"We would like Mongolia to be on the speed dial of the United Nations."

That was the message given by a US official after an American envoy, including Donald Rumsfeld, made a brief stopover in Ulaanbaatar. Rumsfeld personally thanked Mongolia for its "political courage and personal courage" with regards to the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Reuters (once again).

It's nice to see Mongolia getting some respect finally. Ulaanbaatar has a great museum featuring some nice wall displays about the Mongolian peacekeeping efforts. The Mongolian government has said that it wants to create a world-class peacekeeping force, and it appears to be doing a good job of it.

Reading this article made me think of a guy a met while walking the streets of UB. He proudly proclaimed that he had just come back after a stint in Iraq. What are the chances of that happening? I mean, meeting someone that had just come back from one of the most publicized war zones in the world on a -30 degree day in Mongolia is not something that happens everyday. I wonder where he is right now.