Basically, I'm for knowing rather than not knowing. So I start out assuming it's a good thing long term that the Iraq invasion has proven wars of acquisition no longer work. But because of the way it was done, over the next decade or so it will be considered outside the ability of the USofA to exercise influence over great swaths of the planet.

The effect of this on the various American psyches will not be pretty. 

Arab League Nations Offer Peacekeeping Troops for Darfur
Associated Press
Monday, October 9, 2006; A18

CAIRO, Oct. 8 -- Arab countries have launched a new effort to push Sudan toward a compromise over U.N. peacekeepers for Darfur, offering to dispatch a force of Arab and Muslim troops to the troubled region, diplomats said Sunday.

The Arab League diplomats said Sudan's president rejected the initial proposal -- as he has all suggestions for a U.N.-affiliated contingent, regardless of the makeup -- but promised to suggest an alternative soon, in a sign that the Arab effort might show more promise than other attempts to stop the humanitarian crisis.

"The situation is deteriorating and needs intervention," said Hesham Youssef, a top aide to the league's secretary general, Amr Moussa.

Youssef said the Arab negotiators believed that the world community and the United States should be flexible.

"The Americans should realize that there should be a compromise," he said.

The new push could be a significant step in the stalled effort to reach a compromise over Sudan's rejection of a U.N. Security Council resolution that would let the United Nations take control of and significantly expand a peacekeeping force in the western Darfur region, run so far by the African Union.

The two sides are still far apart, however. And it was unclear how much leverage the Arab countries -- close neighbors and supporters of Sudan's Arab-dominated government -- have or how strongly they intended to press the proposal.