Hit & Run Presents: Informed Commentary on Iraq

What the hell?

Comments

[Eric II]

The British experience in Basra has been a slow-motion train wreck, unrivaled in scope as far as Shia regions go. They're now starting to reap the whirlwhind brought about by their post-colonial guilt-induced passivity.

In other news, another journalist was recently killed in that deeply unfortunate city, this time an Iraqi working for the NYT.

[Eddy]

Yeah, seems about right.

[Yogi]

So, why did they have to use force to free these guy from prison? Aren't we (the 'mighty' coalition) on the side of the law enforcement there? Or were they being held by someone besides the local police?

[Eric II]

The local police (really, the local government in general) has been thoroughly infiltrated and compromised by Shia militias, some of which are nothing more than Iranian pawns. Stephen Vincent had some insightful columns on this subject before he was killed for writing them.

[joe]

Hey, look at that, coalition forces actually liberated something in Iraq.

[spur]

perhaps, just maybe we are occupiers and we have lost Iraq.

[Yogi]

Hey, look at that, coalition forces actually liberated something in Iraq.

I don't care who you are, that's funny.

[Mark B.]

Love this quote from the BBC story on the incident -

Colonel Tim Collins, the former commander of British troops in Iraq, described the Basra unrest as like a "busy night in Belfast".

It's all a matter of perspective, I guess. BTW, aren't the British always giving us lectures on how brutish we are in central Iraq, and how we need to work more with "the natives" like they do in Basra? Apparently, that means letting Shia militiamen take over the police and bureaucracy while you hand out candy to the kiddies and look the other way.

[Baylen Linnekin]

From the Reason obit for Steven Vincent:

He was, in short, the sort of pro you want to work with more often, no matter how often you do. And just a few days before the day he would be killed, he had published a disturbing piece in Sunday's Times about the rotten situation in Basra, a city policed by British troops but effectively run by militia loyal to Muqtada al-Sadr and other Shia extremists. Yes, he wrote, the Brits are dutifully teaching locals how to become policemen and enforcers of order. All the better to speed up the eventual exit of foreign troops and a true transfer of power to Iraqis themselves. The trouble -- and it was big trouble -- was that up to 75 percent of the recruits were loyal to religious parties that had little interest in establishing anything like democracy and the rule of law.

PS: Joe -- that's fucking hysterical.

[jf]

The BBC currently has a slightly different version of the story. It still doesn't look great, but:

a) This was a British-Iraqi affair, with a little more substance to it than joe's pithy comment would lead to believe.

b) If it does indeed turn out to be the clusterfuck Reuters originally described, at least it ain't our clusterfuck.

[Ken Layne]

No, it's not our clusterfuck at all ... We only invaded and occupied the place, right?

Jesus christ, they've finally caught these "Coalition of the Willing" bastards performing the "terrorism" blamed on "insurgents" or whatever, and this is all anybody can come up with?

Well, whatever. Torturing and murdering Iraqis at Abu Ghraib and countless other prisons around Iraq -- and any other country where the spooks can torture people without U.S. law getting in the way -- didn't seem to cause much outrage. Murdering Iraqis in mosques while videotape rolls ... that didn't seem to upset too many people. Why not just let it be known that U.K. "undercover" soldiers are also killing Iraqi cops (while dressed as "insurgents") and setting bombs in Basra?

There have been regular (if unsubstantiated) reports that U.S. and U.K. troops were behind most of the suicide bombings. Now it's on the front page.

Won't make a bit of difference, will it? Sure, that new poll says 67% of Americans are now against the White House "Iraq policy," but that doesn't count for a whole lot when the gang in charge proudly states that they don't read polls or pay attention to ... well, anything at all.

[Doc]

Or this one where the Iraqi's weren't willing to pay the Merc's padded bills for 'airport protection' anymore so the Merc's closed the airport? The Iraqi's try to take it back and then have the 'Coalition' forces force it back to the Merc's at Global Strategies Group?

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/09/09/iraq.main/

Mission Accomplished!

[Hakluyt]

So much for Iraqi sovereignty.

[JAT]

Alright, admit it, joe got off a good one there.

My wild ass guess -- SAS assassination team going after Basra "police" terror squads. No way the UK allows those guys to sit in a jail even for a day.

Dirka dirka

[Dave W.]

My wild ass guess

The SAS agents broke under pressure, went crazy and started shooting everybody. It will be interesting when the court martial tells us whose guesses is correct and whose guesses are not.

Unless they decide not to tell us. Paging Cathy Young: thanks for the British FOIA that lead us to the videotaped confession from the July 7 bomber. Good work, journalist. Now, please, another British FOIA so we can see whatever happens to the SAS guys. You know how we hate to remain in the land of wind and wild ass guesses.

[Mr. Nice Guy]

What the fuck indeed.

There's no hope for the middle east. None. It makes me depressed just thinking about it. I can't imagine what it's like to actually live in that shithole.

[Johnny Clarke]

I know this sounds naive, but does anyone have suggestions on where to go to get a semi-realistic view of how this "Iraq thing" is going? Half the sites say it's a disaster and the other half say it's all working out quite well. Granted, no one seems to know what the actual "plan" (if any) really is, but the polarization in views is amazing.

[Jason Ligon]

"I can't imagine what it's like to actually live in that shithole."

It's probably a hair nicer still than most of sub saharan Africa. That doesn't make me feel better somehow.

[Vanya]

Johnny,

The answer is things are going well in half of Iraq, and are a disaster in the other half.

I'm not being completely facetious - in the Kurdish areas of Iraq I think there's no question that life has improved. In the Sunni areas I think there's no question that life is much worse. In the Shi'ite South life is much better if you're a devout Shia, life sucks if you're a woman or not so devout. The situation is fluid enough that everyone gets to cherry pick the evidence they prefer.

[TallDave]

Weird.

So much for the myth the British are doing a better job than we are.

[M1EK]

Oh, come on. Am I the only one who thinks smashing down a jail with a tank is pretty damn cool? Who would have thought the Brits even HAD tanks.

[TallDave]

Johny,

It's a mix of both. Things are a lot worse than in America or Europe, but a lot better than they were under Saddam. There are brutal suicide bombings every day, yet there is also democracy, a free press, women's rights' groups. There is sharia law in some places in the south, but 25% of the parliament is female.

I think people see what they want to see in Iraq. It's sort of ironic that there's beem a sea change in America, under which the left is now anti-progressive and the right is anti-conservative. Progressives on the right see the dawn of freedom and democracy and a better tomorrow through consensual gov't, because every human yearns to be free. Conservative defeatists on the left see death and destruction for no reason, with civil war right around the corner, because the Mideast is incapable of change, and even if it were Bush is surely too incompetent to bring it about.

[joe]

It isn't possible to believe the Bush administration is incompetant, without also believing that the Middle East in incapable of change, apparently.

[TallDave]

Either, or both.

[joe]

OK, what is particularl "conservative" or "anti-progressive" about that perception of the Bush administration's competance and ability?

[a]

There's no hope for the middle east. None. It makes me depressed just thinking about it. I can't imagine what it's like to actually live in that shithole.

So the Brits fuck up royally and it is the middle east that is ashithole!

[Chris P]

M1EK, Actually the brits have some of the best tanks anywhere right now. They're definitely first tier when it comes to armored forces.

[TallDave]

Joe,

Most people's atittudes on the war are shaped by their belief of how it will ultimately turn out. What could be more progressive than bringing freedom and democracy to 25 million people? The conservative viewpoint would be that Iraq can't be changed (for whatever reason, be it gov't incompetence or natural intransigence), and trying to was a waste of time, money, and lives.

[Jason Ligon]

It is a shithole because some significant portion of the locals can't figure out that some sacrifices of some of their wants in the name of rule of law is the only way out of their misery. Instead, blowing shit up is the answer to everything. Oh, and kidnapping and decapitations. That works too.

[thoreau]

Now I know how the season finale of "Prison Break" on Fox will unfold.

Which spares me the trouble of having to actually watch it!

[Eric II]

All of these attempts to move around ideological goalposts on foreign policy by annointing conservatives as the new liberals and vice versa ignore a key, obvious point: One of the defining elements of the conservative foreign policy mindset has long been a greater comfort with using military force to deal with problems belived to involve national security, while one of the defining elements of the liberal foreign policy mindset has been a hesistance to unleash the dogs of war unless it's deemed to be absolutely necessary.

On that front, save for a handful of individuals, Iraq has changed virtually nothing.

[joe]

"What could be more progressive than bringing freedom and democracy to 25 million people?" What could be less progressive than killing 100,000 people, accomplishing nothing, and convincing the whole world that efforts to bring about liberalization are useless?

"The conservative viewpoint would be that Iraq can't be changed" Correct. The liberal position is that Iraq can be changed, but that it has to be done right.

It is those of you who insist that Bush's war was the only way, and that support for his war is indistinguishable from support for the spread of democracy, who are dooming the future of liberalization. When this endevour collapses into dictatorship, civil war, a failed state, or all three, I (and the rest of the left) will still have a vision for bringing about democracy and human rights in the Middle East. Will you?

[a]

Instead, blowing shit up is the answer to everything.

Funny you say that. Some governments think that sending the army and blowing shit up is the answer to everything.

[Matt]

Folks, is anyone else here, besides Ken Layne, picking up on the fact that British soldiers were arrested for dressing up as Arabs and bombing Iraqis? Are you all so inured to this clusterfuck that you have simply tapped the well of outrage dry? Because, and perhaps there is some explanation for this, but it seems to me, this is by far the worst news to come out of Iraq since this whole thing started. At least the prisoners of Abu Ghraib were guilty of something. Not that I defend monstrous treatment of prisoners, but its not as bad as bombing the civilians we are supposed to be liberating, dressed as the people were supposed to be eliminating!

[thoreau]

Matt-

Whatever those undercover soldiers may have done, just remember that Jack Bauer has done much worse...

[paul]

joe, what's your plan/vision?

[TallDave]

Matt,

I think the assumption is they were trying to infiltrate the bombers' groups.

[TallDave]

Joe,

Uh huh. And pigs will fly.

[Don Mynack]

Ken Layne,
Way to pull that stuff out of your ass. No wonder nobody reads your crappy site.

BTW - your band sucks too.

[TallDave]

Eric,

a hesistance to unleash the dogs of war unless it's deemed to be absolutely necessary

Uh huh. Somalia and Kosovo involved the United States' absolutely necessary national interests, how again? Desert Fox was absolutely necessary because...?

The ideological goalposts have always been moving. Remember JFK's inaugural speech? "Pay any price, bear any burden" for freedom?

[gaius marius]

It is a shithole because some significant portion of the locals can't figure out that some sacrifices of some of their wants in the name of rule of law is the only way out of their misery. Instead, blowing shit up is the answer to everything.

which may be true, mr ligon -- but by this definition, the united states is simply a shithole-in-waiting. i see almost no evidence that the coddled whiners that make up the american masses are any different in this respect. take away their zero-interest loans and their hubristic illusion of racial-national superiority, and they become a violent mob of animals just the same.

[gaius marius]

Are you all so inured to this clusterfuck that you have simply tapped the well of outrage dry?

i think, mr matt, so many people have been lied to so much by all sides in this disaster and every other disaster that no one really believes anything they hear about it anymore in the united states. it's all rather like a movie at this point -- by design, perhaps -- and the average american is waiting only for the next plot twist (with somewhat less anticipation as the next twist in the aniston-pitt-jolie love triangle).

i think america is less inured of the clusterfuck than they are a conception of life as a vaudeville show.

[Matt]

I think the assumption is they were trying to infiltrate the bombers' groups.

TallDave, are you trying to be ironic? To take you seriously, why would you grant any such assumption at this late date? Your still giving the benefit of the doubt? Will you loan me some money, and when I dont repay you, will you loan me a bit more?

[gaius marius]

Will you loan me some money, and when I dont repay you, will you loan me a bit more?

yes, if your political religion is attractive. 🙂

[theOneState]

Matt, I think this just doesn't make sense and people aren't ready to believe that two British soldiers went AWOL, bombed civilians, shot at police, and were then rescued by their military unit. Nor would it makes sense that there was a British military operation that consisted of truck-bombing a crowded market. Jesse limited his comments to "What the hell?" for a reason.

Sure sounds like a clusterfuck, but this story is far from clear.

Joe, in case you haven't noticed, BushRiceWolfowitz isn't the only right-of-center-winger that has thought about the middle east. Personally I think the right has more vision on this issue than the left.

(You have to admit the left hasn't really expressed much vision on this issue - which is one reason all they did b/f the war was state that we need to have a debate about alternatives w/o actually starting one. When asked what their ideas were, they repeated that we need to have a debate. I don't think they even began to offer an alternative case b/c they DIDN'T have a vision for middle east peace. That includes the senators and activists and television scholars.)

[TallDave]

Matt,

Ummm... it specifically says they were "undercover." It's right in the first line of the story.

If you or Ken have any evidence for your incredibly lurid and non-credible allegations that American and British forces are setting off bombs to kill civilians, I'd like to see it. Otherwise, kindly stop smearing our soldiers with vicious, disgusting rumors.

[gaius marius]

support for his war is indistinguishable from support for the spread of democracy

the marketing triumph of the entire affair, it's only rival being the fictional association in the mob mind of 9/11 with saddam.

i would suggest, mr joe, more conservatively than either side in this debate, that we have no chance and no place trying to make an america out of the mideast. in many ways, i see the solution to our problems as being a halt to (and explicitly not a continuation or acceleration of) our constant self-injurious empire-building with respect to the affairs of a culture which we obviously do not and cannot understand, after decades of trying, much less manage to some blissful issue. anything more "optimistic" view, so called, seems to me unaware of more than a century of evidence regarding western conquest and management in the region.

[Jason Ligon]

gaius:

I dunno. I was corrected yesterday on my perception that every time the lights go out, we have riots. There is apparently at least some evidence that riots are very rare even in those cases.

joe:

What is the non violent vision for democracy to arise out from under jack boots, or the desert equivalent thereof? Give me something that seems credible, because I'm all out of ideas.

The ideas I have heard from fellow libertarians are all about the liberalising power of trade. I think that free trade does increase demand for liberty in general, but it also is one of the radicalizing factors in this particular case, and the time frame involved is very long.

Diplomacy is ineffectual with guys like Saddam, especially absent consequences to their personal health.

I just don't see the choice to trying something like this.

[Jason Ligon]

that is the alternative to trying something like this

[Jason Ligon]

"anything more "optimistic" view, so called, seems to me unaware of more than a century of evidence regarding western conquest and management in the region"

You're an optimist in your own right, mr gaius. You're optimistic that it is possible for our cultures not to clash and that if we ignore them they will leave us in peace. I am more of a pessimist along these lines. Absent some liberal common ground, the cultures can't but collide violently in areas of geopolitical significance.

[Dave W.]

I think the assumption is they were trying to infiltrate the bombers' groups.

Yes, but what is the objective truth about what the SAS guys did prior to their arrests?

[Jennifer]

At least the prisoners of Abu Ghraib were guilty of something.

Actually, our own military has admitted that a lot of the people in Abu Ghraib were picked up simply for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. As for the prisoners who predated our arrivel, many of them were guilty of nothing more than pissing off Saddam.

[Matt]

TallDave,

Ummmmm.... it specifically says here

http://www.sploid.com/news/2005/09/dressed_as_arab.php

go on to the Wash Post article, that the soldiers stood accused of firing on police and planting bombs.

Now, I realize this aint necessarily the gospel. I do not adopt an 'any stick will do' attitude in my oppo to this war. Even if they were undercover, do UC cops kill other cops to maintain their cover? Plant bombs?

[Jim Henley]

Michael Young says there was a tunnel under the two Brits at the shootout, so it must have been Syria.

[Jack Bauer]

Even if they were undercover, do UC cops kill other cops to maintain their cover? Plant bombs?

You have no idea...

[TallDave]

fictional association in the mob mind of 9/11 with saddam.

Not as fictional as people seem to think. Saddam was certainly a terrorist supporter, and there are considerable ties to Al Qaeda.

[TallDave]

Matt,

People also accuse the gov't of being under control of alien mind rays.

[SR]

What I find particularly amusing is that the British authorities deny that they smashed open the jail with tanks even though: (A) there were reporters on the scene who saw the tanks; and (B) the Basra jail has clearly been flattened. Making complete denials in the face of that much objective evidence seems practically calculated to destroy your own credibility.

[gaius marius]

I was corrected yesterday on my perception that every time the lights go out, we have riots. There is apparently at least some evidence that riots are very rare even in those cases.

this isn't just that, mr ligon (though i agree). i remember the article put forward here that i suspect you're talking about -- and i challenge its point and question its scope.

people are creatures of habit, and where law is habit (as machiavelli noted) it can and does usually temporarily survive the suspension of its enforcement among most. that habit is all the better kept if the delusion of superiority has been indoctrinated into the people.

that isn't what is going on in iraq, where a mindset of disorder is developing as a response to the extended absence of order. this is no different than the west bank and gaza or northern ireland in its heyday, where any disturbance can quickly devolve into riot. america would be no different than that, were it deprived of its institutions and authorities for any duration.

to reduce by statistical abstraction the very recent history of disorder in the westernized industrial world and conclude from that some profundity of eternal human nature, as some reasonoids attempted to upon seeing the quarantelli interview, smacks of a naive desperation in the defense of an ideology of primitivism. it isn't as simple as saying disorder in this narrow sample set is rare, therefore people are rational and reasonable. subject pampered americans to the self-perpetuating conflagration of the mideast in social collapse for a decade, much less a century, and they would be no different.

moreover, one might note of walker's examples of virtue that exactly none elevate the rule of law -- all in fact mock institutional authority in favor of spontaneous tribalism. how we should live in noble savagery by emulating bands of resourceful nomads is not exactly a reasoned defense of the rule of law and civilization.

[Mr. F. Le Mur]

Mr. Nice Guy wrote: "There's no hope for the middle east. None."

I agree. Mostly.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it strikes me that no country worth a damn has ever been created by outside parties, and all countries worth a damn were created despite outside parties trying to stop the process. Has there ever been a mostly Muslim country which didn't suck?

[gaius marius]

Absent some liberal common ground, the cultures can't but collide violently in areas of geopolitical significance.

certainly possible, mr ligon. i suppose that i seek to minimize the friction and hope for the best.

[gaius marius]

Saddam was certainly a terrorist supporter, and there are considerable ties to Al Qaeda.

you present yet more evidence, mr talldave, of the continuing effectiveness of the government propaganda in this respect.

[TallDave]

You know, these same discussions were taking place regarding Germany and Japan in the late 1940s. Germans were regarded as hopelessly recidivist militarists by nature. The very idea the Japanese would embrace democracy, something they didn't even have a word for, was widely regard as incredibly stupid rather than visionary.

A joke of the times went:

1st Japanese Man: Have you read the new Constitution?
2nd Japanese Man: No, has it been translated into Japanese yet?

[TallDave]

gaius,

No, you present evidence of ignorance.

* Abdul Rahman Yasin was the only member of the al Qaeda cell that detonated the 1993 World Trade Center bomb to remain at large in the Clinton years. He fled to Iraq. U.S. forces recently discovered a cache of documents in Tikrit, Saddam's hometown, that show that Iraq gave Mr. Yasin both a house and monthly salary.

* Bin Laden met at least eight times with officers of Iraq's Special Security Organization, a secret police agency run by Saddam's son Qusay, and met with officials from Saddam's mukhabarat, its external intelligence service, according to intelligence made public by Secretary of State Colin Powell, who was speaking before the United Nations Security Council on February 6, 2003.

* Sudanese intelligence officials told me that their agents had observed meetings between Iraqi intelligence agents and bin Laden starting in 1994, when bin Laden lived in Khartoum.

* Bin Laden met the director of the Iraqi mukhabarat in 1996 in Khartoum, according to Mr. Powell.

* An al Qaeda operative now held by the U.S. confessed that in the mid-1990s, bin Laden had forged an agreement with Saddam's men to cease all terrorist activities against the Iraqi dictator, Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

* In 1999 the Guardian, a British newspaper, reported that Farouk Hijazi, a senior officer in Iraq's mukhabarat, had journeyed deep into the icy mountains near Kandahar, Afghanistan, in December 1998 to meet with al Qaeda men. Mr. Hijazi is "thought to have offered bin Laden asylum in Iraq," the Guardian reported.

* In October 2000, another Iraqi intelligence operative, Salah Suleiman, was arrested near the Afghan border by Pakistani authorities, according to Jane's Foreign Report, a respected international newsletter. Jane's reported that Suleiman was shuttling between Iraqi intelligence and Ayman al Zawahiri, now al Qaeda's No. 2 man.

(Why are all of those meetings significant? The London Observer reports that FBI investigators cite a captured al Qaeda field manual in Afghanistan, which "emphasizes the value of conducting discussions about pending terrorist attacks face to face, rather than by electronic means.")

* As recently as 2001, Iraq's embassy in Pakistan was used as a "liaison" between the Iraqi dictator and al Qaeda, Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

* Spanish investigators have uncovered documents seized from Yusuf Galan -- who is charged by a Spanish court with being "directly involved with the preparation and planning" of the Sept. 11 attacks -- that show the terrorist was invited to a party at the Iraqi embassy in Madrid. The invitation used his "al Qaeda nom de guerre," London's Independent reports.

* An Iraqi defector to Turkey, known by his cover name as "Abu Mohammed," told Gwynne Roberts of the Sunday Times of London that he saw bin Laden's fighters in camps in Iraq in 1997. At the time, Mohammed was a colonel in Saddam's Fedayeen. He described an encounter at Salman Pak, the training facility southeast of Baghdad. At that vast compound run by Iraqi intelligence, Muslim militants trained to hijack planes with knives -- on a full-size Boeing 707. Col. Mohammed recalls his first visit to Salman Pak this way: "We were met by Colonel Jamil Kamil, the camp manager, and Major Ali Hawas. I noticed that a lot of people were queuing for food. (The major) said to me: 'You'll have nothing to do with these people. They are Osama bin Laden's group and the PKK and Mojahedin-e Khalq.'"

* In 1998, Abbas al-Janabi, a longtime aide to Saddam's son Uday, defected to the West. At the time, he repeatedly told reporters that there was a direct connection between Iraq and al Qaeda.

*The Sunday Times found a Saddam loyalist in a Kurdish prison who claims to have been Dr. Zawahiri's bodyguard during his 1992 visit with Saddam in Baghdad. Dr. Zawahiri was a close associate of bin Laden at the time and was present at the founding of al Qaeda in 1989.

* Following the defeat of the Taliban, almost two dozen bin Laden associates "converged on Baghdad and established a base of operations there," Mr. Powell told the United Nations in February 2003. From their Baghdad base, the secretary said, they supervised the movement of men, materiel and money for al Qaeda's global network.

* In 2001, an al Qaeda member "bragged that the situation in Iraq was 'good,'" according to intelligence made public by Mr. Powell.

* That same year, Saudi Arabian border guards arrested two al Qaeda members entering the kingdom from Iraq.

* Abu Musaab al-Zarqawi oversaw an al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, Mr. Powell told the United Nations. His specialty was poisons. Wounded in fighting with U.S. forces, he sought medical treatment in Baghdad in May 2002. When Zarqawi recovered, he restarted a training camp in northern Iraq. Zarqawi's Iraq cell was later tied to the October 2002 murder of Lawrence Foley, an official of the U.S. Agency for International Development, in Amman, Jordan. The captured assassin confessed that he received orders and funds from Zarqawi's cell in Iraq, Mr. Powell said. His accomplice escaped to Iraq.

*Zarqawi met with military chief of al Qaeda, Mohammed Ibrahim Makwai (aka Saif al-Adel) in Iran in February 2003, according to intelligence sources cited by the Washington Post.

* Mohammad Atef, the head of al Qaeda's military wing until the U.S. killed him in Afghanistan in November 2001, told a senior al Qaeda member now in U.S. custody that the terror network needed labs outside of Afghanistan to manufacture chemical weapons, Mr. Powell said. "Where did they go, where did they look?" said the secretary. "They went to Iraq."

* Abu Abdullah al-Iraqi was sent to Iraq by bin Laden to purchase poison gases several times between 1997 and 2000. He called his relationship with Saddam's regime "successful," Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

* Mohamed Mansour Shahab, a smuggler hired by Iraq to transport weapons to bin Laden in Afghanistan, was arrested by anti-Hussein Kurdish forces in May, 2000. He later told his story to American intelligence and a reporter for the New Yorker magazine.

* Documents found among the debris of the Iraqi Intelligence Center show that Baghdad funded the Allied Democratic Forces, a Ugandan terror group led by an Islamist cleric linked to bin Laden. According to a London's Daily Telegraph, the organization offered to recruit "youth to train for the jihad" at a "headquarters for international holy warrior network" to be established in Baghdad.

* Mullah Melan Krekar, ran a terror group (the Ansar al-Islam) linked to both bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. Mr. Krekar admitted to a Kurdish newspaper that he met bin Laden in Afghanistan and other senior al Qaeda officials. His acknowledged meetings with bin Laden go back to 1988. When he organized Ansar al Islam in 2001 to conduct suicide attacks on Americans, "three bin Laden operatives showed up with a gift of $300,000 'to undertake jihad,'" Newsday reported. Mr. Krekar is now in custody in the Netherlands. His group operated in portion of northern Iraq loyal to Saddam Hussein -- and attacked independent Kurdish groups hostile to Saddam. A spokesman for the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan told a United Press International correspondent that Mr. Krekar's group was funded by "Saddam Hussein's regime in Baghdad."

* After October 2001, hundreds of al Qaeda fighters are believed to have holed up in the Ansar al-Islam's strongholds inside northern Iraq

[TallDave]

link

[gaius marius]

lol -- did you cut that at nro, mr talldave? LMAO!!

[TallDave]

gaius,

The evidence speaks for itself. You can laugh it off, but it shows your ignorance regardless.

[TallDave]

Did Saddam have operational involvement in 9/11? Probably not. Did he support Al Qaeda and other terrorsts? Absolutely.

It's fine to oppose the war, but try to find more honest grounds on which to do so.

[gaius marius]

evidence

that you consider all that lot to be such, mr talldave, says more than i could.

[gaius marius]

tell me, mr talldave -- do you also believe saddam was trying to purchase yellowcake from niger?

[TallDave]

gaius,

I see you've made up your mind, and facts be damned.

The Niger thing has gone back and forth. I believe British intel is still saying he was in fact trying to, but I don't remember for sure. You are aware, I hope, that the 9/11 commission has specifically stated Joe Wilson was lying?

[TallDave]

Here we go:

The phrase in question was 16-words long: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

The recent British report by Lord Butler ? while finding that the intelligence on Iraq's alleged weapons was "seriously flawed" ? concluded that Mr. Bush's statement and a similar one by Blair were "well-founded."

The US has no such intelligence, but the British apparently still say they do.

link

[joe]

Wait a minute, TallDave.

"Uh huh. And pigs will fly." So, am I insufficiently idealistic and imaginative, or is my vision overly cramped and realist?

[gaius marius]

is that a "yes, i do", mr talldave?

[gaius marius]

or merely a "i really want to"?

[TallDave]

That's a "the British still say he was trying to buy uranium." I personally don't know whether he was or not, and since the British spy agencies haven't shared their data, I can't really make an informed judgment.

Sad that you just dismiss all this evidence as "propaganda."

[TallDave]

joe,

You say you and the left will "still" have a plan. I don't see a plan from the left now, except "what Bush did, only we'd do it better."

Bush has already accomplished a lot: elections and democratic reforms in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon, Afghanistan, and Iraq.

[TallDave]

except "what Bush did, only we'd do it better."

And that's only the center-lefties like Hillary and the DLC. From the far left all I hear is "not our problem."

[joe]

TallDave,

"Uh huh. Somalia and Kosovo involved the United States' absolutely necessary national interests, how again? Desert Fox was absolutely necessary because...?"

I can only speak for myself here, but I can tell you why I supported the convoy guarding mission in Somalia (not the larger mission in creeped into) and the Kosovo War, but no the Iraq invasion. I had confidence that we had a good chance of success at the former two initiatives, while I had no confidence that the Bush administration could invade and occupy the oldest place in the world, establish a decent order, and avoid creating a catastrophe. It would be a task orders of magnitude more difficult, and in charge would be the guy who knows how hard it is to put food on your family, and the guy who was in charge of the military at the end of the Vietnam War. Ouch.

I actually found the Ken Pollack vision fairly convincing. It's too bad we were stuck with such an unworthy band of crooks and incompetants.

[a]

Mr. Powell told the United Nations.

I don't think you help your case by citing what Mr. Powel told the UN.

[TallDave]

gaius,

After looking at your site, I see you immediately accepted the false propaganda of "10,000 dead frm Katrina" as a fact, since it fit your (counterfactual) worldview that the West is declining. I guess if it fits your worldview, it's fact, if not, propaganda.

Regarding your larger proposition, we've only grown richer, healthier, and more productive; we're hardly declining. As Dean Esmay puts it when debunking those on the right who share your view of decline: "For a country that's on the verge of collapse, we seem to be doing pretty well."

[joe]

"Are you all so inured to this clusterfuck that you have simply tapped the well of outrage dry?"

That pretty much sums it up. You know what people told me when I pointed out that the government was lying about its evidence of WMDs in order to start a war for a REALLY BIG IDEA THAT COULDN'T POSSIBLY GO WRONG? That I hated my country, hated the soldiers that served it, was not interested in stopping mushroom clouds from rising over our cities, and wanted to see people fed into wood chippers.

Yeah, I'm pretty jaded.

[TallDave]

joe,

You didn't answer my question, because the answer, of course, is that they weren't necessary. They were completely superfluous to our national interest. The party in power is almost always interventionist regardless of ideology.

I supported all those actions, btw, because I believed they were the right thing to do. I didn't call Clinton incompetent after the Somalia debacle either, and still don't, because I know he was doing what he thought he had to in order to feed starving people. His only failure was trusting the UN to provide backup.

[joe]

"joe:

What is the non violent vision for democracy to arise out from under jack boots, or the desert equivalent thereof? Give me something that seems credible, because I'm all out of ideas."

So your ideas extend all the way to "let's kick their ass," then stop?

VOA. Orange Revolution. Lebanese Intefadah. Fund local resistance. Fund international resistance. Regularly humiliate a contained Saddam in the eyes of his people, military, bureacracy, and clergy.

"...and the time frame involved is very long." Yes, it requires that most unAmerican of virtues - patience. But it has the virtue of actually standing a chance of working someday.

[joe]

Also, Jason, I never said it had to be nonviolent.

[TallDave]

joe,

9/11 was the result of those policies.

[TallDave]

But it has the virtue of actually standing a chance of working someday.

Ridiculous. We've been doing all things to Cuba for 50 years, and Castro isn't sitting on trillions in oil. All it takes to stay in power is military force and the will to use it.

Orange Revolution? Ha! Saddam murdered anyone who voted against him.

[joe]

'I don't see a plan from the left now, except "what Bush did, only we'd do it better."'

What you see and don't see, TallDave, is not a terribly compelling means of ascertaining reality.

Please, quote me some more information from Colin Powell at the UN.

"Bush has already accomplished a lot: elections and democratic reforms in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon, Afghanistan, and Iraq." Your inability to conceive of Muslims as being agents of their own liberation, as people who must be led kicking and screaming to reform, explains why you are so certain that invasion and occupation by their betters is the only path to Arab democracy.

I happen to think more of them than that.

[joe]

"You didn't answer my question, because the answer, of course, is that they weren't necessary."

That's because your question wasn't directed to me, TallDave. I didn't state, nor do I believe, that only narrowly defined national interest justifies action on the international level.

I consider the pre-Bush, Republican "realist" worldview to be almost, but not quite, and disgusting, destructive, and blind as that of you neocons.

[joe]

"joe,

9/11 was the result of those policies."

Say goodnight gracie. You're all done.

[Matt]

TallDave, I had a long lunch, came back, and saw that you compared the newly-American-minted Iraqi police force to Alien conspiracy theorists. Still, I am generous to a fault and briefly thought you informed if misguided. And then this howler...

9/11 was the result of those policies

Didnt somebody make a movie to this effect? Joe, Gauis, you argued TallDave so far back around you made a right-wing Moore-ist out of him. Bravo!

[gaius marius]

hard to argue with someone so stupid, isn't it, mr joe? 🙂 presents a sort of challenge.

[JE1]

"hard to argue with someone so stupid, isn't it, mr joe? 🙂 presents a sort of challenge"

Actually, I think you (gm and Joe) had your asses handed to you on this one. Talldave presented facts, but they didn't fit into your "Bush lied people died" meme.

I have always enjoyed reading your posts, but you seem to have bought into the lie that this war was started based on a "lie," meaning that WMD was the ONLY reason given.

Argue that you don't like the (MANY) reasons, argue that they might have been debated more, but drop the "lie" aspect. You might get more respect for your arguments.

[Shem]

The very idea the Japanese would embrace democracy, something they didn't even have a word for, was widely regard as incredibly stupid rather than visionary.

Do you know anything about history? The Japanese were embracing Democracy as early as the 1870s, when they weren't too much less democratic than some of the more enlightened nations of Europe. Every time you try to draw parallels to previous points in history you manage to get everything exactly wrong. Are you ignorant, or just a troll?

Can we at least put to rest the claim that everything is Basra is fine? And, having done that, is it now OK to question the people who have been telling us that everything was fine all along without being accused of being "objectively pro-terrorist?"

[Tom Crick]

"I consider the pre-Bush, Republican "realist" worldview to be almost, but not quite, and disgusting, destructive, and blind as that of you neocons."

Opposition to a poorly justified, poorly planned and poorly executed war makes for strange bedfellows, doesn't it?

"I have always enjoyed reading your posts, but you seem to have bought into the lie that this war was started based on a "lie," meaning that WMD was the ONLY reason given."

I think someone should take it upon themselves to post under the name "strawman joe" to indulge the mindlessness so many Bushbots crave. They need a "strawman joe" to kick around, why make them reinvent one over and over again?

...and it would free up more time for the real joe to respond to intelligent posts. Think about it--while the drones attack commenter "strawman joe", the rest of us could just go on with the thread!

[Tom Crick]

"Are you all so inured to this clusterfuck that you have simply tapped the well of outrage dry?"

I was called a terrorist sympathizer for comin' out big against torture; I was called a racist for being critical of Reverse Domino Theory too.

...but I live on outrage.

Still, I think the facts of this story are too much for most Bushbots to handle. We can rub their faces in the facts and express all the outrage we can muster, but, in the end, the Bushbots 'll do the same thing they always do...

...make a strawman out of joe and then hump its leg.

[joe]

"Actually, I think you (gm and Joe) had your asses handed to you on this one. Talldave presented facts, but they didn't fit into your "Bush lied people died" meme."

That's great, JE1, except I didn't argue about the fact that Bush lied. I was arguing about the Great Democracy Crusade that, supposedly, had always been the justification for this war, and demolishing it on its own merits, and on the capacity of the boobs in the administration to follow through on their highfalutin' promises. Did you miss that part?

Yep, I just looked through my posts, and not once did I answer TallDave's arguments about The Great Democracy Crusade by pointing out the dishonesty with which it was sold. Does that surprise you? I'll bet it does; I'll bet you are absolutely convinced that my response to TallDave revolve around the statement "Bush lied," and various references to chimpanzees.

"Argue that you don't like the (MANY) reasons, argue that they might have been debated more, but drop the "lie" aspect. You might get more respect for your arguments."

Since I never premised any of my position on "Bush lied," it's clear that your disrespect for my argument comes from somewhere else. Quite simply, you will never have respect for any argument against this war, and you will read your preferred slurs into any such argument you encounter, so you can more easily delude yourself into believing that there are not strong counterarguments to what you want to believe.

[joe]

Nor, in the one post in which I did bring up the adminstration's dishonest case (a comment which had nothing to do with TallDave's neocon liberation shtick), did I state that WMDs were the only reason given for the war.

[gaius marius]

Talldave presented facts

hardly -- he presented the white house line, as reiterated by websites like nro and tcs. the exposure of his inability to distinguish events from propaganda culminated in his inability to recognize the yellowcake fraud for what it is, instead citing more ridiculousness to bolster a shocking claim that it might really have happened.

anyone who has taken the time to look at the yellowcake fraud can see that it was an obvious fake. even if you really thought the documents honest, the numbers don't add. rumors of a british report that makes it all better doesn't change the truth that it was a fraud. if you can't admit that it was, you don't have any foot in reality on the issue.

anyway, arguing with people like mr talldave is rather like arguing with a creationist. when the lies they believed are exposed for what they are, they, in denial, fall back on yet more ridiculous statements to create a self-reinforcing fantasy world rather than confront the far simpler truth that they've been lied to a lot by their dear leader -- who is, in the end, just another dirty politician.

elevating an alcoholic charity case like bush to the level of a demigod -- or, if you like, a womanizing relativist like clinton to the same pedestal -- has the moral and intellectual consequence of making one into a slave and a fool.

[Jason Ligon]

"So your ideas extend all the way to "let's kick their ass," then stop?"

Er, no. First, it is not primarily a 'they' whose ass needed to be kicked. It was a representative regional tyrant 'he'. Second, the idea was clearly not that removing the despot was the stopping point, but rather an essential first step.

"VOA. Orange Revolution. Lebanese Intefadah. Fund local resistance. Fund international resistance. Regularly humiliate a contained Saddam in the eyes of his people, military, bureacracy, and clergy."

Not likely. The internal security apparatus was too strong. Humiliation doesn't work when the tin pot controls the media. I sincerely doubt that anything of this sort could ever get off the ground in Iraq, as evidenced by our efforts along those lines over the previous decades.

As for the timing issue, it matters considerably if you perceive this to have a US national security element. Further decades of demonstrated unwillingness on the part of any international or national body to enforce any sanction can't be the right answer.

[TallDave]

Thanks JE1.

Yes, joe, that's what we tried for about 12 years: containing Saddam, VOA, etc. And what we got from that was 9/11.

Your inability to conceive of Muslims as being agents of their own liberation, as people who must be led kicking and screaming to reform, explains why you are so certain that invasion and occupation by their betters is the only path to Arab democracy. I happen to think more of them than that.

LMAO Oh really? Aren't you the same one who just said the Iraqi democracy is going to collapse in a few years? Yes, your faith in them is touching indeed. Let me guess: that's America's fault somehow.

I think Muslims, like all human beings, desire freedom. I also think dictators are unlikely to give up power, and that the track record suggests they are not going to give it up without serious prodding, and in some cases outright military action.

Matt, people (Iraqi police or otherwise) can accuse anyone of anything. Still waiting for the actual evidence you're using to accuse our troops of deliberately murdering civilians with bombs. Again, that's a shameful way to treat our soldiers.

gaius: Yep, namecalling is about the level of argument I expect from you. Sad.

[TallDave]

Shem:

No, Japan had one brief period of militaristic pseudo-democracy before lapsing into militaristic autocracy. From wiki:

In 1854, U.S. Commodore Matthew Perry forced the opening of Japan... Subsequently, the shogunate resigned and the Meiji Restoration returned the emperor to power. Japan adopted numerous Western institutions in the Meiji period, including a modern government, legal system, and military. These reforms transformed the Empire of Japan into a world power which defeated China in the Sino-Japanese War and Russia in the Russo-Japanese War. By 1910, Japan controlled Taiwan, Korea, and half of Sakhalin.

The early 20th century saw a brief period of "Taisho democracy" overshadowed by the rise of Japanese expansionism. World War I permitted Japan, which fought on the side of the victorious Allies, to expand its influence in Asia and its territorial holdings in the Pacific. In 1936, however, Japan signed the Anti-Comintern Pact and joined with Germany and Italy to form the Axis alliance.

[TallDave]

gaius -

Your argument boils down "it must be true, because everyone knows it." Then you offer some gratuitous ad hominems. Typical behavior when you have not a factual leg to stand on.

You still haven't rebutted the fact that British intel has said the uranium claim stands, because, quite simply, you can't. And that was the issue YOU raised as a strawman to knock down. You haven't even attempted to rebut the evidence linking Saddam to Al Qaeda.

[Shem]

Yeah, 1867 to 1918 is a brief period, all right. And, if they had "pseudo-democracy," then do you agree that we in the United States didn't have real democracy until women were granted the right to vote in 1920? Because the Japanese started with voting being restricted to landholders, with the rules gradually being liberalized until the Wars of Expansion started in the late 20s, at which time I'll agree democracy no longer existed. Is it only democracy if it corresponds to modern ideas of democracy? Even if their contemporaries would have considered it extremely democratic?

And, the question in my post wasn't rhetorical. In fact, it was directed at you. As someone who has been arguing that things in Basra are peachy, doesn't this give cause to reconsider what you've been saying all along?

[TallDave]

The Taish? period (Japanese: ????, Taish?-jidai, "period of great righteousness") is a period in the history of Japan dating from 30 July 1912 to 25 December 1926.

[TallDave]

Shem, as usual you have no idea what you're talking about. Where did I say Basra was peachy?

[TheDumbFish]

TallDave,

Could you expand upon the thought that containing Saddam, yada, yada, led to 911?

Or do you just mean that those things are what led OBL to declare war?

[TallDave]

No, I think sitting around waiting for Muslims to somehow magically rise up against militaristic regimes and usher in a new era of democracy (while the money we pay those regimes for oil props them up) is a ridiculous plan. On 9/11/01, we found out what that gets us: a lot of Muslims who virulently hate the West, and regimes that support them.

[TallDave]

To answer your question, Shem, I don't think anywhere in Iraq is peachy. All of Iraq is poor and badly governed. Much of it is violent and poorly maintained. Basic services are well below what they should be.

But things are slowly getting better. There are elections, a free press, rights groups. Democracy is a massive self-perpetuating social engineering project, not an instant fix for a hypermilitaristic, blood-soaked police state dotted wih rape rooms and torture centers. Look at where America was 100 years ago vs. today; look at Europe in the 1940s vs today. Iraq will probably continue to get better, because that's generally what happens in free democracies.

[Tom Crick]

"Yes, joe, that's what we tried for about 12 years: containing Saddam, VOA, etc. And what we got from that was 9/11."

Just out of curiosity--ahem--how are you tying all that together?

...and to be honest, I'm tryin' really, really hard not to laugh. ...but maybe I'm flat wrong and you have somethin' I've never heard or understood before.

[TallDave]

Tom,

Ummmmm... did 9/11 happen, or not?

[Phil]

No, I think sitting around waiting for Muslims to somehow magically rise up against militaristic regimes and usher in a new era of democracy (while the money we pay those regimes for oil props them up) is a ridiculous plan.

Yeah, them dumb sand niggers need some white guys to save them, right?

On 9/11/01, we found out what that gets us: a lot of Muslims who virulently hate the West, and regimes that support them.

Um, that isn't what made all those Muslims virulently hate the West, you know.

[TallDave]

Those were roughly the policies, that was the reality they produced. I'm not sure why I need to "tie that together."

To put it differently, do you think 9/11 would have happened if we had introduced democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan, and pressed for elections in Saudi Arabia and Egypt and Lebanon, around the time of the first Gulf War?

[TallDave]

Yeah, them dumb sand niggers need some white guys to save them, right?

No, the freedom-loving Arabs need the dumb white guys to stop propping up the regimes that oppress them with oil money and arms.

[Shem]

The Japanese Constitution, the first one, had provisions for voting rights for citizens who held land. I was actually off by ten or fifteen years; it was created and ratified after the Satsuma Uprising of 1877. If you had actually studied Japanese history, you would know that the Uprising was actually fought by former members of the Samurai class who had given up arms after being promised a Constitution with some provision for a degree of self-government. They were put down, but as a result the Meiji Emperor was forced to accede and grant a Constitution, which was ratified in the 1880s. In the early Taisho era, liberalizations of the voting codes were experimented with; these ended with the militarization of the late 1920s and the rise of Hirohito to the throne.

As for Basra, I seem to recall a few months back I raised the issue that Basra has no clean water, to which you responded that things are getting much better there, and that people like me ought to stop expecting so much.

[Tom Crick]

"No, I think sitting around waiting for Muslims to somehow magically rise up against militaristic regimes and usher in a new era of democracy (while the money we pay those regimes for oil props them up) is a ridiculous plan."

You seem to assume that ushering in a new era of democracy is an appropriate use of the lives and limbs of the people in our armed forces. It isn't.

The purpose of the United States military is to protect the rights and liberties of the people of the United States, not to die and suffer injury on behalf of the people of Iraq.

...I care about the people of Iraq. But my primary concern is for the people of the United States--American troops included. I expect that to be the primary concern of our policy makers also.

"On 9/11/01, we found out what that gets us: a lot of Muslims who virulently hate the West, and regimes that support them."

Ugh! Is that your answer?

...So you don't think there was a direct connection between Saddam Hussein and the 9/11 terrorists? ...or do you? Please don't tell me this rests on Reverse Domino Theory!

How will we prevent the next 9/11? ...What nation should we invade next?

[Tom Crick]

"Ummmmm... did 9/11 happen, or not?"

Of course it happened.

...Did it happen as a result of containing Saddam Hussein? Did it happen as a result of VOA?

[TallDave]

Shem,

So? You can argue forever about how democratic they were or weren't in a particular period, but regardless there was still enourmous pessimism about Japan becoming a free democracy after WW II. Their earlier experiment with democracy collapsed into militaristic autocracy, as you yourself admit.

[TallDave]

...Did it happen as a result of containing Saddam Hussein? Did it happen as a result of VOA?

Did containing Saddam prevent it? Did VOA?

[TallDave]

You seem to assume that ushering in a new era of democracy is an appropriate use of the lives and limbs of the people in our armed forces. It isn't

Well, some of us care more about people in other countries than you. Also, doing so will help prevent another 9/11, or something far worse.

BTW, I assume this means you opposed intervention in Kosovo, Somalia, Haiti, Liberia, Gulf War I, etc.

[Tom Crick]

Did containing Saddam prevent it? Did VOA?

Maybe I wasn't clear.

I'm looking for a connection; you seem to believe that there's a connection between these things. ...I don't see any valid reason to believe in this connection.

Maybe we should try a different tack.

...In what way was 9/11 a result of not removing Saddam Hussein from power?

[TheDumbFish]

TallDave,

Tom Crick asked How will we prevent the next 9/11? ...What nation should we invade next?

What do you think? Do we keep invading other countries?

[TallDave]

Fish,

Well, Iraq and Afghanistan gave us legitimate casus belli by invading other countries and/or firing on Americans. Their people were also suffering terribly under those leaders.

Would Iranians, Cubans, Syrians, Saudis, Egyptians and others benefit from forcible democratization? Probably, but their circumstances aren't nearly as bad as Afghanis and Iraqis, war is a terrible hardship, and in some of those countries there are signs of reform through peaceful means.

Now, if Iranians rebel en masse and a million democratic reformers seize Tehran, and the Iranian army/secret police begin slaughtering them wholesale, should we step in? Absolutely. So there are circumstances where military force is appropriate, but it's hard to justify anything like that under the current situation.

[Lowdog]

TallDave - I didn't support Gulf War I at the time, but in retrospect, at least Iraq invaded another country that time. Kosovo, Somalia, Haiti, Liberia? No. What threat were any of those places to us? Maybe some limited, peace-keeping presence with huge help from the UN or our allies, but I hate being the world police. It's not what I want my tax money and the blood of my fellow americans spent on.

And I think Tom has a valid question - how culpable was Saddam in 9/11? If you're trying to say he played a large role, I just don't see it. Not to mention pre-emptive strikes are bad precedent and against what America traditionally stood for.

And please, none of this sanctimonius crap about caring for other people in the world. It's all about making sure everyone knows we're the biggest, baddest motherfuckers on the planet, and not to fuck with us. To me, that's a bad way to roll around if you're looking for people to leave you alone and peace on earth.

[Tom Crick]

"Well, some of us care more about people in other countries than you."

Oh I care very much about people in other countries; for instance, I was very much against dropping bombs on them.

...That said, I consider it unlikely that the American people would have supported the Iraq War on the sole basis of freeing the Iraqi people from tyranny.

The war was presented as a war of self-defense--Iraq was presented as an Al Qaeda collaborator with dangerous WMD. Had it been presented otherwise...

"BTW, I assume this means you opposed intervention in Kosovo, Somalia, Haiti, Liberia, Gulf War I, etc."

That would not be a safe assumption. I'm a big believer in the Powell Doctrine. ...especially the part about the exit strategy.

We didn't need an exit strategy in WWII, but WWII was a war of self-defense. Iraq was not a war of self-defense.

[Tom Crick]

"Well, Iraq and Afghanistan gave us legitimate casus belli by invading other countries and/or firing on Americans. Their people were also suffering terribly under those leaders."

I hear this a lot comin' from the right these days. As if having sufficient cause for taking an action somehow justifies it.

...As if the stupidity of a given strategy weren't sufficient cause for rejecting it. ...I don't think anyone, in this context, asked whether or not the war was legal. Speaking for myself, I want to know if the war was smart.

Was what we got worth the price we paid? ...I say no.

By the way, you still haven't answered my question: In what way was 9/11 a result of not removing Saddam Hussein from power?

[TallDave]

Speaking for myself, I want to know if the war was smart.

Yes.

In what way was 9/11 a result of not removing Saddam Hussein from power?

Are you kidding? Osama's entire post-Gulf-War recruiting strategy centered around the presence of American troops (required to contain Saddam) on sacred Saudi soil, and the fact we were humiliating and bombing the Iraqis.

[TallDave]

Tom,

"BTW, I assume this means you opposed intervention in Kosovo, Somalia, Haiti, Liberia, Gulf War I, etc."

That would not be a safe assumption. I'm a big believer in the Powell Doctrine. ...especially the part about the exit strategy

Well, then you just contradicted yourself, badly. You said:

The purpose of the United States military is to protect the rights and liberties of the people of the United States, not to die and suffer injury on behalf of the people of Iraq.

...I care about the people of Iraq. But my primary concern is for the people of the United States--American troops included. I expect that to be the primary concern of our policy makers also.

Oh, just Iraqis then? It's OK if American troops are in harm's way for Somalis, Kosovars, Haitians, etc.?

but WWII was a war of self-defense

Oh really? Then why didn't we contain Japan and Germany instead of invading and democratizing them? Invasion seems, I don't know, un-self-defense-ish.

[TallDave]

Anyway, my argument is not that any particular event or person led to 9/11, just that the reality is the overall U.S. policy in the region did, in fact, lead to 9/11. That's just a fact.

I think that had we democratized Iraq and Afghanistan back around the time of the Gulf War (remember, freedom was in the air! communism had just collapsed) we could have prevented Al Qaeda from ever becoming anything near what it is today.

[TallDave]

And if anyone's wondering, I blame Bush Sr., not Clinton, for that failure of vision.

[Tom Crick]

"Osama's entire post-Gulf-War recruiting strategy centered around the presence of American troops (required to contain Saddam) on sacred Saudi soil, and the fact we were humiliating and bombing the Iraqis."

To some extent, I suspect our exit from Saudi Arabia has made it less likely that some fanatics would answer Osama bin Laden's call to war. ...but you wouldn't know it by the number of suicide bombers that hit Iraq every month.

...That is to say, I fail to see how an American invasion and occupation of Iraq would have changed Osama bin Laden's recruiting strategy. ...he certainly could have recruited the relative handful of terrorists required to perpetrate 9/11.

At any rate, if you're talking about bombing, invading and occupying a country like Iraq for the purpose of thwarting the terrorist's recruitment strategy, I think you're putting the cart before the horse.

...The American people weren't going to support that as a legitimate cause for war--not before 9/11.

[Tom Crick]

"Oh, just Iraqis then? It's OK if American troops are in harm's way for Somalis, Kosovars, Haitians, etc.?"

This may be un-libertarian of me--oh well...

To my mind, an alliance can be an extremely effective means of self-defense. Because of that, there are things I find acceptable because they're done in the name of an alliance that I might not find acceptable otherwise.

I'm also a pragmatist although--as Halykut and joe have shown me--I'm downright ashamed of some of the things we did in Central and South America.

...and Cambodia

From my pragmatic perspective, there isn't a whole lot to like about the Iraq War. The United States may have been better off with Saddam Hussein well contained under the watchful eye of the coalition. I'm balancing that position--from the American perspective--against the desirability of a new Islamic fundamentalist state loosely allied with a state sponsor of terror--Iran. ...and I'm not sure I like what I see.

Some have argued that Hati was an act of self-defense. I believe that we may have some moral responsibilities to the people of Liberia. Did we go into any of these countries as sole actors under long term occupations and try to remake their societies and cultures? ...I don't think so.

[joe]

Japan only had a "pseudo-democracy," which wasn't very stable, between 1867 and 1918.

Now Iraq 2005, that's a differen story...

"Not likely. The internal security apparatus was too strong. Humiliation doesn't work when the tin pot controls the media. I sincerely doubt that anything of this sort could ever get off the ground in Iraq, as evidenced by our efforts along those lines over the previous decades."

Um, have you read a newspaper in the last four or so years, Jason? I can think of a whole boatload of things that aren't likely to happen in Iraq.

"No, I think sitting around waiting for Muslims to somehow magically rise up against militaristic regimes and usher in a new era of democracy (while the money we pay those regimes for oil props them up) is a ridiculous plan. Yes, that's what we did. America's stance towards the Muslim world was one of passively sitting around waiting when people rose up. That's exactly what we did, and that's exactly why our country has such a bad reputation - because of how passive we were when it came to popular uprisings. My god, can you be any more ignorant?

[joe]

I thought gaius was being too harsh with "It's hard to argue with someone so stupid."

I can't believe how much he lowballed it.

9/11 happened? That's your argument for why we needed to invade Iraq? Because we hadn't invaded Iraq for a while, and then 9/11 happened.

How is it possible that this person manages to type a web address?

I spent roughly twenty minutes of my life composing arguments in response to your inanities, and I want them back.

[Tom Crick]

"Anyway, my argument is not that any particular event or person led to 9/11, just that the reality is the overall U.S. policy in the region did, in fact, lead to 9/11. That's just a fact."

I think I was reacting to your argument as if you were arguing that a particular non-event or person--in Iraq specifically--led to 9/11. That argument's had plenty of airplay, and I think a lot of people are sensitive to it. I know I am.

...causality's a tough gig.

[gaius marius]

what an utter fool.

[Dave W.]

1. It is now being reported that the SAS agents who were freed had local-dress costumes and explosives in the car and that they have pictures of that. There seems to be little media followup so far on that aspect of the story.

2. Supposedly they bulldozed the jail to create a diversion for a rescue operation at a house some distance away from the prison (not part of the prison grounds or anything).

3. 1 & 2 both seem kind of fishy. If #1 is true, why are British agents going undercover and blowing things up? If #2 is true, is that really the most efficient or reliable way to rescue the 2 British agents when they are not at the prison? Wouldn't the noise of the prison raid merely heighten alert levels, and increase the probability of effective evasive action at nearby houses?

4. Cathy: More British FOIAS please. This is a journo's wet dream!!!

[Dave W.]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,7374-1790292,00.html

[Twba]

Limey coppers and Iraqi coppers are telling different stories about the same events. My experiences in deep shit have taught me not to believe everything the cops say. Good luck finding the truth in this exotic clusterfuck.

[TallDave]

...causality's a tough gig.

It's not causality... it's reality. 9/11 happened. You don't have to prove causality for something that actually happened.

gaius: I see having lost the argument, you've descended to the debate level of a four-year-old.

[Dave W.]

You don't have to prove causality for something that actually happened.

Wrong.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proximate_cause

[TallDave]

Ah yes, joe, the guy who says Iraqis can't handle democracy... but also says that he thinks more highly of them than I do, because he believes they can liberate themsleves from a brutal paranoid hypermilitaristic regime (he doesn't say how, so I can only assume it's Magical Liberation Pixies or something), and I don't. The guys who has a "plan"... which amounts to waiting for Muslims to free themselves in the face of tanks and helicopters and machine guns, while we santion 25 million Iraqis into near-starvation, occupy Muslim holy lands, and periodically bomb Saddam's forces.

The guy who can't understand the result of those policies was 9/11.

And I'm the fool.

[TallDave]

I'm not talking about proximate causes. I'm talking about whether a policy actually resulted in something actually happening.

Unless you're arguing 9/11 had nothing to do with U.S. policy, that it was some sort of natural event totally unrelated to anything we do and unpreventable by any action we took, you have to accept that reality.

[TallDave]

Dave W,

1. Again, the assumption is they were only posing as terrorists in order to infiltrate terrorist organizations. If that turns out not to be true, of course that's a serious problem. But I can't for the life of me think of any reason why they would be bombing innocent civilians.

[Dave W.]

Yes you are talking about proximate causes.

Building the WTC in the 1970s was a causation in fact of a big part of 9/11. But you have no problem with that (nor do I).

Allowing private companies to fly big dangerous jets in the sky was a cause in fact of 9/11, but this isn't your beef either (nor do I).

Rather, out of all the possible* causes in fact, you select that the US wasn't being hardball enuf with the Middle East. Effectively, you are saying that "out of the causes in fact, this cause is the important relevant one." That is assigning proximate cause. You can give your selection process a different name, but you are just assigning proximate cause, plain and simple.

FOOTNOTE:

* I do not agree with you that US failure to play hardball was a cause in fact. However, you seem convinced about this and I won't try to dissuade you of that here. I'd rather just have you read up on assigning proximate cause, both in the tort sense and the political sense. It is a difficult, intellectual issue and you are not engaging the issue, just grandstanding. That is a pattern you are gonna hafta break if you want readers to take you seriously.

[Dave W.]

But I can't for the life of me think of any reason why they would be bombing innocent civilians.

And I can't for the life of me understand why the SAS agents were caught with both costumes and explosives in their car. If they needed to explode things, then they should be in uniform like a real soldier. If they need to be undercover, then they shouldn't have bombs on them. I imagine next time the Iraqi police will simply pull a Menezes and say, "they could have detonated the bombs so we had to shoot them immediately." Not much the Brits could criticize about that strategy at this point in time. Good enuf for London, good enuf for Basra.

[TheDumbFish]

The suggestion that the British agents were behind several bombings in Basra sounds like a tin-foil hat theory to me.

My guess is that they were undercover guys who were walking the fine line between good guy/bad guy that men in that position are forced to do.

I can imagine scenarios where such an undercover agent might have explosives in his car. The same way I can imagine that an undercover cop might have illegal drugs on his possession.

[a]

But I can't for the life of me think of any reason why they would be bombing innocent civilians.

Divide and Conquer.

[Dave W.]

The suggestion that the British agents were behind several bombings in Basra sounds like a tin-foil hat theory to me.

Why did they have bombs in their car, then? What's the non-tin-foil hat theory there? I haven't heard any official denial that there were bombs in the car. Have you?

[Dave W.]

The same way I can imagine that an undercover cop might have illegal drugs on his possession.

If illegal drugs are stolen from undercover cops, then some people get high. If bombs are stolen from undercover SAS, then people end up blown up in the road. Having 2 SAS agents running around with real bombs they are trying to sell, if that is what happened, is stupid strategy. You can kinda see why that might have confused the Basra police a bit.

[Dave W.]

Not to mention the fact that undercover police are supposed to have backup when they are carrying around big bags 'o drugs. Doesn't sound like the SAS guys had sufficient (uniformed) backup for their dangerous mission with the deadly bombs. That is pretty suspicious.

[TheDumbFish]

All we can do is wild-ass guessing.

If the undercover agents were trying to infiltrate some insurgent group, having explosives in a car (without any intent to actually use them) might enable them to keep up the appearance of being fellow terrorists/insurgents.

I'm not saying that it was a wise or careful thing to do. I don't know how these operations work, although I have seen many spy movies.

This seems alot more realistic than the idea that undercover British agents are going around setting off bombs, which I think is what several posters are suggesting.

Of course, if this is the same Dave W. who made the infamous secret designer/secret designs quote, I fancy that you are much more conspiracy minded than I am.

[TallDave]

Dave W.,

Right, but those causes aren't "proximate."

Rather, out of all the possible* causes in fact, you select that the US wasn't being hardball enuf with the Middle East.

As your examples point it, it's an extremely low bar to say a policy failed to prevent an action, which is why as I pointed out you have to accept that it did. I don't claim that was the ONLY policy change that would have prevented 9/11. I do think it was a relatively important one, esp in relation to the larger problem of terrorism in general.

If they need to be undercover, then they shouldn't have bombs on them.

Ummm... undercover agents posing as bombers shouldn't have bombs on them? Think that one through again.

[TallDave]

Oh, and my argument was we should have been actively democratizing Iraq and Afghanistan, not just playing hardball, if there was any confusion about that.

[TallDave]

Divide and Conquer.

Divide who? They're on our side already. Bombing Shia civilians would turn thema against us.

[Dave W.]

What if Iraq and Afghanistan and Iraq decided to Islamicize us (assume they had the guns and bombs to do it somehow). Would that be:

a. playin' Hardball;

or

b. playin' softball?

Like I said, hardball.