quarta-feira, fevereiro 18, 2004
Richard Perle e David Frum
A FrontPage Magazine publica uma entrevista com Richard Perle e David Frum a propósito do seu livro "An End to Evil: How to Win the War on Terror". Eis alguns destaques.
Frontpage Magazine: Richard Perle and David Frum, welcome to Frontpage Interview. It's a pleasure to have you with us. In your new book, An End to Evil, you provide a manifesto on how we must deal with militant Islam in our War on Terror. For the sake of our readers, could you crystallize some of the main strategies you emphasize that will help the West win this war? Mr. Frum, why don?t we begin with you?
Frum: Thank you Jamie: honored to be here. An End to Evil is a handbook for victory in the war on terror: a series of highly specific recommendations about what to do to make America more safe and to defeat our terrorist enemies. First, we have to make the American homeland more secure by making it more difficult for terrorists to enter the country; and by cutting them off from money and support if they do enter. Second, we have to wage war against terrorist organizations abroad and the states that support them. Third, we have to challenge the terrorists' ideas - because make no mistake, the terrorists have ideas. Finally, we need to modernize our institutions so that we can fight this new war - including threatening to leave the UN unless it amends its charter to recognize the sponsoring of terror as a form of aggression
(...)
FP: Mr. Frum, you come out in favor of the doctrine of pre-emption in cases where there is a perceived threat. Do you think our preemptive strike in Iraq legitimates that strategy? How does this fit with the fact that, so far, there is the question of the "missing WMDs"? Give your best defence of preemptive strikes. What do you say to leftists who argue that they are "internationally illegal"?
Frum: The operation in Iraq was a tremendous success - and an indispensable prerequisite for what comes next. One crucial thing we must do is pressure Saudi Arabia to cut off the flow of funds from its citizens to terrorists. So long as the world's second-biggest oil producer was, in effect, an international outlaw, Saudi Arabia's ability to get away with a two-faced policy on terrorism was magnified. Iraq is now rejoining the international community. Soon its oil will be flowing. And Saudi Arabia will find itself much less immune to American pressure to cut off the terrorists' funds. As for international law: If international law protected the right of Saddam, Uday, and Qusay to tyrannize the people of Iraq and threaten the peace of the region and the world - well, that's a pretty serious comment about the state of international law, isn't it?
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FP: Mr. Perle, what exactly is France?s problem? Why do the French prefer to get into bed with monsters rather than side with us against the forces of tyranny? There is some kind of dark pathology here. Could you give us a little insight into the mindset of the French in this context?
Perle: When the issue is put properly and the facts are clear I believe most Frenchmen will come down on the same side as us. But often the facts are not clear. On Iraq, the French press was an abomination, rife with distortion on almost every element of the issue. Anyone reading the French press or watching French television would have concluded that we were acting out of base motives (mostly oil) and without regard for the hundreds of thousands of innocents who would perish in a long bloody war at the end of which the Middle East would be aflame. The current French government, under Chirac and Villepain, believes that it can build Europe as a ?counterweight? to the United States. It loathes and fears the emergence of the United States as the sole superpower and seeks to diminish our standing and influence in the world. So it inclines toward opposition to any enterprise that we lead.
posted by Miguel Noronha 10:51 da manhã
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