Friends and enemies

When it comes to choosing friends, the US could probably use some advice. Here is mine. We should have friends. Everyone knows that. Everyone is saying that. But who should our friends be? I suspect that the answers are not simple.

First, we should keep the friends we have. England likes us. Cultivate that. Make them like us more. Canada has to like us. Make them want to like us. Israel likes us. Don’t change a thing. Etc.

Second, ignore the countries who are not going to like us no matter what we do. Say kaddish for our friendship with France. Screw Iran. We have no need to appease China. Etc.

Third, invest in the start-up countries. There are a whole slew of countries who were once worth something and show promise of making a comeback. Or they are just new countries with spunk. There is all of Eastern Europe who like us, and want to be our friends. Get them before the EU does. Make them owe us before they owe Europe. It will pay off when they start producing something. With our help it can be soon.

Fourth, there are all these neutral countries which seem to have little opinion about us. Court them. Invite Iceland to all the cool parties. Be nice to New Zealand. Don’t spend too much on them, but compliment them on their shoes and stuff. Make them feel like big players. They will then want to hang out with the biggest - us.

Fifth, if we have extra money in the budget throw it at the third world. Not the crappy terrorist countries like Pakistan, but like all of middle Africa and things like that. Zaire, India, Malawi, Bolivia, Zanzibar. . . We want to look like we are doing more than all of the EU together. We want to help the world, and not spend too much.

Sixth, enemies. They are a bigger problem. A) Isolate the country. The works, trade sanctions, cold diplomatic relations. . . 2) Regime change, if it is the last resort. Help the pro-democracy troops there. Don’t make any promises, but give lots of money. Don’t make the mistake of funding the psychos this time. Pinochet and the Taliban were our best bets at the time, but we should know better. 3) We need to start bringing the worst of them here for study. Have the CIA open and fund a few universities. Spread the word in Saudi Arabia that they are very Islamic-friendly places. Bring people from the fundamentalist ghettoes. Ignore all the princes’ children who pay a fortune, and come out figuring how to get more out of us. Get them for a short time, and figure out what propaganda works. 4) Educate our college students about the politics of these countries. Until 9/11, I suspect 1% of college grads could find Afghanistan on a map. We need university graduates who speak Pashtun, Arabic, Swahili, and whatever they speak in the Sudan. There are plenty of students who waste away taking years of Spanish in high school or college. This gets them no where. It just makes life harder for immigrants from Mexico, who have even fewer incentives to learn English. Let them learn a language that makes them valuable if we need them. Also integrate language study in to the military. We have two and a half million people in the military. Why are there only a few hands-full in the Defense Language Institute? Why is there not more education about foreign counties there as well? The more they know, the more effective they will be when the time comes.