House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, famous for donning a head scarf earlier this year to commune for peace with the Syrians, has now concluded that this is the perfect moment to pass a Congressional resolution condemning Turkey for the Armenian genocide of 1915. Problem is, Turkey in 2007 has it within its power to damage the growing success of the U.S. effort in Iraq. We would like to assume this is not Speaker Pelosi's goal.Yet Pelosi now wants to pass this resolution that is almost certain to ignite the Turks; very likely in a way that acts against the interests of the United States in supporting our troops in Iraq.
To be clear: We write that we would like to assume, rather than that we do assume, because we are no longer able to discern whether the Speaker's foreign-policy intrusions are merely misguided or are consciously intended to cause a U.S. policy failure in Iraq.
Where is the upside in October 2007 to this Armenian resolution?
The bill is opposed by eight former U.S. Secretaries of State, including Madeleine Albright. After Tom Lantos's House Foreign Affairs Committee voted out the resolution last week, Turkey recalled its ambassador from Washington. Turkey serves as a primary transit hub for U.S. equipment going into both Iraq and Afghanistan. After the Kurdish terrorist group PKK killed 13 Turkish conscripts last week near the border with Iraq, Turkey's prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, asked the parliament to approve a huge deployment of the army along the border, threatening an incursion into Kurdish-controlled Iraq. This of course is the one manifestly successful region of post-Saddam Iraq. In a situation teetering on a knife-edge, President Bush has been asking Mr. Erdogan to show restraint on the Iraq border.
What possible purpose could there be for introducing this resolution now, other than to torpedo what appears now to be undeniable progress in Iraq? As I alluded to yesterday, I have never seen a more deceptive (to the American public)--yet blatant--attempt to sabotage a US military at WAR by a sitting US Congress. I can't think of a more shameless and despicable attempt in US history.
Ralph Peters comments further:
Legislation similar to this has come up repeatedly in Congress, yet it's always been defeated - in 2000, because of pressure from the Clinton administration. But if the resolution passes the House and Senate now, the Turks plan to evict us from Incirlik airbase in southeastern Turkey, to halt our military over-flight privileges and to shut down the supply routes into northern Iraq.
That's what the Democrats are aiming at. This resolution isn't about justice for the Armenians. Not this time. It's a stunningly devious attempt to impede our war effort in Iraq and force premature troop withdrawals.
The Dems calculate that, without those flights and convoys, we won't be able to keep our troops adequately supplied. Key intelligence and strike missions would disappear.
The Pentagon might be able to improvise other options. But the loss of the base and those routes would definitely hurt our troops. Severely. And we'd be more reliant than ever on a single, vulnerable lifeline running from Kuwait.
It's a brilliant ploy - the Dems get to stab our troops in the back, but lay the blame off on the Turks. They pretend they're responding to their Armenian-American constituents - while actually moving to placate MoveOn.org.
For the Democrats in Congress, it looks like a cost-free strategy. For our troops? When did the Dems give a damn about our troops? This resolution isn't a stand in favor of historical justice. It's an end-run that ducks behind the bench. It's one of the most cynical betrayals in our legislative history - of our troops, of Armenian-Americans, of the Kurds under threat from the Turkish military and of the people of Iraq.
We can't let Pelosi & Co. get away with this one. We need to call the Dems on it and make it clear that we, the people, know what they're trying to do.
Right now there are hundreds of new "IED Resistant" Armored carriers on the runways in Turkey. American soldiers need those carriers so that AMERICAN LIVES can be saved on the battlefield. Yet Pelosi and the Defeatocrats seem to care less about the loss of American lives than they do about sabotaging American success in the region. In fact, based on this resolution, I would go so far as to say that Nancy Pelosi WANTS more US deaths to occur to turn up pressure again against the war. And if she is successful, every drop of American blood that is lost because of a Turkish rebellion against the US is squarely on the hands of the Bolsheviks in the Democrat Congress.
Folks, this is beyond the pale; this is where politics ends and treason begins.
If ever there was a time to write your Congressmen and Senators, this would be it. And perhaps a love note to Nancy Pelosi would be in order as well.
UPDATE: Thomas Sowell calls it "Sabotage in Wartime"...
the timing is traitorous - typical of the current dems.
ReplyDeletebut the resolution is accurate and we shouldn't kowtow to the turks - after all they screwed us BIGTIME in 2003 when they denied our military the right to use turkey to attack saddam.
the current regime there is the worst since attaturk secularized them.
we should move our bases out of turkey and we should throw them out of nato and prevent their entry into the EU.
Turkey is of the view that parliaments and other political institutions are not the appropriate fora to debate and pass judgments on disputed periods of history. Past events and controversial periods of history should be left to the historians for their dispassionate study and evaluation. In order to shed light on such a disputed historical issue, the Turkish Government has opened all its archives, including military records to all researchers. Furthermore, Turkey encourages historians, scholars and researchers to freely examine and discuss this historical issue in every platform. In order to have an objective and complete analysis of the Turkish-Armenian relations, the Armenian archives should also be opened and made available to the public and researchers. For reaching the truth, historians must have access to all related archives.
ReplyDeleteIn this respect, in 2005, Turkey has officially proposed to the Government of Armenia the establishment of a joint commission of history composed of historians and other experts from both sides to study together the events of 1915 not only in the archives of Turkey and Armenia but also in the archives of all relevant third countries and to share their findings with the public. Unfortunately, Armenia has not responded positively to this initiative, yet. Our proposal is still on the table.
If accepted by Armenia, Turkey’s proposal for setting up a Joint Commission of History would also serve as a confidence-building measure paving the way for a dialogue towards normalization of relations between the two countries.
TO: reliapundit
ReplyDeleteTurkey has been a long ally of the US for decades. Turkey joined the Korea War and gave thousands of casualties along with the USA. US has been using the Incirlik base for decades. Turkey fully cooperated with the US during the Gulf War. Turkish parliament voted no to join the Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL) in 2003. You can not blame them for the failure of the current war. It's the major supply route for the US troops. The current regime is the most democratic in the history of the country. You must be out of your mind to your suggestions or just full of hatred against any muslim in the World. Shame on you.
temel:
ReplyDeletei DON'T hate all muslims - just those that use their version of islam to attack US.
turkey has to choose sides: ours or the enemy's.
gul and erdogan are islamists - closer to the enemy than to us.
the sooner we move pour bases the better.