Bush prefers Military option to soft pad diplomacy. Do you think is succeeding?

Question

It's my opinion that a war on terrorism that cuts across one of the largest religious secterianism (muslim world) needed to be handled with a more thoughtful and careful policy and diplomacy. This would have created a greater working relationship between america,it's allieds,and the rest of the muslim world .No gun was fired when communism crashed in RUSSIA, the magic was soft pad diplomacy. In Iraqi, Afghanistan, and now Lebanone which BUSH never hide his strong support for Isreal , what has he acheived?

Answer 1

I do not think we should use any method holistically whether it be diplomacy or war; each country should be handled on a case by case basis. We can not treate Afghanistan the same way as we treat Yemen just as we can not treat the United Arab Emirates the same way as we treat Kuwait. The situation in any country is too complex to apply a single oversimplified handling principle to.

The war in Iraq was, in part, due to a failure of diplomacy. The situation before the invasion of Iraq was an uneasy one as Saddam would repeatively break the cease-fire agreement and UN sanctions that came out of the Gulf War. This uneasiness can be seen from the Clinton administration as Clinton often threatened invasion and even bombed Iraq in December of 1998. Diplomacy, threats, and a bombing failed... Bush decided for an all-out invasion. While it is possible that continued diplomacy may have suceeded, it is unlikely due to past dealings with Iraq.

As far as force in Afghanistan, the Taliban which ruled over Afghanistan, had taken claim to the destruction of the World Trade Center. As the Taliban was the government of Afghanistan, this was effectively an act of war. Given this act of war, diplomacy was out of the question from the beginning; invasion was the logical chioce.

As far as diplomacy, we should use some form of it most of the time. As an example, a good ally of ours in the Middle East is Turkey. There has been turbulance due to low local support of the invasion of Iraq from Turkish borders and pressure of formation of a Kurdish state to the south, however, diplomacy has kept the relation strong.

Answer 2

Soft pad diplomacy....right, maybe for the modern world but not terrorist. Soft pad diplomacy is why Arafat got the Noble Peace Prize, soft pad diplomacy is why we lost "Rangers" in Somalia, soft pad diplomacy is why people forget about the 200 some Marines killed in Lebanon, soft pad diplomacy is why Colonel Higgins (USMC) working for the U.N. was found tortured and hanged. Soft pad diplomacy is how the U.S. turned their back on Israel and made a deal with Black September...see were that got us. Soft pad diplomacy is a sign of weakness. All the liberals talk about President Bush, well I got one thing to tell you all...If I was President we would own the oil fields in Saudi Arabia until they turned over all the terrorist hiding there, to include Osama bin Laden. If I was President during 9/11 we ALL would be at war fighting terrorist. If I was President during the down fall of the Shah of Iran, we wouldn't be worried about Iran right now. And you think President Bush is hard!

Answer 3

Soft pad diplomacy was tried for the previous 2 decades, and that culminated in 9/11. The Cold War was far from soft diplomacy - it involved supporting a lot of unsavory people to fight against the Soviets and their allies. I don't think deploying nukes in Europe was a very 'soft' action. I don't think the embargo and threats of war over missiles in Cuba was very 'soft'.

Besides, they are completely different adversaries, with completely different agendas and motivations and ideologies. There is no simple "Foreign Policy for Dummies" formulaic books out there. But we have eyes that see, ears that hear, and minds that think - and we have seen the abysmal failure of soft diplomacy towards terrorism.

Let me ask, how successful have the EU powers and the UN been in negotiating with Iran regarding nuclear weapons the past 10 years?

How successful has the Oslo Accords been in establishing peace and stopping Palestinian terror attacks against Israel?

How has Israel's withdrawl from Lebanon, Gaza and the West Bank made things more peaceful?

Did Clinton's giving North Korea food, medicine and building them a nuclear reactor curb Kim Jong-Il's nuclear ambitions?

Was Neville Chamberlain successful in making peace with Germany?

It seems that soft diplomacy is what these people are seeking - it demonstrates our weakness and folly. It is a product of a peace-at-any-price mentality that usually provokes a war because it is a show of weakness to the aggressor.

I must repectfully disagree with your assessment.

Answer 4

You are sadly mistaken, maybe you should research into the Cold War a little. Soft pad diplomacy has been tried for years in that region, and Isreal has tried it for decades but it does not work. Bush is doing the right thing.

Answer 5

Americans, and particularly American Jews, have shown their support for the free democratic nation of Israel ever since it was formed. Non-Jewish Americans changed from a lot of anti-semitism before WWII to a fairly sensitive feeling for the Jews after everyone saw how horribly they were treated by the Nazis.

Your thoughts sort of jibe with those of many world leaders, including Britain and France before WWII. Diplomacy and appeasement totally failed in dealing with Hitler, and they have also failed with Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, and the RADICAL Islamists that we are facing now. Sure, we can and must continue to work diplomatically with everyone else.

Answer 6

Bush realizes that you can not negotiate with Islam due to the fact that Muslims goals are to kill everyone who is not Muslim.
Soft Pad Diplomacy can not be used with murderers. Islam is like a plague, you can not negotiate with disease. You must eradicate the infection. The whole world will eventually realize this and then Islam will fall.

Answer 7

Bush does not know diplomacy. He is NOT a diplomat, never has been, never will be. Just listen to any of his speeches- he's a complete buffoon. Only opens his mouth to change feet. Worse yet is that Bush does not know anything about the military or war. He somehow thinks having the most expensive military force in the world is all he needs to achieve his desires and he blindly throws them in to execute his will. He reminds me of the British generals in WW1 in that he somehow seems detatched from the reality that this military force has a finite budget and consists of mortal men and woman who can bleed and die.

Answer 8

Well you're wrong first of all. Guns were fired in Russia. People were killed.

And in this war, there is no diplomacy, there is only hate and fire, and it must be fought with a strong hand.

Answer 9

you are right......so what country should we have used more Diplomatic pressure on? Iraq was talked to by the world {UN} for 17 years.....Afghanistan was Taliban, and listened to no one but Bin Laden, and Lebanon has no control over Hezbollah, in fact is scared of them.....so, when dealing with the terrorists, that have no country , who do you put the pressure on? And how do you put pressure on some that will put a bomb around his waist, and blow himself up?

Answer 10

where do you acquire this knowlege?
lay off the drugs and watch the news!
we are trying to bring diplomacy to that region, i dont know where you are getting that he prefers a military option! we have not ruined anything over there! how many atomic bombs have we dropped over there? exactly! none!
stop listening to those antiwar hippies!