Leaked Cables

Perhaps this is premature, because there is no telling what else is going to come out on Wikileaks, but I am completely underwhelmed by the leaked cables. Some of them are nothing more than pointed snark and gossip and the type of "inside" comments and politics that most of us suspect goes on, but never see publicly proclaimed.

Surely we don't believe that diplomats around the world play "nice" in everything they say and do.

Iran's Ahmadinejad responded with less fiery rhetoric than I would have expected:

Ahmadinejad — who was referred to as Adolf Hitler in one of the cables, just one of many slights made against him by other leaders in the region — called the documents “worthless” and an act of “mischief” by Iran’s enemies, an attempt to undermine Iran’s relationship with its Arab neighbors.

“They’re so worthless I don’t even want to waste time talking about them,” Ahmadinejad told an audience of journalists at previously scheduled press conference in Tehran on Monday.

Interesting response from a usually over-the-top personality. Maybe the realization that it's not just the US who has been against him, his regime, and the possibility of a nuclear Iran has shaken him up a bit.

It's never pleasant to find out what your "friends" and "neighbors" really think of you.

I think some of these revelations might actually help US foreign policy move forward. When the US is dealing with countries like Saudi Arabia who don't want to make their stances known publicly, it makes it seem as if the US is acting out of its own limited zeitgeist, rather than moving forward at the prompting of other nations.

The flip side of all of this is realizing how other countries can influence the US without the general citizenry knowing about it. When the Middle Eastern countries acknowledge that they lie to each other, what does it mean about the things that they say to us? And....if Saudi Arabia is so concerned about a nuclear Iran...why does it try to make the US do its bidding? They get to keep their hands clean and their money secure in a set-up like that, while the US continues to go bankrupt trying to police the world.

We have put ourselves in the position of "holding a wolf by the ears" in the Middle East. We can't let it go, and we can't keep holding it.