Steady on the Line

I figured that we would have a tough time confronting Syria over Lebanon since Damascus just has to keep Hezbollah with them to be the goon squad while we need to keep the UN and the assorted wobblies like France, Germany, and Russia as well as the suspiciously cooperative Saudis with us to shut down the various money spigots that keep the Syrian Baathists afloat.

Well maybe we are having success:

A top U.N. envoy will tell President Bashar Assad that Syria will face political and economic isolation if he does not completely and quickly withdraw from Lebanon, U.N. and U.S. officials said yesterday.

In a meeting set for tomorrow, Terje Roed-Larsen plans to inform Syria that the international community is united in insisting that Damascus comply with U.N. Resolution 1559 -- and is prepared to impose wide punitive sanctions if it does not act quickly, the officials said.

"If he doesn't deliver, there will be total political and economic isolation of his country. There is a steel-hard consensus in the international community," a senior U.N. official said.

In preparation for the diplomatic confrontation, Roed-Larsen has met over the past week with top U.S., European and Arab officials to determine the positions and parameters of action. In a final round of talks, he met yesterday with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and also won backing from the Arab League in talks with its secretary general, Amr Mousa, earlier this week -- discussions aimed at leaving Syria no political escape routes, the source said.

The U.N. official said Roed-Larsen had found "remarkable" support for a tough showdown with Assad. The fury over Syria's domination of Lebanon for almost three decades erupted quickly after the Feb. 14 assassination of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri, who had resigned to protest Syria's political manipulation last fall to keep Lebanese President Emile Lahoud in power three years beyond the constitutional limit.

Remarkable? I'd say downright stunning. Especially since so many say that the nomination of Bolton as our new envoy to the UN is an insult to that lofty body.

One has to wonder what kind of Oil-for-Food stick we are wielding quietly to get this kind of cooperation from the entities formerly known as weasels.

Things could yet turn out well for us in the short run. That is, while I am confident that in the long run the trend is with us, in the short run I still think the advantage lies with Syria to figure out a way to ride out the storm and hope the world's attention wanders enough to let Damascus emerge without a scratch.