European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - October 31, 1994, Darmstadt, Hesse T october 31, 1994 commentary the stars and stripes Page 13 i q n d s n Oil i d f i n d i if e after being career wife it so happened that in the hours before lady Diana Spencer was to be come the Princess of Wales in 1981, iwas working on a Story on new York s eighth Avenue hanging out with a group of prostitutes. At Daybreak i in tended to go Home and watch the Royal wed Ding my compan ions to get some sleep. But before we parted Cheyanna Quindlen gave an unforgettable malediction to the Bride. She s got the richest John in the world one of the women said. This purely commercial View of Matrimony seemed exceedingly harsh but if published reports Are to be believed the Princess is nearly As cynical about her marriage now As the women working the West Side of Manhattan were on her wedding Day. And a new biography of her husband reflects an arrangement More like a family business transaction than a love affair. Like so Many other women the Young Diana unsure of who she was and what she cared for decided to make her career that wife. V today that can be a very very iffy line of work particularly with nothing else to Fallback on. And what sometimes happens to the women who pursue it is the Bestar Gurment imaginable for teaching girls that they should always be Able to take care of themselves this is palpable in the letters from women who think the Story of the Century is that of their divorce. And for them it " " once upon a time they went into the wife business and now they have been Laid off often because what their Hus band wanted years ago is not what he wants today. They expected to share in his Good for tune to grow older amid the Best that his salary could provide in Exchange for something once called homemaking. Instead they find themselves dusting off teaching credentials As old As their oldest child and trying to remake a life at Middle age. Studies of divorce in America have shown that after the split a woman s Dis Posable income will plummet while that of her husband rises. The Princess will survive the Money crunch. But who will she be after the divorce he gets the friends the country House Eyen the country. One of the cruellest parts of being an out of work wife is the loss of identity. Vone woman says that what finally did her in was the name the mrs. John Smith on another woman s stationery. Take1 the Case of Betty Broderick cry ing a Long prison sentence in California for the murders of her sex husband and his second wife. Betty had seen her husband through professional school skimped and saved in the Early Jean years car pooled the kids and cheered from the sidelines at soccer games. She worked Long and hard at wife Hood and then her husband left her. And she went berserk incapable of building a new life because who she was the Job she had always counted on was to be mrs. Dan. Broderick ,. /. there Are those who say that the changes in the lives of women in the last 25 years mean that the life Betty Brode Rick embraced has gone the Way of the tuna casserole. But that ignores the truth that Statis tics and trends and the ways of the world first Youk father will Force you nto Loveless marriage theryll be illicit affairs Hen denials there will crisis rarely dissuade us from the notion that we can somehow beat the Odds particularly where love is concerned. Some months ago Parade mag Azine in its column for Young people ran a letter one Young Man had written in 1991 about his dream woman i want to marry a woman of the 90s," he wrote the 1890s." he wanted a wife who would stay Home clean the House Wash dishes and clothes and do Many other household at the time a Young woman responded that s the kind of person i be always wanted to be. I Don t really Ever want to -."/. And when i read her letter i wanted to pick up the phone to warn her that men leave that maybe some Day the boy who wanted a woman of the 1890s would opt for a 21st-Century Fox instead they plan to marry in Marchl i thought my acquaintances Monu mentally cynical that warm night in june 1981, even taking into account How Many times they had traded sex for Money with a Man wearing a wedding ring. How Long ago that seems. The Princess once an Emblem of romantic love has now become a representative of How horribly things some times turn out when a woman hitches All her Hopes to one Man s Star an object lesson in the need for self Reliance and a life of one s own c now York Olmos i Rny with president Clinton having now taken the very hard Road to Damascus it is late in the Day but still essential to review a particular item he brought there and to Jerusalem As Well. This would be an american commitment to help keep the peace that is meant to emerge if Israel and Syria Ever agree on the terms by which the Golan Heights go Back to Syria. It sounds Brave and new age american soldiers in their own or perhaps in. Helmets Locking up the last strategic piece of the Arab israeli Jigsaw the momentum that such an offer could be expected to lend the peace process is what took the. I Stephen Rosenfeld Clinton administration to this place Secretary of defense William Perry told some of us last week. To get there however the administration had to clamber Over some High hurdles. One Perry indicated was awareness of a historic israeli in Terest in maintaining the option of preemptive attacking a crisis an option that International forces might Cir no. A second was the schism Between israeli settlers and the government on what kind of a settlement the country eventually wants. \ in Many ways that s one of the biggest problems we would have in trying to enforce any kind of a peace agreement said Perry. It s reflected by the question of which direction you had to be protecting yourself from in the fact the american and israeli debate is there any debate in Syria goes to the tender Core of Post cold War regional stability. In these times of selective american taste for new foreign entanglements you might be surprised to find much interest either at Home or abroad in an american Golan emphasis in official american peace keeping v policy now rests on Lite interventions operations that the United states could slip out of fairly quickly and easily if trouble arose. This would seem to be the pre Cise opposite of the constancy and predictability that effective peacekeeping in the Mideast requires. Nonetheless there is an evident Market for american engagement. ". The presiding labor government of Israel has set aside some part of the nation s traditional favor for direct military self Reliance. It seems ready for the company of american monitors on Golan the better apparently to persuade an Uncertain israeli Public to make the requisite territory for peace Exchange. Syria is easier to figure. An american presence on Golan promises it a measure of additional Protection against israeli military threat and a filter of sorts against what is for it the hard requirement of Broad Contact with Israel. Israelis and syrians Are entitled to their views. So Are americans. Some sensible thoughts come from the hard line Center for Security policy in Washington its report is signed by Richard Perle a former Reagan Pentagon aide and other military and civilian formers. Debate the question now the report urges before an administration commitment hardens beyond the Means of the Public and Congress to affect it. And note the difference from Sinai where peacekeeping has been successfully uneventful for 15 years Golan is Small close strategic and populated and Syria s Leader now unlike Egypt s then has t put his heart into a key finding of a sensitive Issue often muffled the presence of . Troops on the Golan would in crease the likelihood of . Opposition to preemptive military action by Israel no matter How urgent or Well advised. The Standard american tendency to disapprove military action would be reinforced powerfully by solicitude for the . Peacekeepers. Hence the effect of the . Deployment might be the opposite of that intended it could reduce fear of israeli Preemption among potential Arab the conclusion there is no Mission or rationale for a . Peace keeping Force Oil the Golan that would justify the resulting costs and risks. A deployment would increase the danger of direct . Involvement in a future Middle East War and undermine Israel s stand ing with the . Public As a self Raj want you can look at the Institute that delivered this re port partly As a Washington outpost of Israel s liked opposition. Its cautions seem to me no. Less Well taken for that political fact. Whether the rightful ample and growing american support for Mideast peace should take this further military form ought to be considered still an open question. C Washington Post
