Richard Cohen:

In some respects, Jordan is not having a bad war. Emigre Iraqis are buying real estate here, the high-tech sector is booming, the port of Aqaba is busier than ever, contractors of all sorts stay in the hotels, and a lot of what the military needs in Iraq comes through Jordan. This country is one big supply base.

That first line is curious, since Jordan isn’t at war with anybody, but we’ll let it slide.

In some other respects, the war is not going well at all.

The war Jordan isn’t waging, just so we’re clear.

The neighborhood -- one of the worst in the world for a small country -- has gotten considerably less stable since the war began.

Postwar France wasn’t exactly stable, either – but at least the Nazis were gone.

It is true, of course, that Saddam Hussein, the mad bully of the region, is locked up -- and that is not an inconsiderable achievement. Although it is often overlooked, ridding this area and the world of a dictator who started two wars and savaged his own people has to be cause for a certain amount of cheer.

“A certain amount of cheer.” Imagine what smugness (and I know smug when I see it) it takes to write that line. “A certain amount of cheer.” I supposed Cohen is justified, however, when you consider those who should be smiling the widest over Saddam’s impending execution were put into mass graves by him. The rest of us should smile only wanly.

Ah, but was locking up Saddam really and truly worth the cost of driving up real estate prices in Az Zarqa? Let’s see what Richard has to say about that…

But from there, things go rapidly downhill.

Well of course they do, when one is allowed only a certain amount of cheer.

A Jordanian looking around the region…

…A Jordanian who isn’t fighting this war, nor whom this war is being fought for…

…would see some ominous developments in neighboring countries.

For the record, Jordan has exactly four neighbors. Or five, if you count the Palestinian Authority. You can get up to six, if you include Lebanon just because they’re across the way a bit. How many “neighbors” will Cohen mention?

The most important is the extension of Iranian influence, if not outright control, into southern Iraq, where Shiites are predominant and oil is found in abundance.

Try telling US Central Command that Iran is running southern Iraq. Giving us (and the Iraqis) headaches? You bet. But control? Doesn’t Cohen read his own paper? The Washington Post reported that “many Kurds and majority Shiites strongly support” the draft constitution, which passed by wide margins in the areas Iran supposedly might “outright control.”

The north of Iraq is already a functional Kurdish republic. It, too, has oil.

“Howdy, neighbor!” is what your average Jordanian shouts to his neighbor in Kurdistan. Only he shouts it very, very loudly, because he needs to be heard across the hundreds of miles of desert between him and his “neighbor.” Also, he shouts it in Arabic.

Oh, and Kurds and Shiites have oil, which seems to be bad somehow. Maybe like I hate my “neighbor” (in Atlanta) with the giant plasma screen.

That leaves the Sunni middle around Baghdad. It has no oil but will be rich in aggrieved people -- a vast recruiting ground for al Qaeda. It is not the sort of neighbor Jordan would want.

Again, Jordan’s concerns aren’t necessarily ours. And if Cohen has to stoop to showing the war through the eyes of a third party, then how bad can it really be? I mean, who gives a crap what Canada thought about the Civil War?

To the south is Saudi Arabia, where al Qaeda's influence may be growing and where some recent terrorist attacks seemed to have been inside jobs -- someone in the military or the police was in on it.

Let me get this straight. There’s an organization called al Qaeda. It was founded by a Saudi. It gets its financing from Saudi construction dollars. It’s quietly supported by some members of the giant Saudi royal family. It supports a view of Islam first espoused by a Saudi two centuries ago, and which has millions of adherents in Saudi Arabia today. And Cohen thinks al Qaeda has influence in Saudi Arabia because of us?

Whatever the case…

…I guess Cohen couldn’t even keep up that line of reasoning for an entire paragraph…

…the Saudis, too, have a Shiite minority, and their country is in the oil-rich northeast, right next to Iraq and Iran. The Saudis are not happy with how the war in Iraq has made their lives even more difficult.

Cohen says that like it’s a bad thing.

It is impossible for Jordan, a country with a population of a mere 6 million, not to worry about the potential instability of a neighbor. It is also impossible for an oil-dependent America not to worry about Saudi Arabia.

What Cohen leaves out is what’s holding Iraq together – Coalition forces. What he also leaves out is the old, “stable” Iraq launched two wars of aggression. The Iraq we have today might just get smaller, should the oil-rich Kurds and Shiites decide to tell the Sunnis to lump it. But the New Iraq sure as hell isn’t going to be gobbling up Kuwait again, much less annexing Saudi Arabia or tiny little helpless Jordan.

Now we come to Syria, another of Jordan's problematic neighbors. The dictator there, Bashar Assad, is under great pressure to produce the killer or killers of Rafiq Hariri, a former Lebanese prime minister. Trouble is, some of the culprits might be in Assad's own family -- if not the president himself. Since he is not likely to arrest his brother or his brother-in-law (not to mention himself), it's hard to see what the outcome to this mess may be: perhaps sanctions imposed by the United Nations. However nice it would be for Assad to be among the unemployed, Washington's primary concern is not strictly law and order but the willingness of Assad to allow terrorists to cross into Iraq from his country -- another repercussion of the war and Syria's fear that it might be next.

Cohen probably doesn’t realize it, but he’s just given Operation Iraqi Freedom credit for Lebanon’s Cedar Revolution. No invasion, no instability. No instability, no Lebanese revolt. No revolt, no assassination. In Cohen’s world, it’s better for the people of Lebanon to remain oppressed. And the Iraqis and Syrians, too.

I pay for my own drinks around here. But sometimes I wonder how things would be different if I had Brent Scowcroft picking up the tab.

The United States would love for the Assad regime to go. But what would replace it? It's hard to imagine, but it could be something worse: the radical Muslim Brotherhood, for instance. It is about the closest thing Assad and his clique have to an organized opposition. Replacing a secular dictatorship with a radically religious one is not what Washington would call progress.

Let’s see. Cohen has already admitted that our primary concern with Syria today is that it exports terror. And that would be different under the Muslim Brotherhood how?

In short, and not taking into account the stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace plan, the war in Iraq has hardly made this area more stable.

One doesn’t wage war to gain stability; one wages war to affect change. The former is an oxymoron, and the latter was what we’re after. And yet Cohen complains that we didn’t get the logically-impossible goal we were never out to pursue. Scowcroft must’ve bought him a lot of drinks, and all in one sitting.

Oh, and shame on that first Palestinian intifada, for upsetting the stability of the Israeli occupation. Right, Richard?

It's true, of course, that nothing catastrophic has yet occurred in the region, but the casual assurance that nothing will happen must now be held to a new post-Iraq standard: Just about everything Washington said was happening (weapons of mass destruction) and would happen (an easy occupation) has turned out to be utterly false.

Actually, lots of catastrophic things have happened – but they’ve happened mostly to the bad guys. Saddam is in jail. Baby Assad lost Lebanon – and he might lose his neck. Tehran has CENTCOM on one border, and NATO on the other. Libya has been forced into a stubborn obedience. The Palestinians lost a major source of cash. If that’s instability, and if that’s the “post-Iraq standard,” I’ll take it.

One could almost forgive President Bush for waging war under false or mistaken pretenses had a better, more democratic Middle East come out of it.

Cohen says this just weeks after Iraqis voted for a constitution? Just months after Lebanon rid itself of 25 years of occupation?

But just as the 1991 Persian Gulf War introduced an element of instability in the region -- the rise of al Qaeda in response to the stationing of U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia -- so might this one do something similar.

Saddam “Mr. Stability” Hussein did that, when he stabilitously invaded and annexed his neighbor, and then threatened with all stability to go after Saudi Arabia’s oil wells in a most stabilitous fashion.

A Shiite arc is forming…

Keep telling yourself there’s no difference between Arab and Persian Shiites, Richard. Especially between those who live under a theocracy, and those struggling (with some success) to build a democracy.

…Iraq is infested with terrorists and coming apart…

Which is only different today, because there are Coalition forces present to help.

…Syria might be going from bad to worse…

Syrian history in a nutshell.

…and Saudi Arabia is complaining loudly that the war's only winners are the Shiites and Iran.

And Lebanon and the Kurds, too.

From here, it looks like a war that is already going badly for America could go even worse for much of the Middle East.

Al Qaeda as we once knew it is broken. The Taliban is history. Saddam is on trial. Assad is nervous. Saudi Arabia is getting nervous. Iran is threatened on two fronts. Lebanon is free. Libya has disarmed itself. Israel is getting a handle on the Palestinians. Iraqis have voted in two free elections. Afghanistan is improving. After the mistakes of First Fallujah, we’ve learned to kill terrorists without mercy.

Mission accomplished?

Not yet. But by fits and starts, we’re winning this losing war.

Now pass me the scotch. I hear Scowcroft keeps a bottle of the good stuff in his bottom-left desk drawer.

NOTE: It's too late to fix my many typos and mistakes. Give me six hours of sleep and some well-meaning emails - then I'll fix everything.