Iraq Study Group Reaches Concensus 621
reporter writes to point us to a story in the Washington Post reporting that the Iraq Study Group has reached consensus and will issue its 100-page report on December 6: 'The Iraq Study Group, which wrapped up eight months of deliberations yesterday, has reached a consensus and will call for a major withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq, shifting the U.S. role from combat to support and advising, according to a source familiar with the deliberations.' The Post mentions that first word of the panel's conclusions came from the New York Times yesterday. The Times points out that it is not clear how many U.S. troops would come home; some brigades might be withdrawn to Iraqi bases out of the line of fire from which they could provide protection for remaining U.S. operations.
The Reverse Vietnam (Score:5, Insightful)
That's how we got into Vietnam.
Re:The Middle East is the new Southeast Asia (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally, I'd rather they not stick to any bad plan. Why would anyone possibly want that? What has "sticking to the same plan no matter what" brought us for the lasdt 3 or so years?
Shhhhhhh (Score:2, Insightful)
You break it you buy it. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:cutting out too soon? (Score:3, Insightful)
Why would Iraqis want to fight for Americans against their own people? If you want them to get serious about running their own country, there's only one way to do so: tell them you're leaving in a few months and then they're on their own.
"It will also destroy what little credibility the US has left."
Bush has already destroyed most of America's credibility, and attempting to continue an occupation that's already lost will only destroy the rest. If you wanted to maintain some credibility in the world, you shouldn't have invaded a third-rate country that posed no threat to you, but did have a population who'd be eager to fight against an invader for as long as it took to kick them out.
So yes, American 'military power' will be a joke after you've been tossed out of both Iraq and Afghanistan by locals with AK-47s, but so what?
Re:cutting out too soon? (Score:2, Insightful)
Only one answer to that: FUCK YOU! You have been arrogant and disgusting with your campaign against those who said invading Iraq was a terrible idea, ruining the career of individuals (those CIA agents who warned there were no WMD in Iraq) or making fun of whole populations (Germans and especially the French), so that nobody wants to help you anymore. Now shut the fuck up or accept publicly you have done a mess, impeach Bush and put him on trial. This is the only way to show you have more than one neuron in your brain that voted twice for the chimp that is in the White House.
Re:The Middle East is the new Southeast Asia (Score:1, Insightful)
I was in the army for quite some time, and there was something that I heard over and over and over and over:
In my experience, turned out to be pretty true. If you want to do something, make a plan, once the plan is done then stick the fucking good idea fairy in a bottle and execute it. If you let that bitch second guess you all the time, you will get your ass kicked every time.
Advice on reading fringe pro-bias sites. (Score:5, Insightful)
Reading Newsbusters is as valuable as reading FAIR.org. These so-called "watchdogs" are lapdogs of media that share their own fringe biases, and they bite the media just for not sharing their opinions and political bias.
Re:My plan for Iraq (Score:5, Insightful)
You should be worried, of course given your apparent dearth of knowledge about the region it is no surprise you see it that way. But here's the problem: Saudi Arabia also has Shi'a areas. And, surprise, surprise, those area have oil. You separate the Shi'a in Iraq and they get a base of operations to foment resistance to the Saudi regime.
As for the Sunni area? They basically become irrelevant, especially since Baghdad will become Shiite. The Saudis will likely step in and offer some sort of support to stabilize this area.
Wow, tacit approval of ethnic cleansing, nice.
All in all you seem to miss the point, the US in reality has no say on whether Iraq splits or not, there is and will continue to be a civil war which will decide these matters.
Re: cutting out too soon? (Score:3, Insightful)
It's already a huge victory for radical Islam and general anti-US sentiment in the Middle East and elsewhere. Staying there for a few more years of killing and dying aren't going to help that in the least.
> It will also destroy what little credibility the US has left.
Tell us more about this credibility the US has left.
> Maybe (unlikely) the US will admit it screwed up, request a UN mandate, and allow an international peace keeping force to step in and help administer Iraq till it can get back on its feet?
There's not any peace to be kept. The peace-keeping force will be needed after the three major factions have self-organized the new division of power, and only minor skirmishing over local details remains.
The plots at the bottom of this page give a good feel for how much progress we've made in the past 3-1/2 years. "Stay the course" is just a strategy of trading lives indefinitely in order to avoid admitting to a world-class screw-up.
How many times in the past 3-1/2 years have we been told that "the next six months will be critical"? How many times have people cheered when an election or a high-profile capture gave the illusion of progress?
Is there the slightest reason to believe that the next six months, or 3-1/2 years, will be any different?
Frankly, I think Bush's strategy is to leave the problem for the next President, and then claim in his memoirs that we would have won if his successor hadn't cut and run. The neocons are already taking time out from their clamoring for a similar fuckup in Iran, to figure out who they can blame for the failure of their grandiose vision for Iraq.
Word of advice from old British Empire... (Score:5, Insightful)
Word of advice from the British Empire: things get really sticky later on down the line when outsiders draw lines on maps and tell locals how it's going to be.
Why we are really there. (Score:5, Insightful)
I think occupations can create democracies, by holding a diverse group of people together long enough to develop a common identity. It was done by some European powers, take India for example. The problem is that this sort of colonialism takes a large-scale occupation, much larger than we have now, for a time span of MULTIPLE DECADES. This is economically, strategically, and politically impossible in the modern era.
In order to hold this unstable country together, you either have to be a brutal dictator like Sadam or act like the freaking Romans. I suspect if every time a US soldier was killed we rounded up and killed 500 random people, the resistance would end quite quickly. However, any nation created this way will only last as long as that threat of force is present.
Ultimately, I think the people in charge of this whole charade knew this was going to happen all along. In the minds of the neocons who started this whole thing, the people of Iraq are just one piece in a puzzle. You'll notice lately that US troop casualties have been falling while Iraqi casualties have been rising. This is because our troops have been retreating to fewer, larger bases, performing fewer daily patrols, and patrol in more heavily armored convoys. The insurgents have gone for easier targets, Iraqi army members, and mainly, innocent civilians. Sunnis fight Shiia, Shiia fight Sunnis, the Kurds just want out entirely, and everyone wants a piece of the non-uniformly distributed oil resources.
I think the military is really content to sit back and watch as Iraq destroys itself, while the US troops serve their purpose, guarding the valuable oil pipelines. For the people in charge, as long as the crude is flowing, the whole country might as well just drop dead. Also, the troops presence serves a second important function. By having a large troop presence in the center of the Middle East, the pentagon intends to keep Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and all the major powers in line. While our boys on the ground fight for their lives trying to help the Iraqi people, the people at the top are looking at grand strategic goals.
And that is why we went there in the first place. Not WMDs, not democracy, not anything else. Our troops are there to stabilize Iraq's oil flow, and to keep the whole region in line, stabilizing the larger oil supply. The Iraqi people are meaningless. Our troops will be behind high walls and thick armor, while the rest of the country degenerates into pure chaos.
Re:In other words (Score:5, Insightful)
Not that it really matters since Bush is already planning to ignore what the study group says. He'll just continue to "Stay the course".
You are correct. Bush will ignore what the panel recommends and force the next president to do it.
I considered myself to be pretty much a "yellow dog Republican" prior to this election. For you non-USAers, the short explanation of this term means that you would vote for anyone, even a yellow dog, as long as they run under a particular party's banner. I have to give the Republicans credit that whoever invented the "cut and run" statement was able with 3 words to stop all rational discussion of the issue by turning it into a debate on cowardness. All anyone has to do is say "cut and run" and rational debate is over because it's now been shifted into an emotional issue. What finally did it for me and made me vote Democrat a few weeks ago was that I concluded that Henry Kissinger is right that Iraq is not winnable in a conventional sense. More troops won't shore up the porous borders around Iraq that allow the non-stop flow of weapons that are fueling the Shiite-Sunni civil war. The Republicans try to fear monger that the second we leave, Al Queda will come in, but I finally concluded that we aren't stopping Al Queda right now anyway, so why are we still there?
Unfortunately I didn't realize this until after the 2004 elections where I foolishly voted for Bush, but I finally figured out last year exactly why he does what he does. There is a small subset of people who see the world in black and white. He is one of those people. Most people don't see the world in black and white, so they don't know what it is like to deal with these people because there aren't a lot of them. People who see the world in black and white don't agonize over any decisions. They make their minds up very quickly and rarely change them. If they do change them, they go completely to the other side. Ever heard of former smokers who now compaign non-stop to stop everyone, everywhere from smoking? That's kind of how these people are when they change their minds. The biggest problem with these people who see everything in black and white is that they are completely unable to see the viewpoint of anyone who disagrees with them. It's because to them, everything is crystal clear and it's so clear that if you don't see it that way, you must be crazy. Any dissenting words are just "crazy talk" and their minds are completely closed. This is why Bush says things like "If you aren't with us, you're against us." He sees everything in black and white. Once Chaney and Rumsfield and a few others convinced him that Iraq had to be invaded, it was game over. He'll never back down because to him, it's all crystal clear that he was right to go to Iraq and to leave is wrong. I'm amazed that more people don't understand this about Bush. Once you grasp how he sees the world, it's not difficult to understand what he'll do. It explains why he refuses to talk to North Korea except in those bogus "6 party talks". He's made up his mind that the 6 party talks are the only way to resolve it and he can't conceive of a one-on-one approach because that's "crazy talk". Bush is never going to remove troops from Iraq because to him, the issue is clear cut. He's right, his opponents are wrong, end of story.
Re:cutting out too soon? (Score:3, Insightful)
As far as spinning it as a victory for radical Islam: the US's presence is a victory for radical Islamists, providing endless streams of propaganda and recruits. US withdrawal might embolden the jihadists; but the damage has already been done. Withdrawal might also cause the Jihadi's backers to lose interest in them, much as the US lost interest int he mujahedeen after the AFghan war.
Re: You break it you buy it. (Score:3, Insightful)
I like that principle, but what do you do when you can' fix what you broke?
It's a Civil war (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why we are really there. (Score:3, Insightful)
meh (Score:2, Insightful)
Considering the source (NYT), I am highly skeptical of their 'summary' of such a report.
If this report said something on the order of:
1. rebuild Iraqi army
2. rebuild Iraqi police force
3. stabilize civil situation
4. exterminate/disarm Shia/Sunni factions.
(...)
88. Paint the house
89. Walk the dog
90. Reduce American force deployments in Iraq
the NYT would summarise as "Bush is a poopyhead; Iraq Study Group agrees with NYT that US forces in Iraq should be REDUCED immediately!"
Remember, this is the 'newspaper of record' that somehow failed to publicize that the Congressional committee on prewar intel found that the original claims of the administration were widely held at the time to be accurate & that Robert Wilson (you know, Mr Valerie Plame) was a self-aggrandizing liar.
Re:You break it you buy it. (Score:3, Insightful)
You mean, profited WHO. You misspelled who. I mean, c'mon, $25 and up hammers? I'm a more well informed buyer than the whole of the US Gov't? Are you kidding me? No, it didn't make the US any money, but tanks, armor, hammers, and other stuff, are not free. And in a no-bid situation, you're just throwing money away.
Who knows, Halliburton may have been the best one to go with, but since they had no incentive to cut any prices, as well as the other suppliers for this whole thing, because of the no-bid, there was no reason to cut prices.
Re:cutting out too soon? (Score:3, Insightful)
Insurgents don't win by 'holding territory', they win by forcing invaders to cower in their 'Green Zone' because they're too scared to come out and play, until they finally decide it would be a good idea to leave.
The whole problem in Iraq is that America thought they could win a 21st century war with 20th century tactics.
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:5, Insightful)
There's something in the American psyche these days that demands they leave every job half done.
That's convenient.
There is/was something in the American Administration that demanded that it botch every single aspect of Iraq war planning, from the general idea (Al's a threat! Let's attack Iggy!), to the lack of a plan to keep the peace (as the Shinseki [wikipedia.org] episode so cleary demonstrates).
It may be hard for you to understand, but some people oppose the war, and did so from before the start, because it was a bad idea, poorly implemented.
this should be interesting (Score:5, Insightful)
Since we never really had an objective, it would be easy to declare victory no matter the outcome. Disarm Saddam of his WMD? Done--before we even arrived! Regime change? Done. Would've been done sooner, if we hadn't armed and financed him, but let's not dwell on fine points. Pay him back for his support of Al Queida and his role in 9-11? Er, okay, bad example.
But PR can do anything. All they have to do is say "We won! Bush is a great leader!" and trumpet it over and over and over and over, while acting indignant that anyone would ever suggest that Bush, Cheney, and the neoconservatives bear any responsibility at all for anything bad that happened in Iraq (though we can credit them for every flower that bloomed, it seems) and eventually people will come around. If there is ethnic cleansing and tens or hundreds of thousands killed in internecine war, it's not as if the US population is going to sit down and say, "well hell, our President is responsible for that." People consider themselves and the government they voted for responsible for the noble things they meant to do, not what they did. A school opened and a child got a puppy? That's because of George Bush, God bless him. That kid gets killed later that day by a rocket? Not us, Bub. This isn't new--how many Americans felt responsible for the Khmer Rouge? How many Americans care that American financiers helped Hitler? There won't be a reckoning, because there never is. It's too easy to pat ourselves on the back for our nobler motives, and ignore what our decisions actually resulted in.
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:4, Insightful)
The fact that this "war" was unwinnable was obvious to the majority of the world's population before it even started.
Re:In other words (Score:4, Insightful)
As far as Bush and Cheney are concerned, there are numerous blogs, articles and whatnot out there which describe how people like Dennis Feith and other hawks are manipulating things to make the U.S. the sole power in the world. Not just superpower, militarily, but power as in "We'll tell you what to do" power.
Certainly some of these writings are from conspiracy wackos but others are written by seasoned journalists who document and provide evidence for everything they write. In fact, this article [atimes.com] from Asia Times Online, discusses Bush's willingness to ignore both the Study Group recommendations and his avoidance of talking with Syria and Iran.
Let me put it this way. When I first heard Bush say that Iraq had wmds I knew he was lying. I knew Iraq didn't have all these tons of weapons lying around nor have the capacity to produce any such weapons on a moments notice.
Which begs the question: if I knew there were no weapons there, how could this administration not have known there were no weapons there? Further, even when the UN inspectors were doing their inspections (contrary to what some people have said never took place), the U.S. was giving them specific sites to inspect because we "know that he [Saddam] has them" yet not one facility ever produced any evidence that banned weapons were there. That should have sent red flags up all over the place so either Bush ignored these warnings and was determined to "stay the course" or he had already made up his mind to invade Iraq before this whole thing started and the case for wmds was simply a front.
What is really disturbing is that by January or February of 2007, more american lives will have been lost in Iraq than were killed on September 11th. Put another way, Bush, by his actions, will have killed more americans than did Bin Laden. You do remember Bin Laden, don't you? The guy Bush has called irrelevant.
I will make this prediction. Before Bush leaves office, the vast majority of troops will have been pulled from Iraq so Bush will be able to (again) declare, "Mission Accomplished". It will then be left for the incoming president to figure out a way to extract the remaining troops, under fire no less, and not make it look like a retreat. Thus, the onus of failure will not taint Bush's record for posterity, regardless of the facts.
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure, I'll run right over there and ask them. Or maybe I'll check our some picture they can no longer send. Oh, wait I know I'll ask someone who is essentially *ordered* to have a positive outlook how things are going.
Maybe you need to go ask an Iraqi how things are going.
Question is... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:5, Insightful)
Not that I trust the media either, but asking soldiers? Here, let me tell you in advance how it's going to play out:
"You mean I just spent the last X months (years) of my life away from my family in this god forsaken dust bowl getting shot at, not knowing when the next IED is going to go off, seeing my buddies get killed, maimed or shell shocked, all for nothing?"
Nobody wants to think they've endured all that pointlessly. So they'll continue to cling to the notion that this fight can be won, or that civil war can be averted. Otherwise, their sacrifice is meaningless - and that is a thought too hard to bear. To ask a soldier is to get the answer that victory is attainable, because the alternative doesn't bear thinking about.
(Note: The above is not an endorsement of either the media coverage, or the opinions of any political party. I think they have their own biases and agendas too.)
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:3, Insightful)
You should regret it (Score:5, Insightful)
I do think that the aftermath of the military victory was handled poorly.
This is the latest right wing talking point. Don't admit it was a brain dead idea from the beginning, blame the execution. They're trying the same arguments about Viet Nam. It wasn't the intent, it was the execution. It's setting up Rumsfeld to be the patsy and gives the Republican Congress a pass on not doing anything resembling oversight. Where was all this brilliant insight during the build up to the war?
Divide Iraq into three regions. Kurdistan in the north, which would include the border areas around Mosul, the northern oil fields, etc. A central/western Sunni Arab area, and a southern/eastern Shiite Arab area, including the southern oil fields.
ROFL! That's almost as good the pre-war planning. You just alienated Turkey with the independent Kurdistan idea and gave the Kurds a nearly infinite supply of money to fund Kurdish separatists with the oil field revenue. You alienated one of our better allies in the region and funded ongoing instability in a formerly stable region. Off to a great start.
The Saudis will likely step in and offer some sort of support to stabilize this area.
You got that part right but if you think the Saudi money will go to fund stability you need to put the crack pipe down. The Wahhabis supply most of the really freaky, unstable radicals in the region and there's a good chance the bulk of those funds would end up in the hands of Al-Qaida. Everyone who thinks leaving the Sunnis to depend on the most radial elements of radical Islam for funding please raise their hand.
'm not as worried about the Shiite dominated area.
You're not worried about setting up an Islamic regime run by a radical strong man with ties to Hezbollah? Now I know you're high.
You are right that there's no avoiding a civil war at this point, mainly because it's been going on the last year and half. And you're right that we're not going to fix what's broken with the exercise of military power. Pull our troops back to over the horizon bases...an idea which John Kerry suggested and Bush poo-poo'd. Situate those bases so our guys can help control traffic across the Saudi and Iranian borders. Not that leaving Syria and Jordan borders unguarded is a bright spot, but you have less than 100K troops to work with and that's all you can do. Turn over management of our continued presence to the special forces generals instead of regular Army, which was another huge mistake that tends to get glossed over. But when you have so many screw ups to pick from, it's easy to miss one or two.
Re:Why we are really there. (Score:4, Insightful)
When the British left, there was a unified Indian identity. Sure, there was still the Hindu/Muslim clash, but the country was divided into 3 nations, not 50. This is not some grand endorsement of colonialism, however. The main thing the British did was merely provide stability and modern communication and transport. The same thing could have been done if one of the earlier Indian states acquired foreign technology and conquered its neighbors.
The lesson of the British in India is that a national identity cannot be created artificially, it can only develop naturally. It took TWO CENTURIES for this to take effect. The British enforced peace, provided a common language (their own, conveniently for them), and built railroads. This allowed people to move about with much greater ease, blurring the divisions between regions and slowly, naturally forming a kind of national identity. Now India is still a very diverse country, and it was only thanks to its early leaders that it was able to hold itself together, but the early leaders of modern India built upon the previous national identity.
Yes, the British did create unity in India. However, it must be mentioned that they did so purely for their own benefit. They took control of the national economy, and turned what had once been a world-leading, self-sufficient country with a vast manufacturing capability, into a colonial economy focused on providing cheap raw materials for foreign export. It's certainly debatable whether India would have been better off with or without British interference.
The whole point is that you can create a national identity, but only by a very long-term occupation, brutally surpressing any resistance. It was worth it for the British because they harnessed the entire Indian economy for their benefit. We would not do that in modern times not only because it would be morally reprehensible, but because we would have the entirety of the Muslim world trying to bomb US soil, not just a few pissed-off radicals. (You think things are bad now, imagine if Bush announced tommorrow that all Iraqi oil revenues and tax revenues were being confiscated, that numerous home-grown industries would be prohibited, and that Iraqi citizens would be legally required to buy a whole host of manufactured goods exclusively from US companies.)
As far as Northern Ireland goes, that's a whole diffent ballgame. The nation of Ireland existed prior to foreign intervention. Also, in the minds of people like the IRA at least, the opposing group and the occupier were one and the same. In India, the British could at least present themselves more as neutral arbitors. In Northern Ireland, the resistors at least saw it as the British, working for the advancement of British citizens, living in North Ireland. It's hard to create a common identity with your neighbor if you view him as a foreign occupier.
Re:You break it you buy it. (Score:2, Insightful)
And if someone told the US where they could fly - would *you* pay any attention?
Well, a lot of people think Guantanamo shows evidence of torture.
Thanks, Slashdot (Score:5, Insightful)
Established facts:
1) There were no WMDs
2) We all thought there were WMDs
3) We are currently in Iraq
4) Most of us think we should not have gone in the first place, largely based on what we know now
I am tired of disputing these topics. We are there, right now, regardless of why, and whether or not you did support/would have supported the invasion. Let's get past that and talk about what to do now to try and make the best of this. This report (which, BTW, none of us have actually read) allegedly starts from the present and tries to figure out the best course of action from this point forward, and I applaud that. I just wish that some slashdotters could do the same thing.
We get it, you hate George Bush. He is not (by a long shot) my favorite president either, but that shouldn't matter right now. Can we grow up and move on to actually accomplish something, or do we need to keep pointing fingers and accomplishing nothing?
Re:You break it you buy it. (Score:3, Insightful)
the new plan (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Thanks, Slashdot (Score:1, Insightful)
Are you out of your mind?
Nobody with half a brain thought that. Powell was laughed out of the security council with his ridiculous powerpoint presentation. Al-tubes, WTF!?
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:3, Insightful)
We thought you had that worked out, we thought there was a plan. Obviously there wasn't.
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:3, Insightful)
Whoever thought that deposing a government in such a situation was ever winnable were the insane parties.
We seem to have no problem wining battles whatsoever. Making Iraq a safe place to live - the task we have taken on - that's a whole different ballgame.
TaaDaa! (Score:3, Insightful)
Much as I thought that getting in to Iraq was at best stupid, and much as I think the US really should not be there, simply getting out seems less than responsible. We replaced an insane, cruel, arbitrary dictator who nonetheless kept order (but, of course, for how long) with chaos, foreign occupation and what might seems to be turning out to be an insane, cruel , arbitrary and very disorderly civil war. If there is a way to do it, (which I'm far from sure is the case) we owe it to the Iraqis (and their neighbors and the international community in general) to leave the country with some kind of stability that is likely to last for a bit. Otherwise, we are not only not fixing anything, we have, like a spoiled child , deliberately broken things and are leaving the pieces for everyone else to pick up and try to fix.
It may not be feasible to find a way to manage this. It is almost certainly not going to be feasible without international cooperation which the US administration seems to continue to find distasteful. It doesn't help that they pissed off lots of other countries earlier in the process. It probably will involve a US president going with some serious humility to other countries, hat in hand, to ask for support (which almost certainly means it will not be this US president). But we owe it to the Iraqis to at least do our best to try.
We also owe it to ourselves. Leaving Iraq to fester in civil war will be a legacy that the US will find it hard to overcome. If the civil war involves other Middle Eastern countries, it is hard to see how the US will avoid being seen as the ultimate cause. (Certainly Saddam Hussein also shares a good bit of the blame, but then the US seems to have been at least partly responsible in putting him in power.)
Re:Why we are really there. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Thanks, Slashdot (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm tired of disputing these topics too, but when people make blanket statements such as this, I find it difficult to sit back idly. We all didn't think there were WMDs. I saw Colin Powell's presentation to the UN concerning the threat Iraq posed to the world. It was shite. Showing pictures of double-wide trailers, give me a break. During the whole lead-up to the war, the administration (IMO) seemed to be grasping at straws, trying their very best to convince americans that Saddam was the biggest threat the US was facing. It was all Bush would talk about at the time.
Scott Ritter, a former UN weapons inspector, was on the talk-show circuit in 2003, disputing the administration's claims that Iraq had WMDs.
You want to move forward, fine. You want to work to find solutions to this mess, fine. But don't rewrite history, and don't tell me what I did or did not think.
Re:Legality of sources? (Score:3, Insightful)
So if publishing "leaked" information is prosecuted at all, there should be a reservation that makes it punishable only if the court finds that the information is significantly useful for an enemy power.
Re:Why? (Score:2, Insightful)
"Sorry, I don't give two shits about their country, if it dissolves into civil war, or dissolves into thin air. I bet most Americans don't."
So what do you think going into a country promising liberation, tearing down a regime and destroying the status quo, and then running away when it comes time to rebuild because a handful (yes a handful) of American lives are lost is going to do? Do you think the Islamic fundamentalists who've been preaching war on the West will turn around and say "oh, let's leave them alone now"? No, all it will accomplish is installing a new, possibly even more anti-Western regime in Iraq and leave the Iraqi people as a massive reservoir for terrorist recruitment as they'll (quite rightly) feel betrayed by the Western armies that came in, shot the place up, and then left them to pick up the peices amidst nationwide strife. Again.
It's exactly your kind of thinking that is one of the greatest fuels for the fundamentalist cause. The idea that the relatively tiny amount of American lives that will be lost stablising Iraq are worth more than the many many thousands of arabs who will die if coalition forces pull out too soon is nothing short of racist. Why would you expect some kid growing up under the thumb of an oppressive regime in the Middle East to turn away from a cause that demands the wanton murder of Westerners when you have no greater respect for the lives of his people?
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:1, Insightful)
we Americans hate the truth
That government is driven purely by self-interest, being comprised not of gods or even intellectuals but merely loud human beings who cannot possibly resist employing their power to benefit themselves? That government is founded on, and is defined by, the principle of coercion no matter how many times they scream "by the people, for the people", as if "we" impose oppression on "ourselves"? That there is a reason why no government in the history of organized coercion has ever significantly and permanently reduced its powers through the process of democracy or representative democracy?
(Oops, better catch those cats and stuff them back into the bag!)
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:3, Insightful)
It would actually be physically impossible for the majority of the geografical area of Iraq to be seeing insurgent fighting - it's one big country: plenty of space. I reckon in most of it, there are only element of one side, or the other side or maybe only unallied people.
The places where most people are located (say Bagdahd, Bashra) are the places where insurgent fighting occurs and hundreds of people are killed every week (sometimes daily).
Now, if you really, really want to keep patting yourself in the back and keep believing that the US/UK coalition has done a great job there, i suggest you concentrate on the Kurdish only areas: last i heard there no real insurgent movements there.
Please do not allow me to stand in they way of your self-delusional feeling of success by way of selective blindness.
fuck you fascist pig (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm sure there are some soldiers out there who love to fight and kill and do all the soldierly things, or who are fanatical Bush supporters, or who can't admit to themselves that their friends died or that they killed people for no good reason - but the fact is, Iraq is a victory for Iran and al-Qaeda, not the US.
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:3, Insightful)
Nice spin. You got the touch. Assuming your numbers are right,just a few questions:
Reading the article makes me sad. (Score:3, Insightful)
But first look on the second page, the list of group members brings up an odd question. Why is Clinton Confidant Vernon Jordan on that list? Why are three out of four of the democrats, people who were under Clinton? Oh right because the Democrats believe he was such a genius. However I think that would make anyone but the most diehard Clinton fans balk. Why is the Fourth democrat a senator who was defeated in an election where he was the only democrat incumbant to lose?
Republicans are slightly better, at least having attorney generals, and Supreme Court Justices from a variety of Area, but there's still a lot of concern to be had there. This just makes me feel there is just reason for anyone to ignore the report.
The bigger problem is they have debated reaching out to Iran and Syria for help on Iraq. Anyone who has a little knowledge of the situation of both countries knows Iran is a quagmire waiting to happen and have likely been sponsoring or instigating the insurgence in Iraq, Syria is normally seen as a group who has in the past conducting state sponsored terrorism, however they have "cleaned up their act" at least enough after 9/11 that we can pretend to work with them. Though both countries would have been better options to attack over Iraq, and still are, the only problem is both have issues that made them less desirable.
Re:Shhhhhhh (Score:3, Insightful)
I've known some soldiers who think that Iraq is fixable.
I've known some soldiers who think that that Iraq is beyond fixing. (This is putting it mildly in some cases. One of the soldiers I know is in the base nicknamed 'mortaritaville' due to the frequent mortar attacks. I think he considers shit-flinging chimps as being more civilized than the Iraqis.)
Soldiers are humans too. They don't all think alike. They can have different opinions on the Iraq war, and some of those opinions are rather negative.
Re:Well the one I asked (Score:5, Insightful)
If you see him again, buy him a beer for me.
This is something we don't hear about very much. I was deeply distrubed when the news and government started to only report U.S. fatalities. Every other report of war I'd ever heard talked about casualties, as in soldiers taken out of combat by death or injury. It sounded very suspicious -- the numbers sounded fairly low (at the time) relative to other conflicts, but all I knew about other conflicts were casualties, which are always several times higher than the number outright killed. Yet those numbers weren't being mentioned, making it sound like a deliberate attempt to hide the larger and thus more depressing number.
So as we cross past the 3,000 mark of dead coalition soldiers, we have 46,000 non-mortal casualties. Not all of those are crippling injuries, but nevertheless we're going to be seeing a whole lot more soldiers like the one you met. Especially like that, since the roadside bomb taking out a soldier's legs but not killing them seems to be the most common mode of injury.
I hope to God all those people who support this war will "Support the Troops" when they see one sitting at the traffic light on a board, no legs, holding a sign that says "Iraq vet, need food and work" and drop the man some cash. I know I will.
Figures are from http://www.icasualties.org/oif/ [icasualties.org]
Re:You break it you buy it. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, this is costing us, the taxpayer money. Currently to the tune of over $300 billion.
That money didn't just vanish you know (though certainly a lot of it is unaccounted for).
It largely has gone to the defense contractors, the boeings and halliburtons and so on and so forth. We are spending that money, not shoveling it into a furnace to fuel a war machine. The shoveling is metaphorical. The profit for the defense industry is very very literal.
So yeah. You are losing a shit-load of money. Wealthy corporations are making a shit-load of money. Your money.
Get it now?
Re:Well the one I asked (Score:3, Insightful)
1. Because we are essentially entrenched at critical, known locations, our units are easy to locate and sabotage. Also, because they are largely in cities full of civilians, it's often impossible to identify an enemy until they've already struck. That means that just about every attack is a surprise attack, with minimal chance for winning any particular conflict. This is going to result in high casualties, fatal and non-fatal.
2. Because of improvements in medical technology, and quick access to medical services due to the locations they're fighting in, many of the casualties turn out to be non-fatal, even if they otherwise cripple or maim the soldiers in question. This keeps the fatality number low compared to the overall casualty count.
#2 is the reason that they pick the fatality number over casualties, the smaller number looks better. Combine that with the fact that most people don't understand the difference between fatality and casualty, and you've got good spin with no effort.
Relocate the troops (Score:2, Insightful)