A reader writes to correct us on an error we made in a January 17th post titled Reply to a Muslim. I wrote there that the opinion among Muslims that we are trying to colonize the Arab world is misguided:
"[A Muslim] says that [Muslims] hate us because we're trying to colonize them, but where is the evidence of that? Did we stay in Kuwait? Did we not leave Saudi Arabia when the Saudis insisted? Did we colonize Afghanistan?"
To which our reader replies:
Actually, yes, we did stay in Kuwait (with the Kuwaiti government's cooperation, blessings, and partial funding). We have had a continuous military presence in Kuwait since the first Gulf war. I am a retired reserve military officer, and in 1998 I served at one of the two main American military bases in Kuwait. Those bases are still there, and have in fact been expanded since then. We never left Saudi, either. We still have air bases there (they were there before the Gulf war, and they are still there - we only withdrew the extra invasion troops that came to liberate Kuwait). We also have a large contingency of troops still in Afghanistan, as well as large military bases in Qatar and Bahrain.
None of these military presences are attempts at "colonization," of course, as they are all with the full support and cooperation of the various native governments involved (who give that support and cooperation out of their own self-interest, not ours). Our presence in the Arabian Peninsula has a dual purpose - both out of benevolence to discourage mischief by Iran, Syria, and other rogue states, AND out of protecting our own national self-interests against the radical regimes of the region (again, principally Iran, Syria and the remaining extremist factions in Iraq).
BP
BP is right, of course, and I thank him for the clarification (His e-mail can be read in its entirety at the Feedback Forum). What I should have said was that we didn't stay to colonize those countries; that our presence in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia is similar to our presence in England, Germany, and South Korea. We have military bases there, but it would be difficult to make the case that these nations are colonies of the U.S.
