show of power wins the day.
It is precisely this kind of macho reasoning that led America to war in Iraq in the first place. The war was meant to demonstrate the strategic power of military might. Instead, the war showed its limitations. Moreover, the war undermined America's real source of power — its moral authority. America Counts Cost of Wars It Can’t Win >>> By Joseph Stiglitz | September 10, 2008
* Joseph Stiglitz, professor of economics at Columbia University, and recipient of the 2001 Nobel Prize in Economics, is co-author, with Linda Bilmes, of The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Costs of the Iraq Conflict.
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Dust Jacket Hardcover, direct from the publishers (US) >>>
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