# What is the REAL situation in Iraq? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 29, 2004, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643 "2004-09-29T08:00:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Spiny\_Norman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@Spiny\_Norman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiny_Norman)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/81 "2004-10-01T00:04:35Z")
“Safeguarding morale” - I like that. Good food, uninterrupted sleep, letters and parcels from home, some select creature comforts, good equipment, good supplies - _and a well-defined mission with clear objectives_ is what builds morale. Dog and pony shows don’t. Not that I’d worry - I’m sure the troops are able to form their own judgments. Soldiers have been proven to detect BS from superior officers at several hundred yards, it’s a survival trait. ---
**Author:** ![carolynnjulie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/58956e/32.png) [@carolynnjulie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carolynnjulie)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/82 "2004-10-01T00:10:29Z")
From what I read in the newspapers, Iraq is more like Vietnam than Europe. When United States troops liberated the European countries in 1944/1945, they were cheered, and kissed, and had flowers thrown to them everywhere, and the French, Belgium, and other liberated peoples did not try to bomb or snipe at our boys once we liberated their countries and we were then there as occupying soldiers. I dont even think the German, Japanese, or Scandanavian citizens resisted/killed occupying American troops post 1945, as much as the Iraqis are resisting our presence now. When the United States went into Vietnam to liberate it in 1965, they were still being shot at until they left in 1974. If the Iraqi liberation was a success, we wouldnt even need our boys to still be there. We will lose a lot more of American lives if bush plans on staying there until the middle east/Iraq “stabilizes”. Judge our success(or failure) there by comparing it to history when we sent U.S. troops into Canada in 1812, Vietnam in 1965, and europe in 1944. ---
**Author:** ![Atticus\_Finch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ec9cab/32.png) [@Atticus\_Finch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atticus_Finch)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/83 "2004-10-01T00:14:50Z")
> [@razorblade](#): > > We can do the same for the whole US vs all of Iraq. There are about 25 million people in Iraq and about 290 million people in the US. For the sake of simplicity, multiply the number of casualties in Iraq by 10 to get the equivalent number of casualties per capita for the US. Juan Cole has done [just that](http://www.juancole.com/2004_09_01_juancole_archive.html), and his conclusions are highly disturbing (scroll down to September 22 entry for the full story). > [@](#): > > **If America were Iraq, What would it be Like?** > > President Bush said Tuesday that the Iraqis are refuting the pessimists and implied that things are improving in that country. > > What would America look like if it were in Iraq’s current situation? The population of the US is over 11 times that of Iraq, so a lot of statistics would have to be multiplied by that number. > > Thus, violence killed 300 Iraqis last week, the equivalent proportionately of 3,300 Americans. What if 3,300 Americans had died in car bombings, grenade and rocket attacks, machine gun spray, and aerial bombardment in the last week? That is a number greater than the deaths on September 11, and if America were Iraq, it would be an ongoing, weekly or monthly toll. As **Razorblade** notes, these kind of comparative statistical exercises are fraught with difficulty, so take this with a nice big grain of salt. It’s interesting for illustrative purposes, though. By the way, **Razorblade** , welcome to the SDMB. ---
**Author:** ![Equipoise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/equipoise/32/151_2.png) [@Equipoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Equipoise)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/84 "2004-10-01T00:44:47Z")
Aldebaran, thank you for the response. madmonk28, please be safe. > [@Spiny Norman](#): > > “Safeguarding morale” - I like that. Good food, uninterrupted sleep, letters and parcels from home, some select creature comforts, good equipment, good supplies - _and a well-defined mission with clear objectives_ is what builds morale. Dog and pony shows don’t. Not that I’d worry - I’m sure the **troops are able to form their own judgments**. Soldiers have been proven to detect BS from superior officers at several hundred yards, it’s a survival trait. This one did: > [@](#): > > Marine declares war on Bush > > Iraq war veteran Steve Brozak is running hard for Congress. And he’s turning his campaign into a referendum on Bush’s military folly. > > [http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/09/30/brozak/index.html](http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/09/30/brozak/index.html) (free day pass required) > > Steve Brozak is running for Congress in New Jersey against George W. Bush. Sure, his opponent on the ticket is Republican incumbent Mike Ferguson. But as Brozak sees it, Ferguson is just a synecdoche for the Bush team, whose failings drove Brozak out of the Marines and the Republican Party and into the first political campaign of his life. > > “The bottom line is I’m going to take him down,” Brozak says of Ferguson. “I’m just going to keep hitting at him. This is a national race because I’m going to start hitting not just him but his boss. They lied to us, they misled us about what was at stake in the war with Iraq, and they’re misleading us about what is going to happen going forward.” > > A candidate who has actually served in the Middle East during the Iraq war, Brozak has seen the quagmire up close. A dark-haired, broad-shouldered man, he has a deep, authoritative voice and enunciates crisply – it’s easy to imagine him in uniform, barking orders. When he speaks of the Bush administration, though, it’s with the stunned incredulousness of one who’s seen all his assumptions about the world upended. Before the war, Brozak says, he wanted to believe his president. It barely occurred to him not to. Now, his voice gets heated when he talks about Iraq, which is the subject he talks about most. “There were no weapons of mass destruction,” he says. “There was no planning, just this sense of arrogance and contempt by the civilians in this administration.” > … > Meanwhile, the situation on the ground shocked him. “The number of people there and how they were prepared in terms of equipment and training was, across the board, criminal in terms of its inept management,” he says. > … > When Brozak returned from the Middle East to his post in Arlington, Va., he tried to alert civilians in the Defense Department to the trouble on the ground. But, he says, they were uninterested. “It was that same arrogant, contemptuous attitude. When I came back and said we have a problem, we need to address it right away, we are fighting for our lives, their attitude was, ‘We know better than you do.’ It was their contempt for the people in uniform, it was their contempt for all Americans” that finally drove him out of the Republican Party. > > In fact, Brozak says, Republicans’ contempt for soldiers – coupled with their mawkish reverence for the military in the abstract – had been bothering him for a while. He first started souring on his party when the Bush team smeared John McCain during the 2000 primaries; he was outraged by the 2002 attacks against Democratic Sen. Max Cleland, who was tarred as a traitorous ally of Osama bin Laden despite the fact that he lost three limbs serving in Vietnam. > … > Brozak remains a fiscal conservative and a fervent booster of the military. But there’s not much Republican left in him. These days he shares the conviction, nearly ubiquitous among Democratic activists, that the current administration represents something new and uniquely threatening in American life. The Republican Party, he says, has been “hijacked by a reactionary group that is truly dangerous.” But of course, he’s a Democrat now. What does he know? Chickenhawks always know better. ---
**Author:** ![toadspittle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c0e974/32.png) [@toadspittle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/toadspittle)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/85 "2004-10-01T00:56:53Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > And of course, there is always the wisdom of our BANNED friend [Collounsbury](http://www.livejournal.com/users/collounsbury/). I try and look in once a week. Geez. Did he get banned again? ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/86 "2004-10-01T01:54:37Z")
**rjung** : > [@](#): > > “Salesmen” is a euphemism for “liar,” y’know. No, that’s not what I meant. I meant that they’ve placed greater emphasis on successfully arguing for the war than successfully fighting it. (And selling the attack on Iraq as part of the war on terrorism sounds like the ol’ bait-n-switch.) ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/87 "2004-10-01T03:19:52Z")
> [@carolynnjulie](#): > > I dont even think the German, Japanese, or Scandanavian citizens resisted/killed occupying American troops post 1945, as much as the Iraqis are resisting our presence now. > > When the United States went into Vietnam to liberate it in 1965, they were still being shot at until they left in 1974. > > Judge our success(or failure) there by comparing it to history when we sent U.S. troops into Canada in 1812, Vietnam in 1965, and europe in 1944. 1. Scandinavia was not at war with the United States, so why is it in a group with Germany and Japan? 2. The United States didn’t go into Vietnam in 1965; they were there before then. 3. And they didn’t go in to liberate it; they were there to prop up a puppet government, in part against its own people. 4. The U.S. didn’t occupy Canada in 1812, so why is THAT comparable to Vietnam or Europe? ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/88 "2004-10-01T04:26:43Z")
There appears to be no coherent plan on how to deal with Iraq’s rebel held territories. Or if there is, there’s some serious miscommunication going on between the Iraqi defence ministry, and the US military. On the one hand, Iraq’s defence minister says that there’s a big offensive on the way: [Rebel-held areas will be retaken in October](http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1141312004) > [@](#): > > A MAJOR offensive to retake rebel-held areas of Iraq will be launched next month, the country’s defence minister, Hazim al-Shalaan, said yesterday. > The western cities of Fallujah and Ramadi, as well as some parts of Baghdad and the town of Samarra, north of the capital, are effectively controlled by insurgents. “You wait and see what we are going to do. We are going to take all these cities in October,” Mr Shalaan said. He added that the offensive would be fought by United States and Iraqi forces. While on the other hand, the chairman of the joint chiefs tells us that [Force Cannot Produce Lasting Results in Fallujah](http://www.Globalsecurity.Org/wmd/library/news/iraq/2004/09/iraq-040930-afps01.htm) > [@](#): > > The situation in Fallujah “cannot remain the status quo,” the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff told National Public Radio in a Sept. 28 interview. > Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers said on the “Talk of the Nation” program that coalition forces are working with the Iraqi interim government to find solutions for Fallujah, Ramadi and other areas in Iraq’s Baathist Triangle, now dominated by insurgents. > Any solution in Iraq must have a political aspect to be permanent, Myers said. “There is nothing that can be imposed by force that’s going to be lasting in character,” he said. “That’s what it’s all about.” It’s almost October 1, so _something_ should be happening soon. I hope they get their plans sorted out before taking precipitate action. Not doing so could seriously screw any chance of elections come January. ---
**Author:** ![clayton\_e](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@clayton\_e](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clayton_e)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/89 "2004-10-01T05:19:00Z")
If we are about to send in a crapload of force in the rebel cities and areas… why havn’t we? We have this awesome power, shock and awe to the max, and we have to announce it to everyoe that … ‘Soon! Just you wait… We will send more troops to kick your ass! Just wait another month and you’ll be screwed!’ How about we do it or admit we’re the ones that are screwed? ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/90 "2004-10-01T06:22:30Z")
> [@clayton\_e](#): > > If we are about to send in a crapload of force in the rebel cities and areas… why havn’t we? We have this awesome power, shock and awe to the max, and we have to announce it to everyoe that … ‘Soon! Just you wait… We will send more troops to kick your ass! Just wait another month and you’ll be screwed!’ > > How about we do it or admit we’re the ones that are screwed? Duh, they’re making preparations. They have to take into account the governments wishes of them invading the cities out of their control, the amount of deaths that might occur, whether those deaths will be predominantely civilians which could cause Allawis and the US reputation to sink further lower, and whether it would be better to exhaust all other options to bring them back into the political process before deciding the military option. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 10:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/91 "2004-10-01T10:19:53Z")
> [@Shayna](#): > > Why is it a bad thing that the people who are actually fighting this fight are not being given _all_ the information they might need to actually win it? You can’t seriously be questioning that, can you? ??!!??!! You don’t think the troops might, I don’t know, _need to know_ about potential dangers and risks they’re facing? You think safeguarding _morale_ is more important than safeguarding _lives_? You don’t think the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces has an _obligation_ to report _honestly_ to his troops? You don’t think the contractors who are working to rebuild Iraq have a right to know the _truth_? They should be kept in the dark as to the actual dangers they face so that unlike **madmonk** , they can’t escape while they still have a chance, if that’s the course they feel is safest? Madmonk apparently knows what’s going on; at least, you’ve all heralded him as the voice of authority and vindication for your “I told you so” objective. So how can you say that contractors don’t know what’s going on? Soldiers also know what’s going on. That’s why they’re careful and suspicious of every person they see. War is dangerous. People get killed in wars. Your proposal, it seems to me, is not to give them The Truth, but to paralyze them with fear. “Hey, Joe! Just want to let you know you’re gonna die, but you hang here anyway until then, okay?”. Lord have mercy. ---
**Author:** ![carolynnjulie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/58956e/32.png) [@carolynnjulie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carolynnjulie)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 12:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/92 "2004-10-01T12:08:33Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > 1. Scandinavia was not at war with the United States, so why is it in a group with Germany and Japan? > > 2. The United States didn’t go into Vietnam in 1965; they were there before then. > > 3. And they didn’t go in to liberate it; they were there to prop up a puppet government, in part against its own people. > > 4. The U.S. didn’t occupy Canada in 1812, so why is THAT comparable to Vietnam or Europe? 1. Finland is Scandanavian, and it was an Axis power- Finland was on the other side with Germany and was against the Allied nations. But it really doesnt matter which Scandanavian power allied with whom, if they were oppressed by anyone, e.g. Denmark was oppressed by Germany. The point is, nearly all the Scandanavian powers were oppressed by somebody, we liberated them, and after we liberated them, they did not shoot at our troops. 2. Its true that The United States was involved since June of 1950, and had advisors there for a long time, from a few hundred to a few thousand(we currently have U.S. troops in a hundred countries), but it wasnt until 1965 that a significant number of U.S. troops were sent in, to do military action, a la the Iraq invasion. 3. Use whatever word you want to use, but Lyndon Johnson and American soldiers went into Vietnam for supposedly the same reasons that bush went into Iraq. He said he didnt want the vietnamese people being oppressed, he said that if we didnt go into vietnam it would threaten the US and world peace, he said that vietnam was unstable, etc. and US troops went into a country that didnt want us there. 4. Canada was comparable to Iraq in that Canada at that time was under control of the King of England. If the US was successful in winning in Canada, we would have liberated Canada from the control of the king of England, and free its people from colonial rule. Canada is comparable to vietnam, and to iraq, in that the Canadians did not want us there. It is comparable to europe, in that we were invading a country supposedly to set it free, europe wanted us to free it, other countries do/did not want us there. All I am saying is that whether or not we are or will be successful in Iraq, or Canada, or vietnam, or europe, is mostly a function of whether or not the people want us to come in to their country and change their government. Europe wanted us to do it, vietnam, Canada, Cuba, and Iraq do not want us there. Also, our success in Iraq can be measured by how long it takes. In europe, Germany and japan, it was only days after we defeated the army that the people stopped shooting at us. In Iraq, vietnam, etc, our people will be killed as long as they are stationed there. ---
**Author:** ![Rune](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e68b1a/32.png) [@Rune](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rune)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/93 "2004-10-01T12:29:36Z")
> [@carolynnjulie](#): > > 1. Finland is Scandanavian, and it was an Axis power- Finland was on the other side with Germany and was against the Allied nations. But it really doesnt matter which Scandanavian power allied with whom, if they were oppressed by anyone, e.g. Denmark was oppressed by Germany. The point is, nearly all the Scandanavian powers were oppressed by somebody, we liberated them, and after we liberated them, they did not shoot at our troops. America didn’t fight the Finns – Ivan did. You didn’t liberate any Scandinavian country – Tommy did, and for a small part - Ivan. There were no yankie troops in Scandinavia, there were a few English. Montgomery liberated Denmark & Norway. Sweden & Iceland were neutral. ---
**Author:** ![MMI](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@MMI](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MMI)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/94 "2004-10-01T17:58:56Z")
Finland was forced to “liberate” itself from the Germans when the latter declined to leave Finland as required by the Finnish-Soviet armistice. Finland was never an Axis country per se, but was allied with Germany for the sole purpose of winning back territory stolen by the Soviet Union as a buffer during the winter war. The Finns refer to WWII as the Continuation War for that reason. The Finns had no real beef with the western allies (although Britain did eventually declare war when the Finns turned down an opportunity to make peace mid-war). WRT the time it takes for the Iraqi’s to stop shooting being the measure of success - it was only after several years of bombing and a bloody grinding inch by inch ground war that the German’s surrendered. Let us hope that we are more successful this time. ---
**Author:** ![carolynnjulie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/58956e/32.png) [@carolynnjulie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carolynnjulie)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/95 "2004-10-01T19:16:17Z")
> [@MMI](#): > > WRT the time it takes for the Iraqi’s to stop shooting being the measure of success - it was only after several years of bombing and a bloody grinding inch by inch ground war that the German’s surrendered. After Germany was taken, the German citizens did not keep shooting at us, and bombing us, like Iraq is doing. We have already taken Iraq, just like we already taken Germany. ---
**Author:** ![B.Serum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/b.serum/32/14266_2.png) [@B.Serum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/B.Serum)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/96 "2004-10-01T19:27:45Z")
**In reply to the OP:** Wall Street Journal reporter Farnaz Fassihi is stationed in Baghdad. His recent (9/29) e-mail to his friends is posted on [this site](http://poynter.org/forum/?id=misc). This is a first-hand account of Iraq by a reporter from a fairly conservative publication. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/97 "2004-10-01T20:02:02Z")
> [@Hey you!](#): > > **In reply to the OP:** > > Wall Street Journal reporter Farnaz Fassihi is stationed in Baghdad. His recent (9/29) e-mail to his friends is posted on [this site](http://poynter.org/forum/?id=misc). This is a first-hand account of Iraq by a reporter from a fairly conservative publication. That is one depressing email. As I recall, one of Saddam’s final offers of settlement before we invaded was to negotiate an exile for himself and a gradual conversion of Iraq to democracy. Hindsight is 20-20, I guess. Maybe we should have taken him up on it. ---
**Author:** ![clayton\_e](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@clayton\_e](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clayton_e)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/98 "2004-10-01T20:07:36Z")
Thank you for posting that, **Hey you!**. To be fair, are there any blogs from people in Iraq that say the situation is improving? Or is it just not? ---
**Author:** ![clayton\_e](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@clayton\_e](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clayton_e)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2004, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/99 "2004-10-02T07:45:19Z")
> [@](#): > > Or is it just not? I just checked the thread and realized that might come across in a different way than I meant it. Just seeing if there are any other blogs out there. I’m not saying the situation in Iraq is going either way, good or bad. ---
**Author:** ![B.Serum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/b.serum/32/14266_2.png) [@B.Serum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/B.Serum)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643/100 "2004-10-04T04:25:35Z")
> [@clayton\_e](#): > > Thank you for posting that, **Hey you!**. To be fair, are there any blogs from people in Iraq that say the situation is improving? I don’t know of any Iraq situation blogs outside of the ones already mentioned earlier in this thread. I recall some of those subscribe to a more positive outlook. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-real-situation-in-iraq/266643.md?page=6)