Not really a debate but I believe it’s s more suited for this forum than elsewhere. Mods move if you must.
Across world history and across nations what is the closest historical analog to what the US has gotten itself involved with in Iraq? What is the closest parallel?
I think I’ll go with the Balkans in the 1990’s. With the fall of highly centralized control various factions splintered along ethnic lines begin to kill each other eventually leading to almost complete civil war.
The differences between Iraq and the Balkans lie in troop strength (we had relatively far more troops in the Balkans than Iraq) and in the level of nationalization and centralization of the violent parties. In Iraq, the violence is being carried out by much more disparate factions that are harder to identify or negotiate with.
Failing all else, we can just call it Vietnam and go back to bed.
I’d say all the prior occupation forces over the centuries that took over Iraq, for “Protectorate” reasons, mainly protecting something other than the local population.
Vietnam is the obvious answer because of the murky and contradictory goals of the war. We went to Vietnam to “protect democracy” and “prevent the spread of communism”. The problem was that the people of South Vietnam had democracy already, and they had voted for a communist government. Hence, when the U.S. troops arrived, they were acting against a true democratic government. If they protected democracy, communism would result. If they prevented the spread of communism, they’d have to defeat democracy.
We went to Iraq for a number of reasons, but the most commonly cited were the spread of democracy and the curtailing of Islamic extremism. The people of Iraq are and always were in favor of Islamic extremism. Given a chance to vote, they chose a leader, Malaki, who sided with Hezbollah in its war against Israel last summer. If we spread democracy in Iraq, we inevitably spread Islamic extremism. If we bottle up Islamic extremism, we have to bottle up democracy.
A more precise analogue to what’s happening on the ground would be France’s failed war to hold Algeria in the 50’s and 60’s. First of all, the French government and military didn’t understand Algerian culture, political division, and religion, and it cost them badly. The American politicians and military also failed to understand Iraqi culture, politics, and religion, leading them to underestimate the divisions between Shi’ites and Sunnis and between rival groups of Shi’ites (among other things.)
Secondly, France’s war in Algeria was unwinnable because the two sides attached different importance to victory. The Algerians fought for self-government and their way of life. These goals were worth anything to them, so they willingly endured hardship, torture, and death. To the French, Algeria was an imperial holding that offered a certain amount of profit. Once the cost of waging war exceeded the potential profit, politics guaranteed that the French would have to cut and run. Likewise with Iraq, the insurgents will go to any length to avoid being governed by an American pupped government or a rival ethnic group. To the Americans, it’s over once people decide that the cost of war outweights the benefits.
Huh? The people of South Vietnam had voted for a communist government? That’s a new one.
Myself, I pick Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation. I think its a pretty good analog (as far as any thing can ever be timed to a past event). You had a major superpower invading and setting up its own government, various splinter groups fighting each other and the Soviets, etc. Of course, you don’t have ANOTHER superpower supplying the various insurgent groups, nor do you have the large formations the Afghani were fielding against the Soviets (course, we are still only a few years in…I’m not sure where the Afghani resistance was in year 3 after the Soviets first rolled in).
I think Vietnam is pretty weak in comparison as a good analogue to be honest. I don’t really see the parallels except the whole ‘quagmire’ thingy…and even that seems tenuous. The factionalism wasn’t there in Vietnam, that really WAS a full blown civil war going on, the scales were totally different…I just don’t see it. I think ‘Vietnam’ is always dragged in because of its negative impact on the American consiousness…not because there are any but the most superficial similarities.
-XT
Nah, the imperialist death toll was larger by at least a whole order of magnitude in Vietnam
I’d go with the Balkans (Yuogslavia, but add oil) or Afghanistan. But I think ITR’s example of France in Algeria might have some merit, too. I’m confused about this part of ITR’s post, though:
When did the South vote for communism?
I thought we went in primarily to overthrow Saddam and eliminate the threat he posed with his alleged WMDs. And where do you get the idea that the Iraqis were always in favor of Islamic extremism? That’s a new one!
The other interesting parallel with the Vietnam situation is the existence of a large hostile and somewhat reclusive country on the border which is (not very) covertly involved in the war - China/Iran. The US failure in Vietnam forced diplomacy to occur with China, which led to the Nixon visit to China, which led to the normalisation of China/West relations, which led later to China adopting “socialism with Chinese characteristics”, ie a market economy in a one-party state, and now essentially capitalism and a death of ideology there. It’s not perfect but it’d be great if that could happen with Iran in the next, say, 20 years.
The Lebanese Civil War seems apt, with the U.S. playing the role of Israel.
I must have sleeping through that speech. I thought you went there because it was absotively, posolutely certain that Sadam was going to nuke the UK and the US RIGHT NOW! (actually in 45 minutes).
Iraq had a head of state that was against Islamic extremism already, not only that, he was hated by Islamics extremists.
That is why I do see a close analogy with the 4th crusade, of course it was organazed to attack Jerusalem, but because there was no inmediate profit on that they sacked constantinople, after they did so [del]Osama[/del] Jerusalem was forgotten and constantinople was left so weak eventually it was lost to the [del]Islamic extremists[/del] Turks.
Speaking of the Turks I see similarities with a possible “solution” in Iraq to end up as an analog to “separated groups by walls and still ready to shoot at each other while we all pretend it is a whole nation” Cyprus.
Hmmmm perhaps the Philippine-American war, combined with the Moro rebellion. The American forces in action, casualties to date and size of operational theater is roughly similar. We won that one, for what it was worth.
To be analogous IMO we should had seen a reduction of casualties as time goes by in Iraq.
It’s not that they did, but rather that they would have. Or if not communism per se, at least the revolutionary cadres that had spearheaded the fight against the French. Who were, in fact, communists.
The Geneva Accord of 1954 had specified that an election was supposed to be held in 1956 to reunify the temporarily divided Vietnam. But the Diem government, with U.S. support, refused to do so. If the election had been held, it was a foregone conclusion to everyone at the time that Ho Chi Minh’s faction would have won handily in the combined vote.
ITR is incorrect that the vote had already happened, but sadly he is correct with the rest of his reasoning. The communists would have easily won a democratic election at the time, so democracy was forestalled to prevent it.
Oh and I vote for Minty Green’s suggestion of Lebanon.
Vietnam was one country divided temporarily by the 1954 Geneva Accords that ended the was of liberation against the French. The Accords committed all parties to free elections to unite the 2 in 1956. An election Ho was probably going to win - being the liberation guy.
The USA, a party to the accords but like the temporary Republic of (South) Vietnam had refused to sign them and decided ‘screw this’ and pretended South Vietnam was magically a real country and supported Diem (from the Catholic minority) in his refusal to hold the agreed elections and his suppression of their advocates.
The rest is, as they say, tragedy, as civil wars tend to be.
But the peasants did not get a chance to vote so the assertion they did is wrong.
Looking a good bet. THis article is interesting and for me, a bit of an eye-opener on the scale of resources available to insurgents and the suggestion that the waves of kidnappings etc are ‘fund raisers’.
hmmm, the ol’ have to destroy democracy to save it arguement…
Definitely, that is my nomination. In both cases the war began with the United States overthrowing a genuinely unpopular regime, with few international friends, which was detested by most of its subjects: Saddam in the one case, Spain in the other. (The obvious difference is that Saddam was a home-grown dictator, while Spain was a colonizer.) The first phase of both wars was astonishingly swift and complete (Mission accomplished!)
In both cases, the subject population wanted us to overthrow the previous regime and leave. When it became obvious we had no intention of doing so, the population turned against us, and even 100,000 troops were insufficient to maintain order. In both cases the United States had to resort to reprisals against the civilian population, detention camps, and torture of detainees, damaging our international image.
Both wars were questioned by the Democratic candidate in the next presidential election–Kerry in 2004, Bryan in 1900. In both cases, however, despite all of the controversy engendered by the war, the results in the Electoral College were almost identical to the last pre-war election (2000 and 1896).
The United States did eventually crush the Philippine insurrection, and established more or less peaceful rule over the Philippines until World War II. This was at a time, however, when Western countries had colonized most of the world, and Western advantages in weaponry and sophistication over indigenous rebellions were much greater than they are today. A similar outcome today seems unlikely.