NATO may lack the needed unity

Submitted by Leo K (United States), Oct 3, 2006 at 18:12

It is difficult to imagine any European military support without France, yet France has proven it lacks the ability to do any more than talk. No long after NATO was established, France effectively pulled out and undermined the entire alliance, for instance "... in

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO#Early_Cold_War_-_Crisis_with_France

As recenly as this July, "French President Jacques Chirac said ... that NATO should not lead a proposed international force in Lebanon, saying the alliance is seen in the region as "the armed wing of the West." This shows that France already is fearful of the opinion of terror-supporting countries – afraid of both terror within France from among its population (10% Muslim,) and afraid of losing important trade relations with customers such as Iran. They seem to have taken the role of adversary against the U.S. in our current role in Iraq.

As for the rest of the EU, there are similar reasons to worry that it is becoming a "Eurabia" which could do any terror-fighting organization more harm than good.

In any case, I'm not thrilled with forming an international Jihad-fighting force under a NATO umbrella, which means North Atlantic Treaty Organiztion.. Why not form a new, more meaningful, global, alliance rather than try to redefine an old European one with a different mission? It's clear that the U.S. will be its core force and we should not be ashamed or modest about being a super-power not yet threatened with dhimmitude as Europe is.

The war against terror needs a role model and the U.S. is the best the world has right now. We clearly can't be blamed for not trying to form terror-fighting alliances: China opted out; India opted out; France, Spain and other EU states opted out; Russia opted out, or should we say joined the wrong side, as they are helping Iran become a nuclear power, and "during the fighting in Lebanon Hezbollah received direct intelligence support from Syria, using data collected by listening posts jointly manned by Russian and Syrian crews."

The ultimate question is whether any ideolical organization, such as a one comprising mostly democratic states, can effectively win a war against a religious and expansionist crusade. It may be worth considering the formation of an economic, rather than democracy-inspired, alliance among the oil-consuming nations as a more potent force, since petrodollars are the only thing keeping the Islamic terror balloon afloat. Cut or threaten the flow of petrodollars (i.e. blockade Iran's ports) and you cut the main supply line to Islamic terror.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/769538.htmlhttp://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=11532920021391966 all French armed forces were removed from NATO's integrated military command and all non-French NATO troops were asked to leave France."

---

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".