Mostly, they will probably judge on the body count. The western powers intervened in the Balkans to stop a bloody civil war that was killing thousands of innocent civilians. The intervention restored peace and improved stability. I call that a win.
They intervened because the Clinton administration needed something to take the public's attention off the Cox Report (Chinagate). They intervened because the Clinton administration painted a lie about genocide (claimed hundreds of thousands were being killed when in fact only 1000's died and as many of them were Serbs as non-Serbs). They intervened because the Clinton administration painted another lie about Serb intransigence in dealing with Kosovo (read the actual history). They intervened because the Serbs said no to a totally unreasonable demand that NATO troops be allowed access to all parts of Serbia, be hosted to a large extent at Serb cost, and be immune from any legal consequences for any improprieties.
And what peace was there for the tens of thousands of Serbs who were driven from homes in Kovovo by the *victors*? You do realize, don't you, that cleansing did occur in Kosovo ... after the KLA (who are own government had identified as terrorists) were handed the reigns of government by ours? They drove tens of thousands of Serbs out, motivating them with burning churches and rocks. I guess you could call that peace. Even though ethnic violence is still erupting:
http://www.impunitywatch.com/impuni...1/a-weekend-of-ethnic-violence-in-kosovo.html :"4 January 2009, A Weekend of Ethnic Violence in Kosovo"
You do realize, don't you, that any perceived stability came with a price, that is still being paid. The economy is in shambles (certainly compared to what it was under Serb rule). Kosovo remains the poorest region in Europe with the highest unemployment and lowest wages. Organized crime is rampant. The UN's six point plan is widely hated by Kosovans. The murder rate is still higher than it was before the war. Money Kosovo receives from the EUR continues to disappear, with some members of the Kosovan government implicated. And in late 2008, former Albanian guerilla leaders in Macedonia were threatening to restore their previous forces, while former guerilla members from Kosovo were arrested in southern Serbia. A threat to peace on the horizon? Maybe Holbrooke should intervene.
The US-led coalition intervened in Iraq to start a war that cost hundreds of billions of dollars, killed tens of thousands of people, destabilized the country, triggering a bloody civil war which has destabilized the region, acted as a recruiting tool for terrorists, a
And the cost of doing nothing in Iraq? Even without an invasion the costs would have been hundreds of billions of dollars. Just to keep some constraint on Saddam and his thugs. And even then, there would have been no guarantee that Saddam wouldn't have provided WMD to terrorists or instigated attacks himself. And just one of those attacks could have cost trillions. And we'd now be facing a reconstituted Iraq military (because the sanctions would be long gone) ... one that really would have large quantities of WMD. And Saddam would be thumbing his nose at us as he got into even bigger mischief (remember, he started two big wars costing millions of lives in just the 2 decades prior to his fall). At least the billions spent now have bought something worthwhile.
As for killing thousands of people, tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis were dying in Iraq every year before the invasion. Because Saddam was using the funds meant for them on his army, on banned weapons programs, on bribes to UN officials and non-coalition government members, on more golden palaces, on his hedonistic sons, and on secret cash stashes in the walls of building and foreign countries. That killing has stopped. Call it even with at least a hope that even the killing due to internal violence will soon end.
And Iraq was unstable before the invasion. The economy was in shambles and going even farther south. His rule was maintained with fear and at the point of a gun. He'd already effectively lost control of large portions of the north. As David Kay concluded, the situation in Iraq was even more chaotic than anyone had feared ... making the likelihood that WMD related information and materials would end up in terrorist hands even higher than was thought pre-invasion. In short, Saddam's government was losing control ... to the extent that even he didn't know what his government and military was doing.
As for terrorism, prior to our invasion, terrorists seem to have had free run of Iraq. Even planning mass casualty chemical bomb attacks from Baghdad. Saddam's government was even researching and building terrorist weapons (suicide bombs and vests) and training Iraqis to be terrorists. That's a fact. It's not a very large step to actively helping other terrorists ... remember, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
and which at this point is more likely to end up replacing a secular dictator with an Islamic theocracy as it is to replace it with a democracy divided along religious lines.
As I said, history will judge. I don't think that's what is actually going to happen. I think Iraq a decade from now will still be a democratic republic and be quite prosperous (assuming we don't cut and run as Obama may do). And a lot of people agree with me. I think your dislike of Bush has blinded you to the other possibilities.
I suspect that Holbrooke will advocate for intervention and nation building where he thinks it will make a positive change
Like I said, I'm not opposed to Holbrooke being an interventionist and nation builder. Just convinced that most on your side of the political aisle are hypocritical for finding no fault in his (and Clinton's) past history in that regard yet finding nothing but fault in Bush's actions in Iraq.
The Bush administration was not criticized (at least by me) for invading Afghanistan. He was criticized for dropping the ball on the "nation building" part: he won the war but left all but Kabul outside government control, allowing the Taliban to reestablish control. He won the war but not the hearts and minds of the population. I hope Obama and Holbrooke can do better.
We will see how many hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of lives you are willing to spend turning Afghanistan into what Iraq is already today. And don't forget Pakistan?
