[link|http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A5574-2001Oct16.html|Coalition of the Unwilling]

Excerpt:

Bismarck said every alliance has a horse and a rider, and one should endeavor to be the rider. The same goes for international coalitions. You're either leading them or they're leading you. Of course, we're all interested in what "the coalition" feels may be necessary. We'd like to have as many nations on our side as possible. But with many thousands of Americans dead, and who knows how many more at risk, Washington ought to be making its own decisions about the war on terrorism.

This is not the voice of unilateralism speaking. Contrary to fashionable wisdom, the debate today is not between multilateralism and unilateralism. It's between effective multilateralism and paralytic multilateralism.