Naming Names

The State Department has finally given us the members of the "Coalition of the Willing." A grand total of 30 countries support going after Iraq with an additional 15 willing to do no more than say "go team" while remaining anonymous.

The list confirms that the Iraq re-build job will be a U.S. effort as it is doubtful the likes of Eritrea, Ethiopia, Georgia, Macedonia, Nicaragua, or the Philippines will be of much help and Japan's economy is in worse shape than ours.

Comments

[Dan]

The list confirms that the Iraq re-build job will be a U.S. effort

Unless, of course, you actually READ the list.

First of all, Japan is listed as being on board for post-war rebuilding, bad economy or no. In fact, given that the civil engineering and construction sectors of Japan's economy are among the hardest-hit, it's easy to see why they'd welcome the opportunity.

You also neglected to mention the following nations, which are on the State Department's list but, strangely, not yours (presumably because they refute your attempt to spin this as a "coalition of the poor"): the United Kingdom, Spain, Australia, Italy, Denmark, and South Korea.
Those six countries alone have a combined GNP purchasing power parity of $5.2 trillion, about half of the USA's. Add in Japan, and that climbs to $8.6 trillion. More importantly, the countries in the "Coalition of the Willing" are responsible for the majority of the United Nations' budget. We'd wind up footing the bill whether we had UN backing or not.

This is all moot, since "unwilling to go to war" and "unwilling to help rebuild Iraq" are not synonymous. France and Russia in particular will probably be "persuaded" to join in when it is being decided whether or not a post-Hussein Iraq will honor the contracts France and Russia signed with Saddam.

[Tommy]

EVERYONE will want a piece of this action. The worst thing that could happen for France, Germany and Russia is if the U.S. and Britain decide to shut them out of the post-war recovery effort. That's unlikely, but it's a nice thought.

[Gary Gunnels]

Columbia was like, "We support what?"

Tommy: Ok, so now it will be profitable to be in Iraq after the war? Which is it? Or is this the broken windows notion being ignored again?