…As he made $15,000 a half hour on the lecture circuit, happily distancing himself from a war he helped to start.
I wonder what HE’S paying to “buy” it. Probably not much.
The difference between those two and, say, Iraq, is that in West Germany and Japan we weren’t involved in a continuing state of low intensity warfare with partisans distributed among (and at least tacitly supported by) the native population. The situation in Iraq is more akin to the French occupation of Algeria or the U.S. in Korea, requiring maintaining a high level of occupation forces and accepting a degree of attrition.
At this point, however, we’re stuck. If we pull out, we leave a power vacuum, and the Shia’ factions supported by Iran take over, which will put a chokehold on Iraqi oil and further destabilize the region (at least as far as the House of Saud is concerned). And of course the ensuing ethnic and fundamentalist Islamic bloodshed would be another horror that the Western powers would sit on the sidelines and watch helplessly. Withdrawling troops en masse without a replacement security force and stable political system–democratic or otherwise–is going to be at least as much of a debacle as the initial invasion and occupation effort.
The only way I see an American withdrawl working at this point is to divide the country back up along the pre-existing ethnic lines and have a multi-national occupying force (the UN, or pan-Arabic, or somesuch) policing demiliterized zones between those lines leaving what goes one within those sectors to local governance. That’s not a very palatable solution–it basically gives the fundies what they want–but it’s the only way I see to minimize bloodshed and separate groups with centuries of ethnic conflict.
George H.W. Bush knew exactly what he was doing when he left Hussein in power; it far easier to let a dictator perform the necessary acts to suppress ethnic discord and religious intolerance than to try to do it as a moderating peacekeeper force. Anybody who studied the history of the Balkans under the Soviets and after could see that. But history was never one of George W.'s strong suites. I’m not clear precisely as to what constitutes a strong suite for him, but it’s definitely not history…or science, or math, or literature, or strategy, or public speaking.
Who would have thought that the next President to come along would make Bill Clinton look like a foreign policy genius?
Stranger
A mission which has been continuously redefined to match the latest news reports, at that. Even the damn life-wasting “surge” had the misison of allowing the Iraqis time to form a stable, unified democracy - and yet it’s purpose now is being stated by the talking-point macaws (and the conscious panderers like McCain) as along the lines of “ending violence” and “defeating terrorism”, and “it’s working”. Like hell it is.
Oh yeah, Dave - cite? :dubious:
We’ve finally turned a corner America can use:
Opium fields spread across Iraq as farmers try to make ends meet
These are people, not a product; we have no right to continue to grind our collective bootheels into their faces to make ourselves feel morally superior. And we are continuing to “break it”.
They want us to leave, and most of them support killing our soldiers. This has nothing to do with our imaginary benevolence or helping the Iraqi people. It CERTAINLY has nothing to do with establishing a stable democratic regime, since such a regime would be a dangerous enemy.
We have no right to warp their society any further to gratify our egos.
Real question: Do know of a list of modern conquered states and their aftermath? It might make an interesting comparison.
(That is, do you know of a list of…)
Another point for interested voters.
Neo-conservatives will have us believe that we can win in Iraq provided we’re not stabbed in the back by those liberals. Just like Vietnam – or an early 20th century conflict involving a certain central European power.
The Democrats want to wind down the war immediately, with all troops home (except for an Al Q mop-up squad) by … well, that’s not clear.
Stay the Coursers like John McCain want to remain in Iraq indefinitely – unsurprisingly, they don’t emphasize that this implies 10+ more years in addition to the 5 years laid down already. This scenario would make Iraq the longest fought war in American history: by way of contrast, Vietnam lasted 10 years.
So I suspect that the electoral choices involve 2-3 more years or 5-10 more years.