IRAQ: Time to Admit Mistake; Withdraw?

Great Debates
61

And I suggested that it is realpolitik to make Henry look like Mr. Softie.

Ah. We were shitty before, so let’s do it again. Gotcha.

Yes … those people are savages. Not worth even trying.

Ah, yes. “Stability.” That’s what people marching in the streets want. That’s what makes them proud of themselves and their country. That’s what gives them a reason not to turn their kids into suicide bombers. Human rights, democracy, rule of law, economic freedom… nah. What they want is some stability! Yay, stasis!

Oh, sure. US-installed and supported dictatorsare wildly popular. They wouldn’t incite radical Muslims.

62

shrugs Probably.

Well, it was pretty shitty to invade anyway. If you are concerned about not being shitty, it is a little too late. I think you should move to Canada, if you want to avoid the smell of shit, because we’re neck deep in it. However this situation ends, it is going to be shitty. Get used to that.

Trying what? Shoving our own puppet democracy down their throat? As you say below, they would never accept an American installed leader. How does us staying make it any better? It simply makes more people die and more people resent us.

Civil war is better?

Well, silly, you don’t install him. You let him win. O_o

What is your master plan? Stay longer and end up doing the same thing, only after a bloody civil war and a few more years of street combat?

63

Fine. Than we aim for the least shitty solution. Sticking some thug with a gun in Baghdad is exactly the kind of amoral and counterproductive policy we’ve had for decades, and it is exactly what has led to anti-US hate in the middle east.

Yes, it sometimes is. Read the link.

Now that we’re in, how about, oh trying to help them build the functioning democratic state most of them say they want? What’s your master plan? Feel free to revive this thread.

64

Um, what other course of action can we possibly do that won’t resent in absolute hatred by all parties involved?

What makes you think a strong democracy would come out on top in a civil war, as opposed to, I dunno, a theocracy?

That would be the coup of the century - and in the end, it would still be resented, and likely the victim of rebellion from radical elements.

I’m sorry, I don’t have much faith in the ability for a democracy installed by the United States to exist long in a region with radical Islamic extremists - unless we maintain a huge presence in it and basically run it as a puppet state, in which case it is neither the democracy you want nor is it doing anything to relieve tensions. In fact, it would polarize the region and instill resentment in every neighboring country, standing as a grand symbol of American imperialism.

65

I didn’t say it would; read the link.

I repeat: what’s your idea? Propping up dictators is a proven historical loser. Do you have any ideas, or do you just carp?

66

I did state my idea. That is what we are discussing. O_o Do I have to repeat myself, or can you scroll up by yourself?

I don’t know, however, what your idea is, other than allowing them to fall into civil war where the best faction wins.

67

And you are seriously proposing a US-backed dictator? You really think that that is a long-term solution to the antipathy the Arab world has for the US? Or are you just resigned to letting radical Islam keep growing until a global war is inevitable?

We give the Iraqi people a shot. We get rid of the dictator, we hold down the islamists, we provide security from external threats, we help them get their infrastructure and economy going, we help them develop the basics of a civil society, and then we slowly let go of the reins. If things fuck up after that, we can at least say we tried something new for a change. It sure as hell beats the amoral “he’s our son-of-a-bitch” philosophy that got us in this situation and which you advocate even more of.

If nothing else, we stir things up. If it comes to that, civil wars all over the Arab world, strictly from a US POV, would be preferable to the status quo.

68

I beg to differ.

In many Arab countries, the current governments are far more secular and friendly towards the West than the bulk of the population is. This is true is several countries that have large population bases from which the terrorists would love to recruit openly if they had a chance, such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Yemen. Total civil war in those countries would probably in the end lead to a mob-supported ultraconservative cleric taking power.

69

That seems revisionist or at the least blindly apologetic, especially considering that US politicos managed to convert the vast majority of Americans to be all about 9/11 and WMDs and looming deadly threat as regards Iraq. And the Administration made such a goddamn poor case, repeatedly and on multiple grounds that each time they had to scramble to find some other “stated reason”. Of course, some of us at the time knew perfectly well the WMD reason and others were bogus, and a larger number have since then come to accept that simple fact; but don’t give me the revisionist view that it was fine and dandy because the American people and the world NEEDED to be lied to for their own good!

Consider in particular the vigorous efforts of US and British politicians and spin doctors to demonize French and German and UN (and other) officials who were stating common sense objections to the hare-brained war in the first place. De Villepin’s comments about a clash of civilizations were not as mad as they were made out to be by the warmongers.

Or do you think that after hearing a whole bunch of lies and (at best) inaccuracies on WMDs and so forth, the world should just forget about the matter and move on because “it was just the stated reason”?

Credibility is an important issue. Stated reason is no excuse for blatant and transparent lies that failed to justify a highly objectionable course of action. US forces and taxpayers are paying for that today, and Americans could be paying for it for years to come if the terrorists – highly energized by this idiotic war – have their way.

70

Very, very true. It is in fact interesting to consider that many of these pro-west governments lead a tenuous existence and are still around only because of the firmness with which they act. When Collounsbury was still around he would often cite the example of Egypt, where fundamentalism and related politics were often brutally and viciously suppressed by the ruling power; yes, a despicable practice, but in my opinion the alternative was to abdicate power to the fanatics and watch the world go to hell. Who would you want in power, the house of Saud, or the Ikhwan fanatics they put down early in the 20th century (i.e. bin Laden’s ideological ancestors)?

Iraq wasn’t different in this regard from countries like Egypt, the difference is that Saddam was no longer an ally of the West and thus made for a convenient target. However Saddam kept people like radical cleric Moqtada Sadr (the guy who’s inciting the current violence in Falluja and elsewhere) securely crushed under his foot where, if you ask me, people like that belong until they can be dealt with properly.

Pending a massive education campaign there is no way to get rid of fanatics in the short term. Kill the leaders, and more will be generated. Wipe them out en masse, and you not only set yourself up for never-ending retribution, but you begin to face charges of war crimes as well. Saddam must be respected for keeping fanatic madness in check, or at least from allowing it to boil over.

In spite of all the wealth, lifestyle, and planeloads of busty blondes (that are flown in to be week-end entertainment for high-ranking personages) I really would not want to be the ruler of a country like Egypt or Saudi Arabia – it would be like walking a slippery tightrope over a pit full of hungry tigers.

71

I suppose you could be right, if by “To some extent, it has not been followed 100%” you mean “It was ignored completely”. Either that, or you simply have no idea what you’re talking about.

Note the bits about vital US interest, clearly defined objectives, sufficient resources, exhausting other options, and not using the military as peacekeepers.

72

furt: And you are seriously proposing a US-backed dictator? You really think that that is a long-term solution to the antipathy the Arab world has for the US?

I don’t see why this idea startles you so much; after all, we’re still supporting repressive authoritarian governments in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Kuwait, Jordan, etc. I agree that it’s not a good idea, but it’s certainly not a new idea.

We give the Iraqi people a shot. We get rid of the dictator, we hold down the islamists, we provide security from external threats, we help them get their infrastructure and economy going, we help them develop the basics of a civil society, and then we slowly let go of the reins. If things fuck up after that, we can at least say we tried something new for a change. It sure as hell beats the amoral “he’s our son-of-a-bitch” philosophy that got us in this situation and which you advocate even more of.

This reminds me of the outrage that many advocates of the current war expressed before the invasion when it was pointed out that the US had actually supported Saddam Hussein for a long time and condoned or winked at his worst atrocities. “So because we were doing the wrong thing before, that’s a good reason to go on doing the wrong thing now?” they’d retort. “Obviously it’s wrong for us to allow a brutal dictator to remain in power when we can do something about it! Shame on you for suggesting a cynical accomodation with evil when we have an opportunity to do the right thing!”

I call this the “Random Acts of Goodness” school of foreign policy. The idea seems to be that moral justifications should be paramount in considering some of our policies, even if we’re simultaneously undermining them by our amoral or immoral approaches in other policies. If we can do the right thing in one instance, the reasoning goes, we shouldn’t be deterred from that by the fact that we’re falling short of our ethical standard in lots of other instances.

The rationales I hear for “Random Acts of Goodness” are along the lines of “Half a loaf’s better than none.” “Even if we’re only improving a little bit, isn’t that better than not improving at all?” “So we shouldn’t even try to clean up our act? How can things get any better if we’re not willing to take a first step?”

Those are good points as far as they go, but it seems to me that the “Random Acts of Goodness” advocates aren’t really thinking it through. The thing is, influencing world events isn’t like taking a math test: you don’t get graded separately on your response to each problem and then get an overall grade by adding all the separate responses together. Rather, your actions and motives are evaluated partly on your perceived consistency and trustworthiness.

That means that even when you’re trying to do the right thing in an isolated instance, if the rest of the world already perceives you as a self-interested domineering power hog (and some of your other policies are reinforcing that perception), your Random Act of Goodness isn’t necessarily going to change anything. No matter how much you talk about your altruism, everybody else will still interpret your actions in light of your self-interest. We can talk till we’re blue in the face about our earnest desire to help the Iraqis form a stable and thriving democracy, but if we’re still using our muscle to prop up other antidemocratic regimes, the rest of the world will just write it off as self-serving PR.

Now, that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t do the right thing by spending the time and money (and lives—ouch) to help build a stable Iraqi society (and I think we should let the Iraqis make their own decisions about oil rights and US military bases, too). But we shouldn’t talkabout it as though “doing the right thing” is a policy no-brainer and will inevitably have positive results for our image.

Consistency counts. A lot. We are kidding ourselves if we’re expecting anybody to be seriously impressed or won over by Random Acts of Goodness while we are still racking up a substantial score for Acts of Badness.

73

Reports from Fallujah make me even more pessimistic-the Marines have put down the uprising…but at the cost of wiping out a mosque and many civilian lives. So, we areno longer “liberators” WE are the enemy. Granted the TV coverage is slanted…but when ordinary Iraqis state that “they wish Saddam Hussein was back in power”…something is dreadfully wrong!
All eyes should be on Chalabai and his ersatz government…if you see him making big cash transfers to Swiss banks (and buying plane tickets), then we might a well write the whole thing off.
Reminds me of the song Pete Seegerwas singing in the Vietnam days:
…" we were six feet deep in the big muddy, and the big fool says to push on…"

74

As other have since pointed out, I don’t see your problem in this specific incident.

Are you seriously proposing that we invade Saudi Arabia et al to overthrow their dictatorship and bless them with a Western democracy? Or is your bleeding heart only open to Iraq?

Neverminding that most of the people in Iraq are Islamic, aren’t used to voting, do not have access to public information, and will likely vote along religious lines, of course.

In other words, protect them from themselves.

What, exactly, do you know about Iraqi economics that magically makes it become a balanced and fair machine for the people? We can barely get our own economy going, and our situation is much better than theirs.

In other words, wipe out those pesky Islamic laws and replace them with good Christian ones.

No, what got us into this situation is war mongering and feeling the need to play Superman and overthrow regimes we don’t like.

What on god’s green earth makes you even comprehend that? Are you aware of how most civil wars end? Well, here’s a hint; they don’t usually end with a stable and western democracy.

You ARE aware how Saddam came to power, right?

75

y proposing a US-backed dictator?

funny you should ask.

I happen to be privy to negotiatons going on even as we speak, directed at producing a blockbuster personnel move that willl have george steinbrenner and donald trump blushing like schoolgirls in admiration.

The new administrator/ambassador is preparing to re-enter the statesman’s arena. He’s tanned, rested, and ready. And he’s got $3500.00 worth of new bridgework.

The hair stylists have come and gone, the tailors are ripping out the basting stiches.

Like Nixon Agonistes, rising up from defeat in California.

Like Ronald Reagan after the humiliation of Death Valley Days.

Now, in the the greatest second act in modern history, he will be the REAL COMEBACK KID,

we called on him once before to quell the fractious iraqis,
He can do the job again.

Fight fans, welcome back to the ring

SADDAM “EL SINCERO GUAPPO” HUSSEIN

76

I’m reversing myself on this one, but when our pet Iraqi Governing Council opposes us (even Adnan Pachachi, fercryinoutloud), we’ve blown it, big time.

I don’t think there’s any more good we can do there. Our support to any legitimate leader will itself delegitimize that leader. Our best hope is that the Iraqis are able to build on the unity they’ve found in recent days in their opposition to us. In a way, we seem to be bringing them past their divisions and turning them into a nation. Just not in the way we expected.

But when we spent this past week making war on the very people we were there to liberate and bring democracy to, we screwed ourselves in a major way. And not just in Iraq, but across the Islamic world. We will be a long time living down the damage that we’ve done to ourselves since this time last week. The best thing we can do is pull out before we do any more harm.

Hope you’re having a nice vacation, George W. Bush. Have fun down on the ranch while Iraq burns.

77

There is so much at stake here. If we pull out:

  1. Iraq won’t be seeing much peace for a long, long time and it will all be between currently inconsequential militias making up a small part of the population.

  2. The Middle East is going down the drain. Iraq borders Saudi Arabia, Iran, Kuwait, Turkey, Jordan and Syria. It seems, with Sadr, that Iran is going to try set up its own puppet government in Iraq. If Iran and Iraq become pretty much the same thing, all of its neighbors have a very legitimate reason for concern. That’s a lot of oil, and belligerence to come with it. Turkey is going to have a mess on its hands with the Kurds. The Kurds would probably establish a Kurdish state the moment present authority disappears. It’s not just our national interests at stake.

  3. There will be more terrorism. We won’t have the kind of presence we have now, thus we will be in the dark. They’ll know we’ll give up a lot if they continue to terrorize us. If we leave, we encourage them further. If we stay, it’ll be harder for them to build consequential infrastructure. Don’t think they have the Iraqi people behind them. Most of the Iraqi people are sitting on the fence, waiting to join the winner. Why? I think it’s because they’re scared and they want to live. The thing is (maybe many of you have have generated an idea that our armed forces are incompetent or something) we can win, easily.

  4. We will never have the kind of international weight we’ve had, or have now (which is minimal) ever again. If we pull out, we will lose so much credibility that if September 11 were to happen again, there wouldn’t be anyone to turn to. The world would run its course, excluding us as much as it can. Think France now as being 2x more uncooperative, and not only with security issues.

  5. Israel will be so screwed. So screwed beyond belief. Without our presence, there will be much more bloodshed.

  6. The only good thing I can see come out of this is that we will be officially out of a Middle Eastern phase of civil war. I mean that’s what we’re in right now. We are supporting various regimes that aren’t too popular, so they attack us in order to get at their regimes. If we leave, they won’t have as much reason to attack us.

If we stay, same thing as 6. The transitional constitution was set so that there could not be a ruling identity-based (identity meaning ethnic, or religion) ruling parties. The nation’s leaders will have to work for the support of people beyond ethnic or religious lines (Shiites can’t make the government kill Kurds, vice versa). In the long run, if the place doesn’t fall apart, there will be something good, not controversial and within our national interest to support in the Middle East. That is the unequivocally free Iraq. Then in the longer term, the terrorists will side with us because with Iraq as a strong partner, we can pressure other oppresive regimes to change. In otherwords, the neocon plan be seen through and the United States will become the world’s shining beacon of goodness, yay! And all it takes is for us to not withdraw prematurely. Iraq hasn’t been lost. When it is lost, when everyone is trying to kill us, then we withdraw. Not now, dear God not now.
RTFirefly
*I’m reversing myself on this one, but when our pet Iraqi Governing Council opposes us (even Adnan Pachachi, fercryinoutloud), we’ve blown it, big time.

I don’t think there’s any more good we can do there. Our support to any legitimate leader will itself delegitimize that leader. Our best hope is that the Iraqis are able to build on the unity they’ve found in recent days in their opposition to us. In a way, we seem to be bringing them past their divisions and turning them into a nation. Just not in the way we expected.*

They don’t oppose us, they just want the violence to stop. So do we. Withdrawing will only bring more violence and years before Iraq gets a new central government. What’s important is that we hand over Iraq on June 30, and that elections are held, without violence, January 31. The faster the government can handle Iraq on its own, the less we will be seen as an occupational force. That is why it is critical we stay - so the government has the authority to get things done.

78

They who??

We’ve got a funny way of showing it, this past week. I don’t think this past week is redeemable. I think it’s the week when too many Iraqis made up their minds about us, and will be gunning for us. And in the process of defeating them, we lose even more to the other side. It sure looks like the Death Spiral.

And staying will discredit whoever we work with, whoever we hand power over to.

Not only that, we’ve got two choices if we stay, really. One is to ‘stay the course’ we’ve been following this past week - and you see where that leads. The other is to hunker down in fortified enclaves, being present in Iraq but not really controlling anything. Less bloodshed, but ineffectual.

To whom? Who will even be willing to receive that handoff anymore?

January 31? First of all, who said January 31? I’ve heard “by the end of 2005”. Second, even this June 30 is a long way off, at the current pace. January 31 is an eternity away. I don’t believe we’ll be in a position to guarantee elections anytime in 2005, even if we’re still there.

What government?

Again, what government? Haven’t you been listening? The Iraqi Governing Council is off the reservation:

Or Juan Cole:

And our credibility would be so much improved if we stay and get our asses kicked.

79

While the US government says they want to avoid Iraqis killing each other they are, in fact, killing Iraqis and encouraging Iraqis to kill each other. I am disgusted by the American actions which have cost hundreds of innocent Iraqi lives just in the last few days. This is a criminal aggression and the US should not prevail.

80

RTFirefly:
“They who??”

The Iraqis, the governing council. A disagreement isn’t a call for war.

“We’ve got a funny way of showing it, this past week. I don’t think this past week is redeemable. I think it’s the week when too many Iraqis made up their minds about us, and will be gunning for us. And in the process of defeating them, we lose even more to the other side. It sure looks like the Death Spiral. And staying will discredit whoever we work with, whoever we hand power over to.”

This is all speculation. There’s nothing wrong with that, since I’m speculating too.

I’ll get to the discredit part later on in the post.

Not only that, we’ve got two choices if we stay, really. One is to ‘stay the course’ we’ve been following this past week - and you see where that leads.

It’s only been a week. Whether or not it will be resolved - we still don’t know.

The other is to hunker down in fortified enclaves, being present in Iraq but not really controlling anything. Less bloodshed, but ineffectual.

This has been proven to exacerbate the violence, actually. We were absent from Fallujah, and that’s what made it easy for Sadr to take the city.

To whom? Who will even be willing to receive that handoff anymore?

The governing council. We still have a couple of months to win.

*January 31? First of all, who said January 31? *

It’s all over the Iraqi constitution.

*Second, even this June 30 is a long way off, at the current pace. January 31 is an eternity away. I don’t believe we’ll be in a position to guarantee elections anytime in 2005, even if we’re still there. *

This is all speculation. We don’t even know if we’ve won or lost. Why don’t we wait until we actually know.

What government? Again, what government? Haven’t you been listening? The Iraqi Governing Council is off the reservation: Or Juan Cole:

When September 11 happened, George Bush went up in the air. When stuff like this happens, it’s only natural to avoid it. George Bush is now, again, on the ground. There can still be a Governing Council. We haven’t lost.

And our credibility would be so much improved if we stay and get our asses kicked.

If we leave, that’s surrender, which means we got our asses kicked. If we leave now or later, it’s the same damn thing - we lose. We haven’t even lost and we’re already thinking about surrender. :rolleyes: