Opera bouffe

Roger Cohen writes of the "Coalition of the Reluctant" and a trip by a high Defense Department official to get countries most Americans have hardly heard of to send a dribble of troops to Iraq, all in the cause of pretending that there is a coalition arrayed against whoever it is we're fighting there.

As Cohen notes, "The United States is as isolated in Iraq as a great power can be. A first term spent riding roughshod over friends and vaunting 'coalitions of the willing' over alliances has not been righted by a second term of diplomacy rehabilitation. Wounds linger." Not a new thought, but one that can't be repeated too often.