Every single day another reason appears for letting the Shi'a and the Sunnis go at it, as go at it they must. For the Sunnis will never permit all the oil wealth of "Iraq," and what it brings them, to be appropriated by the Shi'a Arabs. What does it take to get those who make or approve, or withhold approval, of policies, to see this? Of course there is embarrassment. Of course there is obstinacy. Of course wishing to see the various vilayets reemerge as the true Iraq, and to see men, money, materiel, and attention drawn from circumjacent Muslim states, instead of from the United States, is not something the Administration need openly desire. It need only find a reasonable facsimile of an excuse, then fax that reasonable facsimile to everyone everywhere.
What is that "excuse"? That "excuse" could be articulated by the President in a speech like this:
1. In Iraq there has developed -- it is time for all of us to recognize -- a profound civil conflict over the distribution of power and wealth in that society. We cannot, of course, intervene to tell Shi'a how they should use their power, or to tell the Sunnis what new arrangements may be necessary for them to accept. We cannot dictate to the Kurds what is the minimum amount of autonomy that they would be willing to accept, after they were for so many years the victims of mass murder by the forces of the Iraqi state. In order to make sure that a clearly dangerous dictator did not possess, or was not well on his way to acquiring, weapons of mass destruction, the armed forces of the United States entered Iraq and removed that dictator and his entire regime. This ensured that that regime would never again pose a threat for the people of Iraq -- especially the Kurds and the Shi'a Arabs. It also ensured that Iraq would not be a threat to its neighbors, two of which [be careful here not to name "Iran"] had been invaded by Iraq.
And there was something else that we accomplished, with the encouragement of so many Iraqis in exile, so many who had spent decades fighting for a free Iraq. [Speechwriter's note to Bush: well, actually most of those whom the Americans knew were sophisticated, westernized, secular in-name-only Shi'a who had spent decades in the West. They had lost their sense of what Iraq and its Muslim masses were really like: how they thought, how they reacted, what sense they made of things, how they behaved toward Infidels, and what kind of concentric circles depicted their varying degrees of loyalty to family, tribe, ethnic or sectarian identity -- but not, save in a handful of cases, to something called "Iraq." At their encouragement, we thought only of getting rid of Saddam Hussein.] We've done all we can. We have spent, or committed, nearly $400 billion dollars. We organized the first free election in the Muslim Middle East, in a country that for decades has been under one military dictator or despot after another. We arranged for the Iraqis to draw up a Constitution, and then to hold a vote on that Constitution. We have seen an interim regime, under Mr. Allawi, and then the first elected leader, Mr. Jaabari. Now there is a legitimate leader of the Iraqi people, Mr. Al-Maliki.
American soldiers have now been in Iraq since March 19, 2003. Before that, for ten years, American planes protected two zones, both north and south, so that Saddam Hussein could only in limited fashion attack either the Kurds or the Shi'a. The American people did not make, and we did not intend them to make [oh yes you did, but let's not talk about that now] an endless commitment to Iraq. Americans have now been fighting and dying to keep the peace in a country of some 26 million people for several years. It is not too much to expect some of those 26 million people to defend themselves: their government, their own societies, and the idea of Iraq. We are fast approaching the time when we will have been in Iraq longer than the time from the declaration of war on Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany to V-J Day. The American people have spent their money, their men, their war materiel, and have accomplished a great deal. We believe that it is right and proper that we now leave Iraq, wishing it, and its people, well.
Whether the people in Iraq will grasp the opportunity we have given them, and make the compromises with each other necessary to create a real nation-state, is their business. We have accomplished all that we could. I have asked Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to begin the withdrawal of American forces, including all of our military equipment, save for a small amount that is already pre-positioned in Kurdistan in case of future need. That withdrawal should be complete by January of 2007. There are many perils in the world, not all of which we can solve, and not all of which are solvable by military means. There is much to be done, in our attempts, as members of the Western Alliance, to protect ourselves, and others threatened by the worldwide Jihad. Spending all of our capital, the men, the money, the materiel, the attention, the morale of our military and our citizens, in attempting to do for Iraq what it is the duty of Iraqis to do for themselves, is no longer an option.
May God Bless the American People.
Good Night
[And Good Luck].
Something like that. By Labor Day.
10 point jump in the polls tomorrow. We’ve spent about $1,400 per US citizen, and lost the lives of a small, but significant, number of our Country’s best young men to learn a lesson about the middle eastern world. The lives we’re lost and the resources we’ve allocated have not been in vain, they have enlightened the Western population to the realities that we face and destabilized one of the most organized powers in the region.
Maintain a base in Kurdistan, make sure it has an airstrip, a deployable ground force, and an intelligence center willing to pay willing informants. Maintain a low profile. Use Israel’s new model of ‘disproportional response’ to prevent the enemy’s organization. Allow them to turn their creative energies inward.
I think there is also the fear that if we just walk away, Iran could end up geting a large chunk of Iraq, and the oil.
It's all about the West learning how to approach this war. This war is totally dissimilar from previous wars in our history, and totally antithetical to our modern views (many of which are wrong-headed, but nevertheless still exist).
If Iraq turns the page and becomes the first Islamic nation to embrace human rights and reject barbarity, then wonderful.
But in the incredibly more LIKELY event that Iraq regresses backwards towards violent obsessions, crushing oppressions, arrogant aggressions, and international transgressions, we will have something we didn't have before: the ability to say "WE TRIED TO HELP THEM".
Although wrongheaded, our modern Western sensibilities and conscience demands that we try to address all of the PC, multicultural, and economic "factors" that the Leftist among us (namely Europe) persist in blaming for Jihadist violence. Iraq was that trial.
So when the next 9/11-type strike is committed by the Jihadists (not if - WHEN), our efforts and failures in Iraq will enable us to finally prosecute the War Against Islamic Jihad as it should be prosecuted because we have eliminated the possibility of trying to "help".
Having dumped "helping" from our mission objectives, we are left with a much more sensible and effective list of war objectives:
- DESTROY the governments that support terror,
- DESTROY their means of violent conflict, in terms of both human fighters and weaponry.
- DESTROY to the greatest extent possible their means to fabricate future weaponry
- DESTROY any building found to be sheltering armed fighters, be it a mosque, hospital, or school (remove the advantage that Islamists now have of staging their attacks from such places, hopefully with the effect of reducing their frequency)
- TAKE whatever spoils necessary to pay for our troubles - oil included.
- LEAVE.
Let us hope that we are students worthy of the valuable lessons our Middle Eastern Muslim teachers have provided us.
Benjamin, you said: I think there is also the fear that if we just walk away, Iran could end up geting a large chunk of Iraq, and the oil.
This is the real reason why we did not squash Iraq in the first gulf war. We left a weakened Iraq in place to counter the weakened Iran. We didn't want a power vacumn with Tehran taking over the middle east.
This is exactly what Iran wants. Iran has a population that is getting older and they will be out of oil in 20 years. They KNOW that if they do not grab up the oil around them, they are going to be in trouble. ALSO, they very much want to force their type of Islam down everyone's throat in the area. They want to RULE.
So with those factors in mind, we can understand the mess that we now have to deal with.
I HATE IT every time I hear that one of our kids has died or been injured over there. THEY ARE NOT WORTH IT. Why are we sending our Christian kids to die for people who worship a demonic god? It doesn't make sense. I know and understand that they are meant to hold back the spread of this hateful religion, but it sickens me that our kids are paying the price.
I would have preferred that we had dropped a mushroom on Iran and forfeited the oil. Our oil companies have bought the patents to alternative methods of fuel - ie. water- powered engines. Shell bought a patent about 20 years ago and this was common knowledge by some of the engineers at British Leyland. Meanwhile, these companies are making huge profits and the expense of our kids dying. THEY too make me SICK.
Has anyone noticed that such fights for resources break out whenever natural resources are controlled by the government, and not when they are controlled by private corporations? Take Iraq's state oil companies out of the government sphere. Issue an equal number of shares to every Iraqi head of household. This should solve some of the problem.
chsw
PS: Russia, Iran and Venezuela are examples of dictatorships whose foreign adventures are funded by state-owned oil.
It's looking like Islam is the major problem in Iraq and in this special case I'd rather let them slaughter each other for Allah and save the rest of us all the Bull sh*t of riots because a soldier entered a Mosque with their boots still on.
One thing really troubling in Toronto and parts of canada is that while Hezbollah is a banned Terrorist group the Police provide security for Jew-bashing Peace marches where the pro-Hezbollah Arabs and Muslim proudly fly the hezbollah flag and wear the Jihad headbands while chanting death threats from the Quran , the Police now arrest the anti-Hezbollah protester
that counter the rallies .
Funny how Muslims in Canada spew hatred for Americans and America but when border security
beefs up , these same Muslims scream "Racism"
and demand the right to cross into the USA
as a Canadian Citizen.
BTW, these Protests are held near the coffee shop that had a failed suicide bomber that the Police tried to cover up as a man with gasoline sneaking a smoke in the washroom and ignited the gas.
Orangeducks - I agree completely with what you've said above. Iraq was the last, best hope for a non-destructive approach to worldwide jihad. We won't take the same approach after the next big event. The choice for those in the West will be made simple.
Hugh, the reason why the president can't do that is that it would require explaining about Shi'a and sunnis. That would entail explaining arab cultural nuances. The American people wouldn't understand or care about nuances like that. Bush has spoken only about the "iraqi people" as one monolithic entity just as if they were the "American people". For him to explain a pullout by starting to talk about sunnis and shi'a and all that jazz would leave the average american scratching his head. And Bush scratching his.
Indeed, for his part, I am not sure that Bush himself understands the nuances. And even if he did, his simplisitic convictions about global freedom and democracy make his position far too intractable to ever entertain nuances like that, much less use them to explain why America must pullout of an enterprise he has defended as being "democracy on the march".
American should pull out for a myriad of reason, not just to let the muslims slaughter each other, as you advocate. That won't really help, as muslims are more than capable of replenishing their stocks as quickly as they are killed. They breed to fight and kill. However, what will change is that if America pulls out, Iran will surely pull in. Forget about the oil bonanza. Once they own Iraq, they will be able to use Syria as a conduit for a direct land invasion of Israel. That Iraqi buffer zone, is the only thing keeping Iranian forces from charging directly into Israel with everything they got.
Several posters here excuse the Administration's expenditure of resources as an admittedly "expensive" lesson in learning how to deal with Islam. Two things are wrong with these attempts at exculpation.
The first is that the Administration still gives no sign of knowing how to frame the war of self-defense against the Jihad, and therefore cannot admit to itself, much less to the public, that the aim of this war is to weaken and constrain the forces of Jihad, that is, the camp of Islam. Refusing to study Islam, refusing to see what can and what cannot be described so optimistically as "extremism" or a "handful of extremists," the Administration continues to hallucinate. It does not appear as yet to have learned much of anything about either the nature of Islam, its world-wide threat, and about the instruments of Jihad beyond that of terrorism. So terrorism, not campaigns of Da'wa in American prisons, or on the streets, and not the demographic changes in Western Europe that are showing results in the timidity of politicians or, still worse, their deliberate pandering to Muslims at the expense of the interests of the indigenous Infidels.
Obstinat adherence to a policy that squanders resources -- men, money, materiel, and morale (civilian and military), that has and is doing damage to the armed forces, and to the willingness of civilians to maintain, or even to expand, measures designed to contain Islam -- is the result. The only thing for which a reasonable excuse can be made is for the initial invasion, if it was undertaken, as it was presented as being undertaken, for the sole purpose of finding and destroying major weaponry, or in finding and disrupting weapons projects that might result in the acquisition of such weaponry. Any other aim can be understood as being based on a misunderstanding of Islam, a misunderstanding of Iraq, and a final misunderstanding of how the menace of Islam, and the new situation created in Iraq by the removal of Saddam Hussein, coudl work to the advantage of Infidels.
And it will work, if only those Infidels would see the situation correctly. That they do no can be explained by a stubborn refusal to rethink all the original notions, and by an embarrassment that not only are the things they have been attempting to do for the past three years in Iraq not being achieved, but are the very opposite of what we should wish to be achieved.
I wouldn't be quick to find excuses for the obstinacy, the ignorance, and the wastefulness, of all those who are hewing to this policy -- just as there are no excuses for those who attack that same policy not because they find Islam so menacing, but because they don't. The camp of appeasers (Scowcroft, General William Odom, and so on), who stick to the two beliefs that the "root cause" of Muslim behavior has nothing to do with Qur'an and Hadith, and Sira, but has everything to do with Israel and the Palestinians, and who, curiously, appear to think that the best way to have Iran give up its nuclear weapons or its nuclear porject is to have Israel do it first -- in other words, to have Israel commit suicide. With opponents like that, no wonder the Bush Administration keeps thinking it must be on the right path in Iraq.
But it isn't. It hasn't been clever enough, cunning enough, ruthless enough. It believes in winning hearts, winning minds, building countries, handing out money. If we are to believe Tom Ricks, the generals in Iraq have decided to treat Iraqi prisoners who are being released as "customers" (even to refer to them as such) and to "ask those customers" how they felt they had been treated -- perhaps even filling out a little card at the end. And then they are asked such questions as "why did you decide to become an insurgent" or "why did you decide to attack us" and so on. "Customers." "Customer satisfaction." "The customer is always right."
The Adminisetration, and those in Congress who do not scream and yell about what is going on, appearently think that conflict within Iraq between Sunni Arabs and Shi'a Arabs, is not only avoidable, or suppressible (suppressible by whom? and for how long? and what is the likelihood that any Shi'a-dominated government will satisfy Sunni demands, or that the Sunnis will ever acknowledge that they now constitute 19% of the population, have no oil under the lands they live on, and had better submit to that Shi'a domination they so far refuse to accept? None of this can conceivably happen. And for us, of only our government did not feel wedded, possibly out of deep embarrassment, to the current possibliity, it is a good thing that a Sunni-Shi'a reconciliation as "Iraqis" can never happen, that they will never make the compromises necessary. Why should they? Each is convinced that it possesses powerful circumjacent supporters -- the Shi'a Iran, and the Sunnis Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states, Egypt, even the Sunni volunteers from Jordan and Syria. Let both be convinced that each will win. Let them go at it. And hope that men, money, materiel, and morale, this time of Muslims, is used up in the effort.
Nice fantasy, Hugh. Totally inconsistent with Bush policy up to now, which would make it impossible for Bush to say such words.
First, you ignored Bush's commitment to "democracy" in the Middle East. Bush has staked his entire Presidency on that, and he's not going to walk away from it.
Second, Bush has stated that a failed Iraq state would become a breeding ground for anti-Western terrorists and jihadists. You didn't address that problem either. Because, frankly, Bush has a point there. The sectarian violence that took place in Afghanistan between the Taliban and the Northern Alliance didn't prevent al-Qaeda from training there to attack America. Iraq is a big country, and even while Shi'a and Sunni are fighting each other, there's plenty of room for jihadists there to attack America too. Right now, the only thing keeping that from happening is American surveillance--if we spotted an al-Qaeda training camp being built somewhere inside Iraq, our Army could go there and put it out of business.
Leave now, Iraq fades into Shia dominated Iran within years, leaving more of the worlds oil in the hands of Mahmoud Im a madman ejad. Leave now, Iraq becomes the place where Americans died to go home before we completed the mission. Leave now, UBL - Hizb'allah - HAMAS - Islamic Jihad, et al, see that if they attack, attack, attack that Americans will run, just like in Somalia, and the ideology that gives birth to Jihad will have won another victory over freedom, tolerance and peace. 9/11/2001. Never, ever forget. Do not quit now!
1. "you ignored Bush's commitment to "democracy" in the Middle East. Bush has staked his entire Presidency on that, and he's not going to walk away from it."
2. "Bush has stated that a failed Iraq state would become a breeding ground for anti-Western terrorists and jihadists. You didn't address that problem either."
-- both from the sameposting above
3. "...see that if they attack, attack, attack that Americans will run, just like in Somalia, and the ideology that gives birth to Jihad will have won another victory over freedom, tolerance and peace. 9/11/2001. Never, ever forget. Do not quit now!"
-- from a different posting above
I didn't "ignore his commitment to 'democracy'" -- his "commitment to democracy" is exactly what helped assure the Shi'a ascendancy (it would have come by other means without purple-thumbed experiment in vote-counting that one doubts will be repeated once the Americans leave). The speech put into his mouth takes note of that "democracy" (a "democracy" like that in Lebanon would now doom its Christians and give greatest power to Hezbollah; a "democracy" in Egypt would bring the Muslim Brotherhood to power; ditto in Syria). I didn't accept any of his hallucinatory hopes, his sentimentality (sentimentality about "freedom" but cruelty to the troops, asked to sacrifice themselves for a policy based on ignorance of Iraq and ignorance of Islam). He's "not going to walk away"? Then he is assuring more years of waste, diverted attention, and growing isolationism.
That's a reply to #1.
#2. -- see posting above for the objection I am replying to.
The "failed state" invocation. What is a "failed state" anyway? Is Iraq now a "failed state"? Is Iran a "failed state"? Is Cuba a "failed state"? Is Venezuela a "failed state"? Is Libya a "failed state"? What does this phrase mean? It is used a lot, with brows furrowing and looks of great signficance exchanged, as if the phrase "failed state" meant something everyone clearly understood, and whatever a "failed state" was or is, any "failed state" is a danger, a danger which, apparently, will inevitably lead to terrorist training camps, and we all know that if Iraq becomes a "failed state" -- that is, with the Sunnis and Shi'a slugging it out everywhere, there will be plenty of time in the midst of all this mayhem for groups of them, joining forces or acting separately, to set up those very same Al-Qaeda camps that were in Afghanistan, and which are apparently indispensable to all terrorists everywhere, even if Hamas, Hezbollah, Laskar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad, and a thousand other groups never seemed to rely on people who had trained in Afghanistan, nor were the attacks in Moscow, in Beslan, in Amsterdam, in Madrid, in London, or planned but aborted or averted in a thousand other places, dependent on those who had "trained in the failed state of Afghanistan."
I've been through this with you, S.L., many times before. Each time you have no answer, but you simply ignore what I write, ignore the points made. This kind of thing is intolerable, and a waste of my time, and that of others here. Answer the points made, the main point being that the chaos and warfare likely to develop makes Iraq a most unlikely place for the smooth functioning of a terrorist training camp -- remember, it was when the Taliban had finally triumphed, when the Soviets were long gone and the Peace of that Taliban reigned, that Al Qaeda could establish itself. Do you think Sunni Muslims would not find their hands full just fighting Shi'a? Why don't you? And do you think the Americans, having learned at least some lessons, can't monitor the situation much more closely than they ever did in Afghanistan? Is everything always exactly the same?
#3. Why would "Jihad win another victory over freedom, tolerance and peace" if the Americans no longer are in Iraq to prevent internecine warfare? Isn't the best way, the most sensible way, to take advantage of whatever pre-existing divisions exist within Islam, and when they are presented on a platter in Iraq, with both sectarian and ethnic divisions, made all the more acute by the sudden removal of the dictator who kept the Sunnis on top, and the equally sudden realization by the Shi'a of their own numbers, even as the Sunnis continue to believe that they constitute not 19% but rather 42% of the population -- what kind of reverse realpolitik is it that fails to recognize this, at long last, and fails to see how it can work, inside Iraq, and with repercussions outside Iraq, likely to lead to further diisions and demoralization within the camp of Islam.
The current policy makes no sense, except as a reflection of the inability to admit, or not even to admit, but at least to quietly refashion the matter so as to cover a withdrawal that will not be a defeat but a declaration of victory (just wait, and that "victory" for Infidels in Iraq will come).
Hugh: Thanx for your learned analysis. If I had two next door neighbors who were beating each other bloody and if, when I tried to separate them and restore peace, they wanted me to partake of the same, I would probably leave them to their party without any further interruption by me...I'm sure you've heard that well worn saw from down south: When you rassle with a hog, you git dirty an' the hog likes it...