How Stupid? This Stupid.
Just how stupid are the brainiacs in the Bush administration? Now we know.
The same top Bush administration neoconservatives who leap-frogged Washington's foreign policy establishment to topple Saddam Hussein nearly pulled off a similar coup in U.S.-China relations—creating the potential of a nuclear war over Taiwan, a top aide to former Secretary of State Colin Powell says.
Lawrence B. Wilkerson, the U.S. Army colonel who was Powell’s chief of staff through two administrations, said in little-noted remarks early last month that "neocons" in the top rungs of the administration quietly encouraged Taiwanese politicians to move toward a declaration of independence from mainland China—an act that the communist regime has repeatedly warned would provoke a military strike.
What makes this attempt at a change in relations with China the paragon of stupidity is why having an avowedly independent Taiwan was so important. While getting rid of Saddam Hussein was at least superficially a good thing—although what Iraq would be like without Saddam Hussein was potentially unsettling—Taiwan truly acts independently of mainland China. The current state of affairs between Beijing, Taipei, and Washington is a stalemate that all three sides seemed willing to maintain. But now no idea seems too stupid for the Bush administration to have seriously considered.
Labels: China, Stupid Republican tricks, warmongering
