You’re funny, Elvis!
Let em have their civil war. All this American welfare is simply delaying the coalescence of Iraqi factions into groupings that are powerful enough to run the country by themselves. If Iraq wants a strongman, he will emerge. If they decide they prefer some sort of pluralism, their guns will speak, and that will emerge. If they decide to split, that’ll happen. Our attempt at holding their hands through this difficult transition is no longer doing them any good.
Or whoever is more powerful will impose their will, no matter what the Iraqis as a whole want.
As if we ever tried to help them. Trying to use someone as a tool or a puppet or exploit them or slaughter them is not “holding their hands”. Our contribution has been purely destructive; we’ve done nothing but harm, harm, and more harm.
The people called themselves Iraqis. They had a sense of nationalism.The bloggers from there want it to return as one. If we left .there would be some who attempt to make it whole. To impose partitions is to guarantee unrest. Havn’t we done enough damage yet.
That’s us, the Great Satan, huh? I realize that sort of black and white thinking has gotten very popular since 9/11, but I don’t buy it.
Really. Then name all the great and glorious things we’ve done in Iraq, while slaughtering and raping and torturing and destroying. How have we “helped” them ?
Nope, I’ve seen this hijack too often. Let’s instead try to stick to the subject at hand.
Well, there’s less people but more stuff. So, per-capita everyone has more stuff.
Sheesh, silly liberals need the most basic stuff pointed out to them…
-Joe
And this just in…
US plans last big push in Iraq
Offered without comment, due to the impossibility of uploading an audio of a blood-curdling scream of shock, horror, and rage.
In other words, you’re wrong. You have nothing because we’ve done nothing, except exploit and slaughter and destroy. You’re simply irritated that I don’t respect your patronizing “oh, how could those awful Iraqis fail to appreciate all we’ve done for them, the ungrateful barbarians !” speech. You feeling the White Man’s Burden, Squink ?
I think it’ll probably go too, despite Abizaid’s admission today that we don’t have the troops needed to sustain a 20,000 increase:
Everything we have, plus a little bit more might buy us another six months, but it won’t buy us a representative democracy, or a strong man, or an equitable partion, or anything that can be mistaken for victory.
Huh. I always thought that the policy review by experts was supposed to have a “decisive impact” on the policy stance, not the other way around.
“Thank you for agreeing to be my advisor. Here’s the advice I’m willing to listen to. Now give me your advice.”
Shoot, why aren’t my advisors compliant enough to tell me only what I want to hear? Maybe I need to recruit more “family loyalists” to advise me.
It’ll be Beirut all over again. One fifth of the country’s population is in Baghdad and even if you could slice it up it will be like West Berlin was - isolated inside enemy territory for two factions.
I can’t believe no one’s smacked 'luci for this execrable pun.
…batting big, brown, innocent eyes…
Why, whatever do you mean?
What’s the problem, luci? This just means that the next six months are crucial and we’re about to turn a corner.
This is good news!
-Joe
More substantiation that the nightmare is coming true…
Unleash the Shiites?
Profanity fails. Words fail. Hard to type screaming your throat raw…
That just means picking a side in the civil strife rather than remaining neutral. How is that any different than advocating partition, since we then have to pick 3 sides to be on-- one for each region?
BTW, for those who advocate partition, where does Kirkuk end up, and how does your answer prevent a war between whichever side doesn’t get it and the side that does?
Well, gosh, when you put it that way, its rather trivial isn’t it? Couple of niggling details…
We will have, in essence, chosen sides in a sectarian struggle, whereas previously we were at least paying lip service to the notion of a secular, religiously neutral state. And that’s just for starters.
Numero two-o, the Shia are a minority in Islam. What few allies we have in the region are Sunni, as are the greater bulk of Muslims. Are they likely to react with calm acquiescence? If Jordan sends troops to protect their co-religionists (unlikely, to be sure, but still…) do we fire upon them?
Perhaps, just maybe, this will improve our standing amongst Shia dominated governments, i.e., Iran. They might cease to hate our guts and merely despise us with every fiber of their being. Peachy. They will certainly be entirely happy to allow us to sacrifice our blood and treasure on their behalf. Why not? Set the infidels on the apostates? Win/win.
And if, God forbid, a Sunni massacre by Sadrist forces begins to unfold before the very eyes of our troops…will they have orders to stand aside? Personally, I would consider any man who disobeys in order to protect the helpless a hero. But that’s just me.
It may be that, at least to some degree, a brutal oppression of the Sunni is inevitable. And a brutal reaction is equally inevitable. And the Sunni will lose, they have no chance, even without our involvement. And they will never, ever forgive us. Sunni based terrorist orgs, like AlQ will surely be engraged and emboldened, they will have to keep their recruiting centers open 24/7/365 to handle the influx of eager martyrs.
So, yeah, a few drawbacks.
Ostensibly, our presence in Iraq was intended to prevent just such an outcome as outlined above. Now, there is no certainty that the situation will deteriorate into genocidal conflict. But there is a very strong possibility.
And to the final question, the really ugly question: Is this the least horrible choice of a set of horrible choices. God forgive us, I don’t know.
elucidator: All I was doing was comparing “taking sides” with “partition” (the subject of this thread). My bad for making it seem like you were in favor of partition. I should have directed that comment towards those who do, as I did in the second part of that post.