i finally got around to reading thomas friedman's column from this morning. he spends half of the column puzzling over why france and germany didn't promise any money to rebuild iraq at the madrid donor's conference earlier this week. as he goes through the motions of exploring their possible reasons for not pledging anything, setting up several straw men to knock over in the following sentence.
as a preliminary matter, friedman glazes over the fact that france and germany did pledge money at the madrid conference. both france and germany are members of the e.u. and the e.u. pledged 200 million euros at the madrid conference. that is on top of the 100 million euros they have already donated to humanitarian assistance in iraq. while 300 million euros is not nearly as much as the u.s. is donating, it is not nothing. friedman only tacitly acknowledges this when he refers passingly to "their share of the paltry E.U. contribution[.]" paltry as it is, it is not zero as friedman says in the first sentence of the column. furthermore, arguably at least, france and germany's share of the e.u. contribution--which is a grant, not a loan--is worth more than saudi arabia's $1 billion in "new loans and credits." france and germany, at least, will not put iraq further in debt.
but more importantly, when friedman explores the possible reasons for france and germany's decision not to contribute more, he never bothers to raise what i think are those countries' real objection to dumping significant amounts of money into iraq: that the money would be totally under the control of the americans, with no accountability or transparency on how it is spent. the u.s. was asking, in effect, for a blank check. france and germany were not alone in their reluctance to hand over the money to an administration that has shown nothing but contempt for their concerns. nor does he mention that france and germany were hardly alone in their reluctance to contribute. the madrid conference showcased just how isolated the u.s. is and how unwilling most of the world is to invest heavily in iraq without any kind of outside accountability for what the u.s. does there. friedman claims the madrid conference is a symptom of the different ways that the u.s. and europe see the world. maybe there is something to that point, but it seems to me that the rest of the world is not thinking all that differently than the europeans.
