The Bush administration belief that a foreign policy built on democratization and military intervention was the appropriate response to terrorism emerging from the Middle East is not meeting the test of time. The rationale is that democratization would bring freedom and with freedom would come markets and the benefits of globalization. What the Bush administration seems to have ignored is the power of tradition, of religion, and of tribal animosity for these forces have been unleashed in Iraq overturning many dimensions of secular life that had emerged since Iraqi independence from the British after World War I. For an interesting account of the rise of the clerics in the wake of Bush's transformation efforts, see this article By Borzou Daragahi, Times Staff Writer in today's LA Times.
