Two fundamental facts have created an apparently insoluble dilemma for the global economy, and have turned countries like Argentina and Greece into victims of an impossible logic. First, debt continually grows second, there is no really satisfactory way of getting rid of it.

The political passions aroused by the clashes of interpretation often make the crisis seemingly insoluble. It was those conflicts, rather than some technical flaw in the operation of the economy, which made the Great Depression of the 1930 s such a dismal and destructive event.

Diplomats make careers of finding procedural solutions to insoluble dilemmas surely, they hope, there is a conference table with a shape that matches a given strategic configuration. So far, the US has handled the various forms of political transition in the Arab Spring without severely damaging missteps.

But the price that was supposedly paid by the Palestinians touched another neuralgic lobe in the European mind. Because Europe remains entangled in this seemingly insoluble conundrum, Israelis see it as trying to compensate for its lack of political effectiveness in Middle East diplomacy with unbearably self righteous and moralistic talk.

In fact, the obligation of states to abide by humanitarian rules of conduct while their enemies are free to barbarize warfare is what makes asymmetric wars especially insoluble. Moreover, in an era of global media and international war crimes courts, the criteria for states use of military force have become more complex than ever.

An Arab Israeli peace requires a comprehensive approach, because the problems at stake are intertwined. Not only are key issues such as Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees insoluble without an all Arab consensus, but any country that is left out of the peace process is bound to persist in its role as a revolutionary power bent on regional destabilization.

Three obstacles stand in the way of success the drug war that sets the local population against the occupying powers the existence of a safe haven in the tribal areas of Pakistan and the Karzai government s loss of legitimacy and popularity. The situation is not insoluble, but it will require extraordinary skill and perseverance to bring it under control..