Exiting the Harbor "Problem"?

With stiff upper lip and imperialis chauvinism, "If Churchill were alive today, none of this would be happening..."states Krauthammer (Townhall, Feb. 24, 2006) with characteristic aplomb. We "hapless Americans," however are in a state of disarray over the obvious: "do we want our ports, through which a nuclear bomb could come, handled by a country whose nationals flew into the South Tower on 9/11..."

We're ready to shoot down any that would dare to try that trick again. The danger now is more subtle:

The greater and more immediate danger is that as soon as the Dubai company takes over operations, it will necessarily become privy to information about security provisions at crucial U.S. ports. That would mean a transfer of information about our security operations -- and perhaps even worse, about the holes in our security operations -- to a company in an Arab state in which there might be employees who, for reasons of corruption or ideology, would pass this invaluable knowledge on to al Qaeda-types.

     That is the danger and it is a risk, probably an unnecessary one. It's not quite the end of the world that Democratic and Republican critics have portrayed it to be. After all, the UAE, which is run by a friendly regime, manages ports in other countries without any such incidents. Employees in other countries could leak or betray us just as easily. The issue, however, is that they are statistically more likely to be found in the UAE than, for example, in Britain.

But in fairness, even statistically less likely doesn't leave Britain off the hook or any other nation. Come to think of it, Britain is chock full of Islamists and is, sorry to say, considered a choice destination for various Muslim extremists groups, and the rest of Europe isn't far behind!

The President has to make hard, unpopular calls. What will he do?

It's a fairly close call. I can sympathize with the president's stubbornness in sticking to the deal. He is responsible for our foreign relations, and believes, not unreasonably, that it would harm our broader national interest to reject and humiliate a moderate Middle Eastern ally by pulling the contract just because a company is run by Arabs.

A charge of racism has been lodged against those who are uneasy about turning this information over to Arabs. What racism? "Arab" is not a race. "Arab" is culture taken from a location: the Arabian Peninsula where presently we find several countries. Arab culture is Muslim, an imperialistic and expansionist ideology developed and spread for more than a thousand years by use of the sword. Islam is still be spread in the same way in Africa (Nigeria), the Far East (Thailand, Bali, the Philippines), and more quietly (Canada, the United States, Australia, Japan, Europe).


Islamic culture does many elements expressed must fully in Shar'ia law that clashes and will always trump Western democracy if Muslims are given half a chance. Arab culture is what America is reluctant to experience when resisting the entrance of the Emirates in the ports. The resistance to a culture could be termed bigotry if there were good reason: the threats of Shar'ia and Arab cultural imperialism, the world's scourge.