Huh?
Is anyone else confused by this?
(ie according to this post, the OP contradicts the OP)
Then you lost RISK, as Central Asia (or the “Ukraine—see Seinfeld”) is not a “good” “jumping off spot.”
kids…teach them one thing and they lose another.
It’s called a threat. In other words, it doesn’t actually have to be carried out in order to be effective.
In light of Afghanistan, Iraq and the July War, parties in the region now have substantive data about what will happen if a coalition is forced to invade somewhere else. We hold all the cards. It’s brutal and again, I don’t like it, but it’s damned effective.
Also, it’s not all about oil. If you look at the example of the Golan, you’ll see there’s something even more important that needs to be controlled and protected; it flows from the slopes of Hermon.
Praise be to the mods for the smackdown! 
No, but it does have to be one we can carry out, and it has to be connected to the behavior of the people we threaten. We are bogged down in Iraq, and can’t effectively invade Iran, and our unprovoked attack on Iraq demonstrates that there’s no point in not provoking us; we’ll attack you if we feel like it, no matter how you behave.
Hardly; we’ve crippled ourselves and they know it. And we were’t forced to invade Iraq.
We shall turn your Brocolli into CABBAGES
And your iPods to SHEAVES OF WHEAT!
Your water pipes will be MARTINIZED
And your window frames rendered STICKY!
It does have to have teeth, though. Right now, it’s becoming increasingly obvius that it’s a fairly hollow threat. One branch of our government is digging its heels in about sending a further 21K troops to Iraq and come this summer, the “coalition” is going to be further reduced when the UK troops are pulled. The “Coalition of the Willing” is looking more and more like the U.S. all by itself. Not to mention the outcry it’s guaranteed to generate in the U.N. if we decide the middle east is now our personal sandbox.
I’m sorry, I must’ve missed something. Did I say anything at all about oil?
You do realize there are others engaged in this discussion? 
I don’t see how either of you can think this is a threat we can’t carry out. If the Admin has the will, we have the manpower.
Back to Iraq, Saddam’s dementia and his heirs’ abject disregard for humanity was impetus, but it did not force our hand. I’ll give you that. We weren’t forced to invade Iraq, but we do have obligations to our allies, regardless of what the leftist blogs have to say about the matter. Beyond that and most importantly, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it 'til I die: an unstable Kurdistan threatens the world.
Someone needed to control Iraq until it could make its own destiny; isn’t it better that we did it? Which other world leaders would you trust to stave off Turkey’s heavy-handed approach to the Mideast? In this respect, don’t you trust our American troops, and the good people of the Coalition, much much more than any other group, or single state?
Flash forward to the burgeoning conflict in Iran. Consider the cheap interview on Good Morning America where Ahmadinejad shows his ass. Consider that among all the other news outlets in the US, this supposed strongman set himself on Diane Sawyer. This is a reasonable, educated (and scared) dude who is just about ready to come to the table. On our terms.
Postscript: one day, when this is all over and Iraq is a stanchion of peace and prosperity, the world will look on the nobility and generosity of all Americans who made it happen. And note I didn’t say our volunteer troops, I said all Americans. This is a turning point for our nation: do we protect our influence as it stands, or do we shrink our interests back to the 50+ States?
A damn fine bit of satire there, Cid.
How could you possibly think that was satire?
What allies demanded Saddam’s removal? It’s funny to hear a Republican worry about our international reputation…
I, for one, would have preferred that the U.N. do it.
Wow, you should be a stand-up comic, because that’s hilarious.
So you’re fine with another Armenian-style Genocide until the UN can get its sorry, unreformed ass in gear? No thanks. If we’re playing Pre-Crime on that whole potentially horrible affair, I’m OK with what we’ve done for the Kurds so far.
No, we don’t. We don’t have the manpower to keep control of Iraq, much less attack a larger, more unified country.
We were the impetus behind the attack on Iraq, not any “allies”. And which allies are you talking about, anyway ? What obligations did we have towards them in regards to Iraq, given that Iraq was too crippled to be a danger to anybody ?
With our incompetence and greed and brutality ? No. Nor are we trying to “control” Iraq to let it seek it’s own destiny; we wanted to make in into a puppet state. Nor does killing tens of thousands and wrecking the country qualify as benevolence. We’ve ruined Iraq, and created a situation that makes Saddam’s rule look like a golden age, and we’ve set back democracy elsewhere in the region.
No. I’d trust most of the planet to do a better job than us.
There is no such conflict. We are going to attack them.
Why ? Saddam tried that, and it got him killed. There is no point in negotiations with America. We can’t be reasoned with, or appealed to, or bribed, or trusted, or shamed; we respond to sheer force and that’s it.
:rolleyes: Killing and destroying, torturing and raping and murdering is not “generosity”. And it’s highly unlikely that the Iraqis will ever feel anything towards us but ravening hatred, and any “peace and prosperity” they achieve in spite of us will no doubt be used to fund any and all efforts to harm and hinder us. Our behavior in Iraq has not been “noble and generous”; it’s been greedy and sadistic and murdeous and greedy. And as far as our influence is concerned, our Iraq atrocity has crippled it.
Then you need to get out more. Consider the options of succession once Saddam was deposed without our influence. See my post about the Armenian Genocide.
And fuck you. We are a good people.
… I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but the U.N. kind of didn’t exist in 1917. In fact, at that point there was no international body of any sort, really.
Yes, Americans as a whole are good. That doesn’t mean that our politicians wouldn’t be shitty at figuring out how to fix Kurdistan. The two have nothing to do with each other.
The modifier “-style” mean anything to you? Do I have to get mean and mention Darfur?
How? Sure, all unstable societies are potentially dangerous, but AFAICT the Kurdish region was not really high on the list of potential sources of global catastrophe. Are you sure that you’re not just exaggerating the importance of the Kurdish situation, in order to make the establishment of a semi-stable, semi-autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan (one of the few clearly positive accomplishments of the invasion so far) seem more significant?
“Control”? What we’re doing in Iraq doesn’t look to me much like “controlling” it; in fact, it seems pretty clear that events in Iraq are largely out of our control.
Actually, ISTM that until a few years ago, the most effective carrot inducing Turkey to back off from its repressive policies was the prospect of qualifying for EU membership, and thus having to improve its democracy and human-rights record and so forth. Now that the Iraq situation is so destabilized, Turkey’s started cracking down on the Kurds again. So in that respect, so far from “staving off” Turkey’s undesirable behavior, we’ve encouraged it.
Hmmm. Vietnam has attained a pretty good level of peace and prosperity at present, but I’m not sure it makes sense for Americans to claim credit for it. IMO, if Iraq does develop peace and prosperity any time within the next quarter-century, the credit for making it happen will belong overwhelmingly to the nobiilty and courage of the Iraqis themselves, for overcoming the current bloody chaos to create a stable society.
Unfortunately, to be good people it’s not enough just to have good intentions. You also have to be able to act on your good intentions with successful results, without causing excessive damage to other people.
Still better than us, almost certainly.
Tens of thousands of dead Iraqis would disagree. Good people don’t do the things we do. And we are certainly not up to anything good in Iraq.
But, that’s just it, we don’t have the manpower. Not even to stabilize Iraq, let alone occupy Iran, which is 3.7 times as large, 2.5 times as populous, and, in military terms, ten times as formidable.
:dubious: No U.S. ally called for the invasion. Not even Saudi Arabia, which was desperate for our protection back in 1990; nor even Kuwait, which owes its very existence as an independent (not free, but independent) state to our intervention back then. What on Earth are you talking about?
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How?
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What is your point? The invasion did nothing to resolve the Kurdish question.
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Turkey is our ally, in case you’ve forgotten.
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Turkey has a larger and more discontented Kurdish population than Iraq, in case you’ve forgotten.
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1 and 2 together make it impossible for the U.S. to help an independent Kurdistan emerge.
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Turkey has never, since it emerged as a nation-state after World War I, wielded a heavy hand in the Mideast, except WRT its own Kurdish minority and other internal dissidents. In fact – leaving aside the intractable problem of Cyprus – the Turkish Republic has never, ever, even come close to a military conflict with any of its neighbors. What on Earth are you talking about?
Iraq, from 1991 to 2003, was quite thoroughly and effectively contained, as a military threat to its neighbors. Beyond that, why did it need to be controlled?
I trust American troops to follow orders. I do not trust those who are ultimately giving them their orders, not in any respect.
:rolleyes: You’re in college right now, are you? Then you are probably talking about your retirement years, if not your afterlife. And that’s best-case scenario, i.e., assuming no U.S.-Iranian conflict; if that happens, all bets are off.
Pre-1991 Iraq, BTW, was a land of prosperity, if not of peace. In case you’ve forgotten. Hussein’s iron fist, cruel and arbitrary as it was, was at least able to make the economy function, provide most Iraqis with jobs and public services and sufficient food and clean water, suppress religious/ethnic strife, and maintain a society that worked. If you just paid your taxes and kept your mouth shut about politics, you could have a safe and comfortable life. But now . . .
It will be at least another decade before Yugoslavia is a stanchion of peace and prosperity, and Iraq’s endemic problems are even worse. Have the past four years taught you nothing about geopolitical realities?!
Genocide against whom? Iraqi Kurdistan was effectively autonomous and safe from Hussein before the invasion, and Hussein was not threatening genocide against any other ethnic or national group.
And what do you mean by “unreformed”? How would you reform the UN?