Good idea or total lunacy? For me this is a practically rhetorical question but maybe there is an up side I’m not seeing.
‘Thanks for the guns Infidel. Of course we wouldn’t even begin to think about dreaming of using them for anything other than what you tell us.’
(Insert requisite number of roll-eyes here).
Lunacy. Of course any weapons we give out will either be used against us, or against other Iraqis. Al Qaeda is our crusade, not theirs, and the Iraqis know we are their enemies. As for this :
If they want to get rid of Al Qaeda, just leave. Al Qaeda will either leave with us, keep it’s head way down, or get turned into hamburger by the Iraqis - they already have enough weapons to do that, and won’t have any reason to tolerate Al Qaeda once we are gone.
Didn’t they try this strategy about 20 years ago, arming Afghani warlords so that they could go fight the Russians?
Look how well that turned out
Not if the local AQ franchise in Iraq is using indiscriminate tactics that kill civilians in an effort to stoke the civil war fires. They have pissed off people who are otherwise quite happy to see them slaughtering the Occupation forces.
But you are broadly correct IMHO. Once the AQ problem is solved by force, or more likely a practical shift in AQ tactics and a rebuilding of ‘enemy of my enemy’ alliances any weapons we give will be turned against the occupying forces.
This tactic smacks of short-sighted desperation.
What I meant is that while I’m sure they’ll cheerfully kill off Al Qaeda types for things like that, it’s way down on their priority list. Give the typical Iraqi a gun with two bullets, and an American and an Al Qaeda, and I’d expect them to shoot the American twice.
Well it at least worked as far as it’s original purpose, and while Afganistan hasn’t done well since, I don’t know how much of that is due to the fact that we gave them some weapons back in the 80’s.
But really, who looked at the situation in Iraq and said to themselves: “these people could really use some more guns”. The Sunni insurgents seem pretty adaquately armed without our help.
Let me get this straight… the main problem in Iraq right now is sectarian violence, so the solution this folks came up with is to give arms to one of the warring factions?
I request an illegal substance test to all involved on the creation of this abortion of a solution.
This is strictly a booze idea.
‘These people could really use some more guns, ammo, body armour and transportation.’
Can I take it, as we are now supplying the insurgency with body armour, our own troops have enough of same?
And I’m a bit worried. I’m not sure the insurgents have enough main battle tanks. Boy, could they kick some Al-Q ass with a few Abrams.
I’m sure you are right.
Meh. I don’t know. I think half the starting problem, tactically, not morally, is that we didn’t choose sides to start with. If we’d picked a side, armed the hell out of them, and encouraged them to start with, we’d have fewer random problems now.
… of course, we’d probably have ethnic cleansing, which is a different issue.
The Sunni were Saddam’s boys and girls. Overthrowing a Sunni regime to arm the Sunni side in the ensuing and inevitable civil war would seem a tad silly, even by the low standards set by the current Mal-Administration.
We should have armed the Christians and called the policy something snappy and redolent with history.
If only it had been known beforehand that there were different forms of Islam and that two of them were in Iraq. But hindsight is such a wonderful thing. 
The focus on al-Qaida both in the media and (supposedly, it may be a public act) in high military circles is quite depressing to me. If every foreign fighter in Iraq disappeared overnight we’d still be drowning in the quicksand that is Iraq. Al-Qaida should be around number 15 on our priority list. We should be more concerned about a whole host of other issues and focused on the other 80% or so of the Iraqi population who wants us dead.*
I’m also sorta surprised we simply haven’t taken a ruthless strategy of fully siding with the Shia. War crimes? C’mon, we crossed that Rubicon as a country a long time ago, and I’m not even talking about Iraq. Besides, the rationalizing for internal consumption is easy (don’cha know they’re evil Saddamists who hate freedom). There’s less Sunni, so they’re easier to purge to boot. And during the process we could attempt to woo the Shia to our side to make up for the end of the Gulf War. Then we can mostly withdraw and leave 40K troops for the next 50 years for our “vital national interest.” It’s still totally evil of course, but it’s competent evil. Incompetent evil is just embarrassing. If I’m going to be a citizen of an empire who snatches up countries whenever it wants I’d like it to be efficient at the very least.
The problem, marshmallow, with what you propose – purely on pragmatic grounds; let’s not go near the moral and ethical ones – is that it would require honesty: the ability of those in power to look honestly at the naked brutal truth about what they do, and why. I don’t doubt that a majority of those running our empire have convinced themselves that, however distasteful the means, the ends are good and noble and patriotic, and thus whatever consequences flow from their decisions are no reflection on their moral and ethical worth as human beings.
To pursue the competent evil, they would have to admit to themselves that they’re just power-grabbing, wealth-grabbing imperialists. The ancient Romans didn’t blink at that reality, and did a bang-up job of it. Our modern leadership can’t admit, even to themselves, the truth of what they do, so they choose half-measures and policy follies to paper over the raw ugliness with a facade of high principle.
That’s how I see it, anyway.
Isn’t it more like the Jayne-Administration?
Probably. He got all the Canton votes.
The irony (but for the whole Saddam/Ba’athist thingy) is that the Sunni were probably closer to our natural allies than the Shi’a ever were. Of course, by taking the Sunni out of power and basically putting them under the majority rule (with all the ugly implications that entails) that ship has probably already sailed at this point.
-XT
I’ll be in my bunk.
Well, it’s a load of bunk somehow…
Eh, it’s a two-part plan, really.
They’re hoping they’ll go after AQ (and like everyone else here I’m sure that’ll go SO well) and maybe it’ll help the Sunnis make the inevitable ethnic cleansing just that little bit more difficult for the Shi’ia.
-Joe