Dear Member of the U.S. Senate / House of Representative,

In hindsight, Henry Cabot Lodge may have been right in his principled opposition against Europe's unrealistic post-WWI peace formulas. While not an isolationist, he argued in his 1919 Philippika to President Wilson: "The United States is the world's best hope, but if you fetter her in the interests and quarrels of other nations, if you tangle her in the intrigues of Europe, you will destroy her power for good and endanger her very existence. ... for if we stumble and fall freedom and civilization everywhere will go down in ruin."

But as powerful chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Cabot Lodge probably would not have allowed successive administrations to lead the United States astray from existing security, reconciliation and cooperation arrangements. Particularly not when they were successfully negotiated with and by the ethnic, religious and cultural communities directly involved. Regardless of whether these texts have an American seal dangling from it. And he wouldn't have been kind to current office holders here and there who treated history as bunk or would have forgotten about past and still valid international agreements. Yet, in the case of Iraq, that is precisely what is still happening, with valid international minority protection and private property guarantees waiting to serve the cause of peace.

The over three-million-strong Assyrian community in Iraq, in the United States and elsewhere - who, of course, hold no monopoly for good ideas either - have taken it upon themselves to identify some lesser-known elements, means and methods which for now may be most immediately and practically helpful to stop and reverse the current disastrous developments in all of Iraq and beyond. Inspired by the lapsed House Resolution 272 of 2003, this is done in the form of the enclosed draft Joint Declaration which may be developed further and adopted as you and your colleagues in the Senate and the House of Representatives may conclude to be helpful, effective and indicated under the circumstances.

While thanking you for your benevolent consideration of this matter, we remain at your disposal for any furher questions, and look forward to hear from you at your earliest convenience.
 

Senator John J. Nimrod (ret.), Secretary General, Assyrian Universal Alliance | www.aua.net
tel:    +1773-2749262    fax:    +1773-2745866    e-mail: aua@ameritech.net ¦ johnnimrod@aol.com
(url: www.solami.com/cabotlodge.htm)