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And Cue Sectarian War
Forget the cartoons. It is these images that have Iraq on a fast track to all-out civil war.
|2.22.06 @ 8:05PM|#
Maybe those Dinars won't make me rich after all.
Still, they'll look cool as "Hamarabi wallpaper" in my
bathroom.
|2.22.06 @ 8:30PM|#
I hope somebody can explain that this isn't a bug, it's a
feature, and everything is going according to plan.
Please, somebody give me some reason to feel optimistic. Because
optimism is tough once you see people start to attack each other's
holy sites.
|2.22.06 @ 8:40PM|#
So? Which side is Dubbya going to back? In who's name are we going to see our troops get slaughtered, the Shiite's or the Sunni's?
|2.22.06 @ 8:42PM|#
thoreau,
You know damn well, because you live near there, that those gummint
types that get chauffered thither and yon in the shiny limos, live
in a different dimension.
Time for the common man to take some torches and pitchforks to big,
black shiny limos.
Speaking of holy sites!
|2.22.06 @ 8:49PM|#
Please, somebody give me some reason to feel optimistic.
Because optimism is tough once you see people start to attack each
other's holy sites.
Nope, it's all going to end in blood, fire, and death.
Dubbya will make sure of that.
|2.22.06 @ 9:01PM|#
This isn't the first mosque they've blown to smithereens, and
attacks on pilgrims have been common right from the beginning.
...so, I'm sure, some optimists will say that there's nothing new
to see here, plenty of carnage, but nothing new. Also, people can
point to Al-Sistani calling for peaceful protest as a continued
reason for optimism. ...and my understanding, from admittedly
filtered reports, is that people on streets blame "foreign"
insurgents for this. ...'cause no one who wants a unified and
peaceful Iraq would do something like this, or so the supposed
logic goes.
If the new government can't put down attacks like this, and attacks
on pilgrims too, and/or Sistani goes down the warpath, there ain't
nothin' anybody can tell me that'll make me think that the place
isn't gonna go up in smoke. ...and as someone who's been
pessimistic about Iraq for a long time, I have to ask the optimists
(I know you're out there), shouldn't we expect to see some progress
by now? ...on big, nasty terrorist attacks on Muslims in Iraq, that
is. Is there some new election coming up that's gonna make all this
better? Does keeping our troops there help protect against attacks
like this?
|2.22.06 @ 9:04PM|#
Maybe it's just remodeling? Entrepreneurial Iraqis are replacing the golden dome with the Golden Arches. Get your little neo-con action figure with every Happy Meal.
Varangy|2.22.06 @ 9:21PM|#
What are you hard-core BIG "L" libertarians complaining about?
This is libertine anarchy.
Let them all kill each other, and let Allah sort 'em out.
|2.22.06 @ 9:24PM|#
OK, place yer bets, place yer bets...
Who will appear first: The typical NRO/Free Republic Goons to
defend Bush's Iraq policy, or amazingdrx to claim this thread is a
"Bush Love Fest."
|2.22.06 @ 9:24PM|#
Let them all kill each other, and let Allah sort 'em
out.
Morality aside, the problem with that line of thought is that what
results in Iraq will likely be another terrorist home base similar
to Afghanistan prior to Sep.t 11 2001.
And then it matters to us a whole lot.
|2.22.06 @ 10:04PM|#
Amen, HappyO, amen. I was against the war from the beginning, but once we got into the damn thing I wanted us to do it right. We haven't. To quote Colin Powell, "you break it, you've bought it." Note that "you've bought it" has a double meaning.
|2.22.06 @ 10:18PM|#
don't think this fits in the "winning the war" category. am curious how our military justifies its continued inability to finish this up - seems a good thing iraq never attacked us - it would have taken more than 3 years to beat them - this must give 3rd world countries some ideas...
|2.22.06 @ 10:39PM|#
Seriously, what's the argument against carving the place into three ethnicity-defined countries? There'd be a certain amount of relocation needed (mostly to disentangle the populations where Saddam forcibly settled Sunnis among Shiites) but it wouldn't be impossible. If these people don't want to live peacably side-by-side, what's the point in trying to force it?
|2.22.06 @ 10:43PM|#
"There'd be a certain amount of relocation needed"
Oh, please, let's not even go there. In theory it always seems
simple, but in practice it's probably the cause for about half the
world's problems.
|2.22.06 @ 10:46PM|#
Please, somebody give me some reason to be
optimistic
Well, on the bright side, at least it wasn't the Ali Shrine in
Najaf. I don't think Sistani could hold back the bloodlust if that
was the target.
|2.22.06 @ 10:48PM|#
If only the treasonous liberals hadn't divided us and sapped our will to win this never would have happened. This is not Dear Leader's fault, it's the stab in the back from the evil liberals.
|2.22.06 @ 10:48PM|#
As an example:
Under Saddam the Arabs in the north 'relocated' the Kurds. Now, the
Kurds are currently 'relocating' back. In turn, they are
'relocating' those Arabs who 'relocated' earlier.
|2.22.06 @ 10:49PM|#
It's scary how much Dubya and his dad have in common. Daddy gave
us ADA that cost billions of dollars. Dubya has given us Homeland
Security and the prescription drug plan that will cost
billions.
Daddy invaded Iraq but didn't finish the job so Dubya invades Iraq
and he leaves an even bigger mess.
And there's Jeb in Florida...how the hell does a family like this
get so much power?
|2.22.06 @ 10:51PM|#
Redeploy to Kurdistan, help 'em annex the Northern oil fields
and Kurd populate portions of Syria, Turkey and Iran, blow anything
that even remotely looks nuclear related in Iran (what are they
going to do, ramp up Shiite/Sunni conflict in Iraq?), and Fuck Off
Home.
Hell, may as well give decapitation strikes against Assad and the
Iranian Mullahs a try. Whenever my pot starts boiling over on the
electric stove, I give it a good stir.
Might be a good time to cancel that UAE deal too. it's not jingoist
isolationism I'm talking here, just a Kissinger style 70's
revival.
In the off chance the boys on the ground manage to figure out a way
to get this thing to even kinda blow over, and Congress will be
fully 50% Iraqi war vets in under ten years.
|2.22.06 @ 11:04PM|#
The
Harsh Oil Reality Of A Tri-Partite Iraq: The process in Iraq is
a complicated one indeed, and the more we are there the more
confused the entire situation has become. Civil war now seems
almost inevitable, and although the US forces have done yeoman's
work in creating schools, hospitals, roads, et al in the Shi'ia
controlled south, and have had the able support of the Kurds to do
the same�and more�in the Kurdish controlled north, it is the Sunni
controlled area of central Iraq that dominates the world news each
evening. It is there that the soldiers from the coalition forces
die each day. It is there that the schools are in shambles. It is
there that the hospitals do not function. It is there that the
terrorists flourish. As Nigeria was a makeshift country forged by
the British colonialists of the 19th century from the hundreds of
tribes that had (and still have) very little to do with one
another, and just as Yugoslavia was a quasi-nature of even more
disparate cultures held together by the sheer dint of force of
President Tito, so too is Iraq a nation forged by the British from
three very different cultures now rending at the seams.
Few understand that the Kurds in the north have in their region one
of the largest unexplored oil reserves in the world, and it may
indeed actually be the largest. Suffice it to say that it is
enormous. The problem is that the Iraqi constitutional convention
is putting forth a federally oriented constitution that grants a
good deal of regional autonomy to the various ethnic groups there,
creating an inherent instability. Eventually, the Shi'ia will form
just such a region in the oil rich south; so too the Kurds in the
oil rich (and soon to be oil-richer) north. That leaves the
oil-poor Sunnis in the middle. They know this all too well, and it
is perhaps the central reason why they fight as they do, having
lost control of their once fabulous fortunes in the north and the
south.
The constitution, as it presently stands, mandates that all of the
revenues and profits from all current known oil reserves in the
three regions will be shared by the Iraqi federal government. BUT
(and this is a huge "but" ... a very, very huge "but") all future
oil discoveries will be controlled by the various regions. This was
the only way that the constitution might even be modestly palatable
to the three groups involved. Even so, we wonder how it shall be
that the Kurds will continue to allow their present oil wealth to
be split three ways with the Shi'ia and the Sunni. We wonder how
the Shi'ia will allow their oil wealth to be split in the same
fashion between the Kurds and the Sunni. Just as the Ogoni
tribespeople in the southeastern Nigeria have fought for years to
have control of the oil wealth that lies beneath the soil and
offshore there, instead of having the revenues flow to Abuja and
the federal government, so too will the Kurds and the Shi'ia fight
against the Sunni. Were we in that position that is what we would
do. It is what any faction anywhere in the world would do. To think
otherwise is nonsense and na�ve.
There will be a separate Kurdistan at some point in the future. The
Turks, having fought the notion of a land-locked Kurdistan on its
southeast corner, will now support such a nation, for the Kurds
will have every reason to support the movement of their oil through
Kurdish-Turkish pipelines to the Turkish port at Ceyhan. If Turkey
supports an independent Kurdistan, which for all intents already
exists given the level of autonomy and stability in that region,
then eventually it will be a reality. If Iran supports the creation
of an independent Shi'ia nation in the present Iraqi south as a
"buffer state" to separate it from the Sunni controlled central
region of present day Iraq, then it too shall eventually be
independent and oil wealthy. The Sunnis, as they say, are caught in
the middle. They know that and they are creating chaos, strangely,
in order to hold the old Iraq together. They are fighting a
rear-guard action and they are facing a very bleak future.
|2.22.06 @ 11:29PM|#
If they were going to divide Iraq into three seperate countries
they should have announced it in 2003 within weeks of the fall of
Baghdad.
Now that Bush has worked to establish this unified government and
supported it as the soveriegn government of Iraq ; we and Iraq are
stuck with it. We can not say now that the US has decided to divide
Iraq into three countries and abolish the national government. It
would undermine any credibility the US has abroad and cause many
Iraqis who now favor cooperating with the US against us. It would
appear to prove true the rhetoric about America being a militant
imperialist power that does whatever it wants in other countries at
its own convienece.
The only way Iraq can be partitioned now is if the decision to do
so is made by some kind of Iraqi consensus or by the Iraqi
government. Otherwise there is likely to be a decades long civil
war between multiple factions, most or all of which are hostile to
the United States.
|2.22.06 @ 11:46PM|#
"Seriously, what's the argument against carving the place
into three ethnicity-defined countries?"
We've argued about that before--I suggested it here
over a year ago. Actually, I remember discussing it with other
people here before that. The most persuasive arguments had to do
with borders as opposed to balkanization per se. Rather than having
distinct districts, like the maps on TV show, Iraqi ethnic areas
ripple through Iraq. Should some ugly state emerge in one of the
countries, there could be a significant risk to certain minorities.
In a unified Iraq, or so the theory goes, the external borders are
already determined.
In practice, districts emerged anyway, and Kurdistan, according to
the constitution, will, essentially, leave the rest of Iraq six
months after the formation of the new government. The constitution
also puts in place the process by which other districts will,
effectively, leave the rest of Iraq behind, and overwhelmingly
Shiite areas are likely to use that door. Indeed, Sunnis that
participate in government, from what I've read, seem to be
concerned about being the sole guardians of the federal
state.
...This would all suggest that there's going to be a three state
solution anyway.
I've got one other really good argument against "carving the place
into three ethnicity-defined countries", and, like I said, I think
the three state solution is probably the best option. It has to do
with who's doing the carving. Outsiders coming in and carving up
things is a good portion of what went wrong in the first place.
This "carving" up business seems much like central planning to me
with all the problems that make central planning impossible to do
well. ...except in carving up a country, there are many more
variables--it would seem to make centrally planning an economy easy
by comparison.
I know this going in and reshaping Muslim culture thing is supposed
to be at the heart of Bush Administration genius, but it just
doesn't seem that ingenious to me. I think we'd have done better to
let the locals carve themselves up, form something like states and
let the states combine themselves as they please, sorta like what
we did in the United States. ...So, anyway, my preference would
have been to never have undertaken this Sisyphean task, unless we
were forced to out of self-defense, like in the cases of Japan and
Afghanistan.
...most of us agree that Iraq wasn't a case of self-defense now,
right? I'm sure there are still some hard heads out there, but
that's why those in the Bush Administration, and their supporters,
cling so tightly to the dream of a western style democracy in Iraq,
isn't it? If not for democracy, then why did we go in? If Iraqi
liberalism fails, on what, then, did we spend all of that time and
money, and why did we sacrifice all those limbs and lives? Just
this week, one supporter suggested to me that the only alternative
would have been to do nothing, as if doing anything was
better than doing something foolish, never mind the false
dichotomy.
|2.22.06 @ 11:47PM|#
...how the hell does a family like this get so much
power?
Because there are people in this country who fanatically support
Bush no matter how stupid he behaves.
Case in point: My father is a die-hard Bushie. Before Dubbya came
into power, he thought George H. W. Bush was the "greatest
president in history" and credits him with the fall of Communism
and "victory" during the first Gulf War. Like most conservatives he
went off the deep end in 1992 when that "dishonorable, draft
dodging, drug using" Bill Clinton was elected.
Fast forward to 2000: To my father, Dubbya was a way to reclaim the
country from the "decadence" and "moral decay" of Clintons. Bush
scraps by after Gore tried to "steal" the Florida with "voter
fraud." Then 9-11 happens, and full paranoia mode sets in. Every
action taken by Bush is to defend America from those filthy
moose-lims and their pansy liberal sympathizers. In 2004, my father
was afraid that John Kerry was surly going to sell us down the
river to Osma if elected, while George W. Bush is a REAL MAN who
eats pig iron and spits nails and would bomb those "camel jockeys"
back to the stone age.
To him, every wiretap is justified because he heard on Sean Hannity
how U.S. Rangers in Iraq found the cell phone of a top Al Qaeda
operative and found he was making calls to the U.S. (Of course it's
true, we're talking SEAN HANNITY here.) Torture is a-OK because
"those towel heads didn't show our people mercy on 9-11." Abu
Gharib was perfectly Kosher as a means to get the prisoners to
talk. To him, every act of violence in the Mid East is evidence
that ALL Muslims are barbarians.
Since dear-old-dad is an uber-Catholic, he's also pleased as punch
that Bush put anti-abortion zealots on the Supreme Court and won't
let those "faggots and dykes" debase the sacred institution of
marriage. (Despite the fact that he let his own marriage go to
shit.) Those negative approval numbers? Those were made up by the
same "liberal media" that lies about our impending victory in
Iraq.
...and this is a man who graduated from college.
|2.23.06 @ 12:20AM|#
Holidays with the folks can get pretty exciting in my old neighborhood too, Akira. ; )
|2.23.06 @ 1:02AM|#
Well, I think it�s about time for some get back. These folks have been on the receiving end for quite a while.
|2.23.06 @ 1:07AM|#
Holidays with the folks can get pretty exciting in my old
neighborhood too, Akira. ;
The thing is, I don't think that there is one member of my family
(on either side) who isn't a Republican. I would actually say my
mother's side is worse since most of them are also
Evangelicals.
Naturally, I keep my politics and my religion (or lack thereof)
quiet.
|2.23.06 @ 1:32AM|#
I don't keep much to myself. In fact, I think they use the same
tactic that you seem to use--they just started keep their politics
and religion to themselves.
...and life's great on the other side. Just go after 'em next
time--let them be the ones that keep it all to themselves.
|2.23.06 @ 1:38AM|#
Please, somebody give me some reason to feel optimistic.
Because optimism is tough once you see people start to attack each
other's holy sites.
So a month from now when no civil war brakes out...can we then say
that iraq is stable?
Or does Joe get to keep saying the shit has hit the fan like he has
every day over the past year?
b-psycho|2.23.06 @ 1:40AM|#
Careful you never ask Daddy to explain why he feels that way, Akira. Don't wanna give him a stroke...
|2.23.06 @ 1:54AM|#
Careful you never ask Daddy to explain why he feels that
way...
Why is pretty simple: He was raised with 1950s morals and values
from WWII vet parents. He was an alter boy (BTW, e doesn't belive
half the stories about sexual abuse in the clergy because he was
never molested, the other half are because those "communist
Jesuits" started letting "fags" into the seminaries) and went to a
Catholic elementary and high school. As a boy, he was taught to
duck and cover, and that the Ruskies were a coming to spread
Godless Communism around the world unless Joe McCarthy could stop
them. In college, he joined ROTC as a means to avoid the draft but
retained the whole "duty, honor, country" line that the Army
Reserve drilled into him.
In short, he was never raised to ask "Why?" He believes that there
is only one way to look at life, politics, philosophy, and anyone
who thinks differently isn't just wrong, but a threat to all that
is civilized and moral.
He's a very scary man, and I'm surprised he hasn't killed anoyone
yet.
|2.23.06 @ 3:09AM|#
Akira,
Your father sounds like the flipside of many, if not most, liberals
I know.
He believes that there is only one way to look at life,
politics, philosophy, and anyone who thinks differently isn't just
wrong, but a threat to all that is civilized and moral.
The above statement describes them exactly. They're some scary
fuckers.
|2.23.06 @ 3:48AM|#
Morality aside, the problem with that line of thought is
that what results in Iraq will likely be another terrorist home
base similar to Afghanistan prior to Sep.t 11 2001.
And then it matters to us a whole lot.
Very true. But most people seem more caught up in either Bush
Bashing or BushBotting to think that far.
Wasn't there an article just the other day about the Myth of the
Independents in America? Yeah, I think there was.
The above statement describes them exactly. They're some scary
fuckers.
I know. I've seen a few of them around here.
Please, somebody give me some reason to feel optimistic.
I can remember wishing for huge snow storms when I was a kid, so
they'd close school the next day. More often than it not it seemed
that the storms ran out of steam too soon.
If I was going to place a bet, I'd bet this is what's going to
happen now.
An extensive and extended civil war in Iraq seems unlikely. Nobody
in Iraq (except whoever we choose to back) has any serious outside
backing.
If you read history of Vietnam closely you find a curious little
fact -- that we did, actually after all, do a pretty damned good
job of wiping out the communists on the battle field. We lost the
political and idealogical war and that was our demise. But without
extensive input from Soviets and China, the communists would have
been wiped out militarily way before the Tet Offensive.
Of course that probably won't go over well with some people because
it conflicts with PC history, but it's true. Militarily we knocked
the crap out of them. And before anybody knee-jerks, there is a
relevant parallel here.
We can do the same thing in Iraq if we have to, and with our
technology today it won't take all that long. Unfortunately yes,
we're going to break some eggs doing it. More Americans, and lots
more Iraqis, will die before it's done.
fwiw thoreau, this is what I see as the most probable outcome even
if they start shooting at each other. But I'm not convinced yet
this is really going to go ape shit.
It does, however, give the MSM an "OH, MY GOOODDDD!!!!" headline to
run, so that everybody (who says they don't really trust the MSM
anyway) can say, with conviction and angst, "OH, MY
GOOODDDDD!!!!"
|2.23.06 @ 3:51AM|#
Even so, we wonder how it shall be that the Kurds will
continue to allow their present oil wealth to be split three
ways
Oh, my God, is that William Buckley, posting here on H&R?
|2.23.06 @ 4:46AM|#
thoreau,
Obviously you aren't paying attention. Sectarian violence and the
attacking of mosques has been going on for over a year now.
BG,
...we and Iraq are stuck with it.
Not really. It could easily break-up while we are there or while we
leave.
kahn,
Militarily we knocked the crap out of them.
Sort of. We never delivered any sort of blow which would have
knocked N. Viet Nam out of the war, nor did we ever successfully
knock out the Ho Chi Minh "trail" despite all of our bombing, SF,
etc. efforts. Of course the N. Vietnamese (and their S. Vietnamese
allies) never had to win a decisive victory and indeed absorbing
massive losses was what was expected by them. And we made very
stupid strategic errors like taking the war to Cambodia, and thus
diluting the frontline strength of the S. Vietnamese
military.
BTW, stop treating the tactical military success in the war as if
it were a "big secret." It isn't. Every so often some bozo like
yourself comes to this board acting like it is, when indeed it
isn't.
Nobody in Iraq (except whoever we choose to back) has any
serious outside backing.
There are enough arms in Iraq today that no one needs serious
outside backing; furthermore its well known that foreign fighters
cross the border all the time, and they aren't coming unarmed. Plus
there is whole business of corruption within the Iraqi government.
On the last note, we can also draw a parallel with American
involvement in SE Asia, since its the case that most of the
military hardward that the Khmer Rouge used to bring down the
Cambodian government came from the U.S. via corrupt Cambodian
officials.
R C Dean|2.23.06 @ 7:11AM|#
We never delivered any sort of blow which would have knocked
N. Viet Nam out of the war, nor did we ever successfully knock out
the Ho Chi Minh "trail" despite all of our bombing, SF, etc.
efforts.
That's what happens when you fight a war of "containment" rather
than fight a war to win - you respect borders that shouldn't oughta
be respected. If we had fought Viet Nam to win, we could have, and
would have, crossed the border into North Viet Nam to knock it out
of the war, and crossed the border to shut down the Ho Chi Minh
trail.
We are now fighting a war of containment in Iraq as well. By any
historical and legal standard, we would be perfectly justified to
cross the border into Iran and Syria to shut down the support lines
for our enemies in Iraq. For what may be good and sufficient
reasons, we are not doing so.
Wars of containment are long and bloody wars of attrition. The
alternatives are quite unattractive in different ways.
On the one hand, we can pull out, and let Iraq have its civil war
and Iran install its proxies. That'll do a lot to calm down the
Middle East and dry up the supply of terrorists. God only knows how
destabilizing that would be across the entire region.
On the other hand, we can finish this the old-fashioned way, by
telling Syria and Iran to secure their borders, or else. And then
following through on the or else.
Given those alternatives, a war of containment may be the least bad
option, if we can sustain the will to wear down and outlast our
enemies. Which we failed to do in Viet Nam, even though it was well
within our capability to do so.
|2.23.06 @ 7:29AM|#
R.C. Dean,
That's what happens when you fight a war of "containment"
rather than fight a war to win - you respect borders that shouldn't
oughta be respected.
We never respected the Cambodian or Laotian borders. Indeed, we
secretly bombed, sent in SF units, etc. for several years into
these countries. Just how bloody ignorant are you?
As to the issue of taking the war to N. Viet Nam, well, both the
Johnson and Nixon administrations discussed that issue and decided
it wasn't worth the price of a Soviet and/or Chinese
counter-attack.
|2.23.06 @ 7:42AM|#
I think when these sorts of things start happening, it's
probably time to pull out. I just don't see how you can change a
people's mindset and stop a culture of religious intolorance.
For what it's worth, and I know it's unfashionable these days, but
I do admire the fundamental pulse of American ideology and the
concept of spreading freedom. Unfortuantely, it is, and has proven
to be, naive.
The middle east needs to be left alone.
|2.23.06 @ 7:48AM|#
Please, somebody give me some reason to feel optimistic.
Because optimism is tough once you see people start to attack each
other's holy sites.
Okay, Thoreau, my two cents. When I was in Al Anbar province around
the time of the "Big One in Fallujah" in 2004 (I enjoy inflating my
military excursions in Archie Bunker style), a lot of people had a
sense of dread about the first election in Jan 2005. There were
officers and senior enlisted who were calling home to get family
and spouses to feign family tragedy in "Red Cross" calls to get
them out of country because of the fear of the "election
bloodshed".
Everything I read and saw in the media (even military press) was
saying it was going to be a massive bloodbath on election day. The
Council of Foreign Relations and Foreign Affairs magazine
(which I used to read regularly) was screaming "RUN RUN RUN!!!!" as
the rest of the MSM pretty much had the same assessment.
John Kerry even brought his wretched ass to Camp Fallujah to say
what a bloodbath it was going to be. Having just got his behind
electorally handed to him by GW (who I am no fan of), he came half
way around the world to stir the fires of failure.
Came election day, it was, statistically speaking, one of the
absolute safest days that we experienced in our tour of duty.
Although there was some increase in enemy activity in road atacks
(IEDs, etc.) it generally was no more dangerous than many other
days in Iraq.
After that, I've never read Foreign Affairs ever
again.
Remember, the Muslims are a people who responded to political
cartoons in greater numbers than they did to the release of Abu
Ghraib pictures.
I don't think one (more) bombing is going to instantly change that.
But we are on a progressing march to outright chaos there, it's
just not going to happen in a single day or event (unless one of my
fellow cartoonists draws Mohammad tossing Jesus' salad ... )
One thing I've learn is that it's hard to "Monday Morning
Quarterback" the madding crowd ...
|2.23.06 @ 8:30AM|#
It's amazing how many "libertarians" believe that you can make
friends with people by pointing guns, tanks, and missiles at
them.
I mean, the fact that might makes right, and the infallibility of
social engineering are the two polestars of libertarian thought,
right? Right?
So yeah, as long as we're willing to kill em all, we'll win. And if
we just did it right, there would be no problem with our government
engaging in social engineering in Iraq, because it's so good at it
here, right? Right?
And you know, the Constitution specifically grants the federal
government the power to engage in "wars of containment" where there
is no threat to our territory. It's right there in Article 0, along
with the powers granted to the unitary executive to override any
all provisions in the Constitution when he feels like it's
necessary.
And, as we all know, "self-determination" is all about being given
a vote in a process controlled by someone else. I mean, that's why
we rebelled, right? Even though the Brits were willing to give us a
few worthless seats in Parliament? And that's exactly why the U.S.
is currently libertopia, right? Right?
The only way this fiasco was going to end successfully (defined by
having the least number of people willing to kill us in the end)
was to start out with the three state solution, help each state
establish and defend its borders, and then get the F out. Of
course, that would have delivered quite a prize to the theocrats in
Iran, and would still have made pretty serious enemies of the
Sunnis (who would have gotten a big shaft in such a result), but
that's exactly why we shouldn't have gone in in the first place. W
was too busy snorting and drinking to learn a little wisdom at his
daddy's knee...
|2.23.06 @ 8:46AM|#
Oh, yeah, and for the tried and true "you borke it you bought
it" BS (only slightly less annoying than the "Constitution is not a
death pact" talking point) -
"I" bought nothing. I was never given any choice in the matter. In
fact, I was entirely against the whole charade the whole time. Why
do "I" now own it? Why must I, and my children, pay taxes to
support the CF the hawks "bought"? Why shouldn't they be the ones
to exclusively pay for the mess they made?
In my less liberal moments, I favor an amendment to the
Constitution - the war powers are reserved to the people. The pres
can send troops for 60 days, but absent a national referendum
declaring war, they must be returned on day 61. All votes in the
national referendum shall be public, and any vote for war acts as
instant conscription. And the military will be like Heinlein's
Space Marines - everyone fights. No deferments. No cushy state-side
jobs - we can find civvies to fill those. You want war, you get it,
in all its beauty. No more "intellectual warrior caste" sending
others off to die while enriching their crony friends and doing
everything they can to actually avoid paying any of the cost.
Xmas|2.23.06 @ 9:21AM|#
quasibill,
Actually, what's amazing is that we've gotten such a warm welcome
in the Northern and Southern parts of Iraq.
"You know, that guy we equipped with the weapons and money to buy
poison gasses that he used against you for 10 or 20 years, who we
said we were going to get rid of 10 years ago after he invaded a
neighboring country, you know that guy with the funny mustache.
Yeah, NOW we are here to get rid of him."
I know we've had our Shiite problems in the region. But for 30
years of pent up anger and frustration, there reaction has been
remarkably calm.
|2.23.06 @ 9:36AM|#
Quasibill,
I feel your pain (Bill Clinton voice), but since we are a
representative republic, and we elect (or don't elect by not
voting) people to represent us and legislate on our behalf, we have
"broke it/bought it" in the sense that our elected dunderheads did
all of this in our collective name as a country. And anything that
involves "staying the course", "getting out of dodge", or otherwise
ultimately comes out of even the pockets of libertarians.
Believe me, I met with plenty of Iraqis, Kuwaitis and other Arabs
on my tour of duty who don't hate each and every single American,
and understand that this was not (as one of my legal dictionaries
puts it) a "perfect war" where everyone in America raised there
hands and said "GET 'EM!!"
As one of the (former)troops that was, as you put it, "sent off by
the intellectual warrior caste" on a fool's errand, I often
question my own libertarian philosophy. For example, the belief
that an "All Volunteer Army" would keep America out of
interventionist adventures.
Also, just about everyone in Iraq owned a rifle or weapon of some
sort, yet Saddam ruled with an iron fist, which kind of throws a
wrench into the argument that "if we're all armed like the 2nd
Admendment says, it'll keep the police state at bay."
I've come to view libertarianism, as all ideologies, like the
shadows on the cave wall in Plato's allegory. Something we strive
for, but can never perfectly attain.
|2.23.06 @ 9:41AM|#
Wasn't Heinlein's MI filled with volunteers?
IIRC, society was divided into 2 segments: Taxpayers and Citizens.
Only citizens where allowed to vote after they had served in the
military. The logic being that a person should only be allowed to
vote only after demonstrating the ability to put the needs of the
group ahead of their individual needs.
|2.23.06 @ 10:44AM|#
Hakluyt,
You know, I posted last night and then the first thought that came
to mind was you. :) I wondered if that would flush you out.
We never delivered any sort of blow which would have knocked N.
Viet Nam out of the war, nor did we ever successfully knock out the
Ho Chi Minh "trail" despite all of our bombing, SF, etc.
efforts.
Well.....sort of. Though it came to the point that the SAMs in the
north were operated by Chinese and Soviet "advisors", because the
north had run out of people.
The key point to note about the Ho Chi Minh Trail is that without
Chinese and Soviet supplies, the communists would have had nothing
to ship along that trail except barefoot, starving, unarmed
troops.
Outside supplies kept the communists armed well enough to keep
fighting.
stop treating the tactical military success in the war as if it
were a "big secret." It isn't. Every so often some bozo like
yourself comes to this board acting like it is, when indeed it
isn't.
I'm not the bozo here, you are. There are a number of books and
magazines and TV "documentaries" that have touted the "military
defeat" of the US in Vietnam, without emphasizing the fact that our
defeat was fundamentally political and idealogical. There is a
difference, it does matter, and I'm pointing it out (because I
think we just might make the same mistake again, eh?).
You should understand this better than most. Bozo.
There are enough arms in Iraq today that no one needs serious
outside backing; furthermore its well known that foreign fighters
cross the border all the time, and they aren't coming
unarmed.
I beg to differ. This is fundamentally not the same as a major
outside power shipping in (and operating) entire SAM batteries and
radar systems, tanks, artillery, etc.
Besides, the Sunnis are 20% of the population. If it gets heavy,
they aren't going to have the manpower to stay in the game that
long. I doubt there's enough foreign fighters coming in to make
that much difference.
Plus there is whole business of corruption within the Iraqi
government.
See my point above, Re: Nam was an idealogical/political defeat,
not military. That hits the nail right on the head.
If thoreau is in despair, I'd say this is the greater reason for
despair.
both the Johnson and Nixon administrations discussed that issue
and decided it wasn't worth the price of a Soviet and/or Chinese
counter-attack.
Yeah, but if we'd been smart enough to move during the Cultural
Revolution, when the Chinese were in no position to do anything, it
would have been over before the Russians could have
responded.
But that's another story and it's going way off topic now.
RC Dean,
That's what happens when you fight a war of "containment"
rather than fight a war to win - you respect borders that shouldn't
oughta be respected.
I agree.
Fight to win, and do what it takes to win asap, or else don't
fight. Half measures leave us in the position where everybody sits
around and starts doing the Monday morning quarter back
thing.
Plus it dilutes our impression abroad. People should think "If the
US fights they're gonna kick our asses right up over our heads and
that'll be that, because this is the only way they fight".
That psychological effect is worth preserving.
Ed|2.23.06 @ 10:55AM|#
That shrine appears to have been made of mud. They're gonna need stronger stuff.
|2.23.06 @ 11:17AM|#
That shrine appears to have been made of mud. They're gonna
need stronger stuff.
Actually, that's one of (many) the problems with "reconstruction"
over there. In addition to graft, incompetence, accounting
misamanagement, there is the disconnect between our standards of
construction and theirs (in smaller municipalities, not "urban"
ones like Baghdad).
You'll remember the HALF a million Iranians who died a few years
ago from an earthquake in an ancient city of mud homes that, had it
been in California with modern (i.e., American) standards, might
have killed only a couple of hundred at the most.
|2.23.06 @ 11:49AM|#
Read this:
http://www.tehrantimes.com/Description.asp?Da=2/23/2006&Cat=2&Num=012
Xmas|2.23.06 @ 1:42PM|#
Lurker Kurt,
The Starship Troopers in Heinlein's book were volunteers.
Mostly.
The basic government presented in S.T. was a benevolent fascism.
You only earned the right to vote through volunteering for public
service. Where you ended up in the public service heirarchy
depended on how qualified you were for the positions you
selected.
The main character in the book had numbered off a large number of
choices and picked Mobile Infantry as his very last choice. He was,
apparently, unqualified for every other single option for public
service.
Also note that in the book, almost all public sector, bureaucratic
jobs went to wounded soldiers. This is why the teacher in the
Civics (Military Indoctrination) class was a former soldier with a
missing hand.
|2.23.06 @ 4:19PM|#
Besides, the Sunnis are 20% of the population. If it gets
heavy, they aren't going to have the manpower to stay in the game
that long. I doubt there's enough foreign fighters coming in to
make that much difference.
Don't underestimate the Sunni. The Sunni have the benefit of
trained soldiers and the same ties with foreign terror groups which
the Shi'a possess. And we can take advantage of these divisions
only so long as both sides consider the other to be a greater
enemy. If we go in gung ho and start "fighting to win," those
involved might decide that they hate the Americans more than they
hate each other, and make alliances accordingly. They already have
strong ties to each other at the local level; stirring the pot to
remind them of this fact is the last thing we want to do.
As for their will to fight, these are people who are still upset
enough to kill over the Reconquista in 15th century Spain. The last
thing we should do is make assumptions that they'll give up easily,
especially with their use of terror tactics, which require very few
people to carry out.
|2.23.06 @ 10:28PM|#
Mini-rant:
The right to vote in Starship Troopers was not linked to
military service, but to all public service. The main characters in
the novel were in the military, but it was more akin to Germany's
public service, which includes military service, than pure military
service. Why do so many people seem to miss that part of the
government of the book?
|2.24.06 @ 12:50AM|#
Why do so many people seem to miss that part of the
government of the book?
Mo:
Because that was one paragraph in the book, and the non-military
options were taking experimental drugs and the like?
|2.24.06 @ 1:39AM|#
Don't underestimate the Sunni.
I'm not underestimating the Sunnis. I think you're underestimating
the capacity of the US war machine. Turn it on, and the Sunnis and
Shias together are toast.
If we go in gung ho and start "fighting to win," those involved
might decide that they hate the Americans more than they hate each
other
They might. An asteriod might hit the earth too.
By the time a genuine all out civil war has flared up, I wouldn't
bet much on the idea that the Sunnis and Shias were going to kiss
and make up.
As for their will to fight, these are people who are still
upset enough to kill over the Reconquista in 15th century Spain.
The last thing we should do is make assumptions that they'll give
up easily
I'm not assuming they'll give up easily. I'm betting they won't,
any more than the Vietnamese did (the Vietnamese were about as
determined as an enemy can come).
What I'm saying, again, is that you underestimate the power of the
US war machine. It pounded the Vietnamese into the ground in spite
of their will. Absent Chinese and Soviet aid, the Vietnamese would
simply have been beaten, in spite of their will to win.
AQ and other terrorist orginizations do not quite have the
resources to pour into Iraq that China and the USSR did. That's why
the Iraqis, even united against the US, could never hold out for
long. They've got small arms......but don't over estimate their
efficacy against our armor and air power.
If the whole ME started supporting a united Iraq against the US,
I'd start worrying. But do you really think that's going to happen?
Not likely.
We could do the same thing in Iraq that we did in Vietnam if we had
to, is what I'm saying. And that is precisely why I don't believe
the situation in Iraq is going to turn into any major war. They
know we could do it, and they'd be stupid to try.
Besides, look at how much of this amounts to murdering civilians.
From
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060224/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq
Eight Iraqi soldiers and eight civilians were killed Thursday
when a bomb hidden in a soup vendor's cart detonated in Baqouba,
police said. At least 20 people were wounded in the
blast.
At some point the sensibilities of the Iraqis are going to surface,
and they're just going to want to be rid of people who act like
this. If it happens to be Sunnis who act like this, then I predict
in the end it will be too bad for the Sunnis. And the Sunnis look
really suspicious because everything is happening in their
areas.
It was similar attrocities that turned large masses of the South
Vietnamese against the communists. Don't count on the Sunnis and
Shias ganging up on us. It won't happen.
It's far more likely that we're going to make other really stupid
mistakes to blow the whole deal. I for one don't believe Iraq is a
lost cause even yet. But I have little faith in the wisdom of US
leadership to do the things that should be done.
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