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Originally Posted by aceventura3
My point is that with Bush in the WH, NK had no leverage and was not going to be able to posture, delay, lie and pretend in the manner that they had grown accustom to. Bush established a precedence with Iraq. If we had continued to let Iraq get away with world defiance and the oil for food fraud, NK would have continued on their path of development of nuclear weapons. Bush diplomacy works, just the way Reagan diplomacy worked. Bush deserves some credit if NK stands down on this issue.
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Bush and Kim can keep playing cowboy and each can claim that he won the shootout or staredown because they both know that the only country whose actions have a meaningful impact on NK is China. Will NK keep its word on nukes any more now after the Bush "stick" approach rather than the Clinton "carrot" approach....only if China continues to pressure NK in that direction..
It hard for me to imagine how anyone can characterize our cowboy actions in Iraq as precedent for anything positive or that Bush diplomacy works. The use (or threat) of unilateral pre-emptive force is not diplomacy.
The Bush doctrine ("cowboy diplomacy") failed miserably in its first test with the unprovoked invasion of Iraq. With all the bluster about WMD and Saddam's brutality to his own people, the result of our invasion has not created a better state for the Iraqi people, stabilized the region or lessened the threat of terrorism. In fact, quite the opposite.
Iran now has greater influence both in Iraq and the region, the Iraqi people are in the midst of the worst sectarian violence the country has ever seen (much of Baghdad has been ethnically cleansed of Sunnis), our actions have been the best recruiting tool for al Queda that we could have provided, and the image of the US around the world has never been lower.