Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 06:02:52 -0500 (EST)
From: belmonte@MIT.EDU (Matthew Belmonte)
To: president@whitehouse.gov
Subject: Iraq reconstruction contracts and debt forgiveness

Your administration recently announced that countries that did not support the
war in Iraq are to be excluded from main contracts for the reconstruction of
Iraq.  This shortsighted and petty policy does nothing to mend relations and
everything to alienate further the United States' sometime allies.
(Compounding the problem is your history of sparring with European allies over
trade.)

Adding insult to injury, a matter of hours after announcing this exclusion you
began a diplomatic effort to obtain debt forgiveness for Iraq, from a set of
creditors that includes many of the countries excluded from the reconstruction
contracts.  (I use the term `diplomatic' very loosely in this context.)
Really, what do you expect the answer to be?  You cannot give a country a slap
in the face and then turn round and ask for alms.

I hope that the United States will soon begin again to focus on long-term
positive relations with its allies, instead of short-term spats.

Matthew Belmonte
[address]