George Bush and “victory”

36 thoughts on “George Bush and “victory””

1. FP makes a strong point
   Recent FP article hardly has anything to do with real live Iraqi elections, but it makes lots of sense when “lefties” like Mr.Freedland are concerned. Having endorsed MEMRI as a trustable source in his recent scream, Mr.Freedland made his real position on the ME and Iraq 100% clear. Yes, this is true “watershed moment” for him.
   1. FP. Victory for Freedom in Iraq: Left’s Agendas Crushed: http://frontpagemag.com/blog/index.asp
   The election today in Iraq, the third since January, will create the most democratic regime in the history of Islam and strike a devastating blow against the forces of Islamic terror — and the international “progressive” left. Since the beginning of this war for Iraqi freedom, the international left, led by its American comrades — has been against this war for freedom in Iraq.
   2. GU. Jonathan Freedland. The sickness bequeathed by the west to the Muslim world: http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,,1666871,00.html

2. “I can’t really decide how I feel about this claimed ‘victory’.”
   Helena, you are showing a certain amount of courage by displaying your liberal angst in this way. However, there is really no reason to be so torn. It looks like W’s propaganda has seeped into your brain via some unprotected back channel. Here are a few things to keep in mind:
   1. Democracy is not to be confused with “elections.” Democracy means rule by the will of the people. Elections are neither required nor sufficient to establish a democracy. Elections are merely a tool, which can be used to either support or subvert the will of the people.
   2. Rule by the will of the people is totally incompatible with foreign military occupation. Any “election” which occurs under these circumstances is meaningless, except as a tool of propaganda for the alleged victors. The self-determination of Iraq cannot begin until the occupation has ended.
   3. The success or failure of the US military adventure in Iraq will be determined by physical reality, not by what George Bush claims or intends, or by what people think about his claims or intentions. The fact is, we lost the war at least a year ago. As Rep. Murtha has stated in unambiguous terms, we lack the personnel, equipment, funding and tactical ability to prevail in this conflict.
   4. The political issue in America is not whether the neocon agenda was right or wrong. We are way past that. The issue is who will be blamed for the inevitable retreat, and the disastrous consequences that will flow from the collossal waste of America’s true strength and influence in the world.
   Peace.

3. Henry J., thanks for those links. (Btw, others may want to know that your ‘FP’ is david Horowitz’s front Page blog– NOT Foreign Policy mag, as I’d assumed.) Horowitz is certainly a salutary or should I say extremely illustrative read.
   JC, don’t worry my brain hasn’t been captured by w-oid forces. I retain my powers of independent human reason. I am, however, open to being persuaded by convincing arguments produced by all parties and that wd also apply to GWB were he ever to produce one.
   I completely agree with your points 1-3. #4 needs more discussion, and I’m too tired to do that now.
   Anyway I just want to pop in a link to this piece, that its author Gareth Porter recently sent me. His lead there is this:
   While U.S. President George W. Bush continued to claim a strategy for “victory” in Iraq in recent speeches, his administration has quietly renounced the goal of defeating the non-al Qaeda Sunni armed organisations there./ The administration is evidently preparing for serious negotiations with the Sunni insurgents, whom it has started referring to as “nationalists”, emphasising their opposition to al Qaeda’s objectives./ The new policy has thus far gone unnoticed in the media, partly because it has only been articulated by U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and the spokesman for the U.S. command in Baghdad./ The White House clearly recognises that the shift could cause serious political problems if and when it becomes widely understood. The Republican Party has just unveiled a new television ad attacking Democratic Party Chair Howard Dean for suggesting that the war in Iraq cannot be won./ Renouncing victory over the Sunni insurgents therefore undercuts the president’s political strategy of portraying his policy as one of “staying the course” and attacking the democrats for “cutting and running”.
   I didn’t read this until after I’d written my post here. But the two texts do have some interesting meshes.

4. Helena, I am heartened by your anguished posting. The questions you ask are indeed quite important. The point is not about W, it’s about the people of Iraq. Personally, I believe that had the US an interest in what the people of Iraq think or feel, they would’ve found some way to deal earlier with Hussein with much less tragic consequences for the Iraqi people that this war has brought them.
   All in all the debate should be about how America is going to be an empire. I know that this question has floated around in the background for a while now. But it has been tacitly denied rather than explicitly debated. It should form the explicit terms of debate. I believe that the refusal to take this debate head on is something that the American people should have some say on. Unfortunately, I think such questions as this are left to the eggheads and think tanks. As Walter Lippmann said so long ago, the public is a fiction. It’s the insiders who make the decisions, and all we do as voters is passively accept or not their decisions.
   With the massive spin machine and the manipulation of facts and stories available to political parties, the American public is even more distanced from the real debates than even in Lippmann’s time. The question is, “how do we frame the debate” so that he public can get a real picture of what’s at stake?
   If you’ve ever talked to real people about the American Empire, they often look at you like you’re talking Maritan. Americans are not comfortable with the idea, as Wesley Clarke has pointed out several places. Yet, it is exactly the reality of this fact that the public needs to come to terms with. Take it out of the backrooms of the insiders and put it in front of the voters–let them decide: are we an empire? should we be? if so, how do we to go about exercising our power as one?
   Several thinkers have suggested that there are many kinds of empire–in and of itself the concept does not need to resemble those of the past. Bernard Williams has suggested something along the lines of an enlightened empire.
   I believe that this tacit acceptance of America as empire is the reaosn why many Democrats are loathe to undermine the basic assumptions underlying America’s presence in the Mideast. They accept the notion of the US as empire, but they’d just “do it differently.”
   So the question of whether the US should be an empire is a done deal for insiders from both sides–now it’s just a matter of how to grease the machine and how to make it run.

5. Helena, your quote from Gareth Porter would seem to directly support my point #4. I woud welcome further discussion after you’ve rested up.

6. The political issue in America is not whether the neocon agenda was right or wrong. We are way past that. The issue is who will be blamed for the inevitable retreat, and the disastrous consequences that will flow from the collossal waste of America’s true strength and influence in the world.
   The way neoconservative ideology works, God spams them with revelations. So, they are always right and their opponents are always wrong.
   Henry J., thanks for those links.
   My pleasure 🙂
   Horowitz is certainly a salutary or should I say extremely illustrative read.
   Well, IMO, he is a hard neocon as any other. There are truckloads of this stuff on NatRev, JPost, etc.
   The neocons and the Iranian castle
   In Kafka’s novel, K lives in a certain Village while being heavily alienated from the villagers. They, in turn, are heavily alienated from the Castle which rules the Village in some mysterious ways. With villagers’ help, K tries to establish contacts with the Castle, but without any success. Socially and politically, this story gives a powerful model of a system that breaks down because its parts cannot talk to each other.
   Ironically, Kafka’s novel explains much more about Khalilzad’s Iranian predicament than GU article. The problem is, GU never cared to cover the Iranian developments anyhow reasonably. So, the readers of Mr.Klug are supposed to believe in “lame duck Ahmadinejad” theory: either pro-Western reformers are ready to depose him, or he is stuck in internal political clashes, or he is scared to death by nuclear blackmail – oops, international non-proliferation effort. Or maybe Iranians sleep and dream about the latest masterpiece of Russian go-between diplomacy? Maybe uranium enrichment in Russia will resolve the crisis?
   However, “lame duck Ahmadinejad” is a typical Kafkian delusion, and brief wiki entry is just a hint to how it works. So, in real life, Iran goes through the next stage of Khomenist revolution, and Ahmadinejad is perfectly in place there.
   As for Khalilzad, ideologically, he is a 100% pure neocon, for this reason alone, he has nothing to talk about with the Khomeinsts. Khalilzad’s record in Afghanistan is also far from stellar. US/UK media whitewash aside, he presided over Afghanistan’s transformation into a global opium superpower.
   The bottom line is, neoconservative diplomacy is as blind and confused in the ME as a Kafkian hero. All they can do now is to say thank you to Lewis and Pipes for their dreams and get over their miserable selves.
   1. GU. FOSTER KLUG. U.S. Ambassador to Iraq to Meet Iranians: http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-5443889,00.html
   The U.S. ambassador to Iraq has been given permission to meet with officials from Iran, a country with no diplomatic relations with the United States, the State Department said Monday.
   “It’s a very narrow mandate that he has,” spokesman Sean McCormack said of Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, “and it deals specifically with issues related to Iraq.”
   “We are willing, as a government, in the interests of diplomacy, to try to find a diplomatic solution to this issue,” McCormack said. “And we hope that the Iranians do come back in a serious way to negotiate.”
   He added, however, that “given Iran’s past behavior, we believe that it is likely that Iran will be referred to the Security Council. But … we’ll see what the Iranians do. The ball is in their court.”
   2. Iranian news blog: http://inplainview.us.tt/newsWorldMEIran.htm
   3. Afghanistan news blog: http://inplainview.us.tt/newsAfghan.htm
   4. Wiki on the Castle: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Castle

7. John, why is the “political issue” in the USA “who will be blamed” rather than what is actually happening?
   As an outsider, I must say that it is hard to keep patience when there are so many acres of text devoted to “who will be blamed” and the like. It is only shadow-boxing. It is unreal. It is also disaempowering. It means you, and by extension your reader, are accepting the role of observer and not participant.

8. According to several of my Kurdish informants the vote in Kurdistan was very much rigged by the two Kurdish mafiocracies, just as it was in the other “elections”. There are also credible reports from Kirkuk of Kurds being bussed in from other areas to vote in that city in order to tip the demographic balance in favour of the Kurds, just as Kurds were “imported” to Kirkuk for the January “election”. I have not yet heard this time around, as I did after the January “elections” that the Kurdish mafiocracies took steps to block non-Kurds – Assyrians and Chaldeans all over Kurdistan and Turkmens and Arabs particularly in Kirkuk – from voting, but that does not mean it did not happen, and I intend to check it out when I have a chance.
   I know a number of people who voted for `Allawi this time on the premise that he is better than the Iranian mullahs who are now in power. This is, of course, very dangerous, as he is very much the Bush regime’s “bitch” and will do anything they tell him to do. `Allawi is also no less a corrupt and brutal opportunist than the people now in power, and cares not one bit for Iraq or Iraqis, but only for himself. When it was in his interest he was Saddam’s thug, when it was in his interest he committed car bombings for the CIA, he was an embezzler in Yemen, and now he has the full backing of the US government (which has financed and designed both his political campaigns).
   And people here wonder why I do not get excited about these “elections”.

9. The Iraqi elections cat
   As we know, the Iraqi elections are completely unobservable for outsiders because of heavy violence. In fact, these observers may need to kill quite a number of voters if they want to stay alive!
   This means that Iraqi election violations are exactly like Schroedinger’s cat. This cat is famous for being both alive and dead at the same tine because there is no way to observe its actual state.
   However, now there is international standard that Iraqi elections cat is alive and well regardless of anything.
   1. AJ. Iraq’s election “met global standards”
   “The Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq is to be commended on the way it has performed its role under the difficult circumstances prevailing in Iraq,” said Paul Dacey, spokesman for the international observers.
   Note: AJ has changed the title of this article to “Warning of factional fighting following Iraq’s poll”
   2. Wiki on Schrödinger’s cat

10. “John, why is the “political issue” in the USA “who will be blamed” rather than what is actually happening?”
    I meant that this is the game now being played by politicians, not that it is the people’s concern. Of course you are right that we need to continue to press for better solutions.

11. Interesting Va href=”http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/classics/story/0,6000,1669276,00.html” traget=”blank:>article by Harold Bloom on the death of American “democracy.” Goes some way in supporting my view that American decency has died on the vine.

12. “The Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq” (so-called) is anything but independent. Its members were appointed by, and serve by the will of the invading/occupying power.

13. Okay, I’ve checked out the Schrodinger’s cat Wiki and agree it’s a good analogy for the Iraqi elections.
    Points well made, Shirin. (I feel a sense of deja vu from our discussions earlier this year about the January elections. I may be more persuadable this time round. However, now as then, I’m still open to the argument that “endorsing” the election may help speed the withdrawal… )
    And so, on to JC’s point 4: The political issue in America is not whether the neocon agenda was right or wrong. We are way past that. The issue is who will be blamed for the inevitable retreat, and the disastrous consequences that will flow from the collossal waste of America’s true strength and influence in the world.
    Okay, I agree totally with the first two sentences there. I think what I’m not easy with is your assumption that “disastrous consequences” will flow from “the collossal waste… ”
    Yes, I completely agree that the “investment” of hundreds of billions of bucks (that could have been used to help combat AIDS in Africa, or rebuild tattered social and physical infrastructure systems inside the US, or whatever other good goal… ) and of thousands of human lives into pursuit of the war and occupation in Iraq have been a waste.
    But if the (perhaps paradoxical, perhaps only dialectical) outcome of the decision to undertake that war is actually to dent and start to roll back the global hegemony of the US military machine, then I call that outcome very far indeed from disastrous.
    Heck, it could even be the first significant step on returning the US to a relationship of simple equality and reciprocity with the rest of the world. (Though that will, of course, take a lot more work yet.)
    I think I’ve started writing about that here on JWN. (Here, for instance.) But I probably need to flesh out these ideas a bunch more.

14. First a comment about neocons. I still think it’s useful to separate the Bush Administration into four groups; the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld cabal, the neocons, the religious right wingers and the realists. Keep in mind that the power of the neocons has been waning over the last two years. Even the religious right wingers aren’t as significant as they once were except in the polls and in terms of the bones that are thrown to them. The number of realists is very small and smaller than they once were. Condi Rice is sometimes in this group and sometimes in the cabal. In the end, as far as understanding the Bush Administration, only the cabal matters. The cabal is Nixonian, it is Hobbesian, it is power-hungry. It is also surprisingly incompetent outside the field of campaigning, public relations and destroying political opposition; in those three fields it is dangerous.
    One thing to keep in mind about the war is that in the first year everybody kept talking about the need to correct various problems before the window of opportunity closed. The window of opportunity closed a long time ago and everything since then has been a political attempt to get the best we can out of Iraq without admitting what a fiasco the enterprise has been.
    Ironically, the initial thought of starting Iraqi democracy using caucuses was probably Iraq’s best hope for some kind of beginning to democracy but it depended on a sufficient number of troops to establish and keep the peace in the opening months of the war and it depended on the Bush Administration not supporting people like Chalabi and Allawi. That never happened. Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld were blinded by their ideological assumptions and had too many ambitions for the democracy side of the project to have succeeded. All we have seen since then are ad hoc attempts to deal with developments. I’m not happy with the failures that the elections represent but there is no other workable option but to have had the three elections this year given the failures in the first year.
    Bush is clearly trying to keep his options open. And most of those options are not good. In reality, none of his preferred options are implementable; what we’re hearing is the noise of a floudering administration under stress. When you have a failed presidency, steer the president towards the least objectionable option: let him declare his phony victory if it means drawing down our troops and shifting the remaining troops to one side.
    As for the consequences of Bush’s adventurism, there are consequences that too many parties are helping to obscure including investors in our bonds. There will come a reckoning and it can’t be put off much longer. Even the lower gas prices is misleading since its based on supplies that have been released from our reserves and the reserves of other nations. The greatest damage, however, has been to our credibility. And that damage matters. It is recoverable but it will take time. Keep in mind that the world still looks to America for leadership, because there really isn’t anywhere else to look. At the moment, the world just isn’t looking at Bush for that leadership.

15. Correction: it should be “floundering” administration.

16. Its members were appointed by, and serve by the will of the invading/occupying power.
    You are quite right but for some like Vadim they still see the black as white and keep arguing on this site a bout the goodness of invasion most of us we can see it simply because they are invaders and occupiers, I don’t know why this mangling and manipulative talk about the truth, I wish for those if their country invaded by China or USSR what will they say then?
    For more filtering to prevent of the truths revealed and to hid the truth of the real life of Iraqis under occupations see this story well reported “Terror reborn in Falluja ruins”

17. OK Helena, my language was a little hyperbolic, and I jumbled some different thoughts together. The blame game is one thing. The waste of resources is another. But I don’t buy the notion that America’s past strength was just imperialism or miitary hegemony. Call me naive, but I actually think this country stood for more than that. Nothing is ever as pure as we would like it, but in the past it was at least possible for an American President to talk about freedom, democracy, equal opportunity, and actually be taken seriously – perhaps even be inspiring. As Harold Bloom put it so well, “Democracy” is now “a ruined word, because of its misuse in the American political rhetoric of our moment.”* This crowd of robber barons stole the treasures, both tangible and intangible, that we had built up over the years, and simply wasted them on a crude, failed attempt to destroy their rivals once and for all. That is the “collossal waste” I had in mind.
    *http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/classics/story/0,6000,1669276,00.html

18. John C. writes:
    Democracy is not to be confused with “elections.”
    This is a key point in any attempt to determine the consequences of the American role in Iraq. The US has enabled the holding of elections in Iraq, not “the founding of democracy,” as the rhetoric of the Bush administration would have it. Ironically this was not the first order of priorities for US officials.
    Craig writes:
    … the initial thought of starting Iraqi democracy using caucuses was probably Iraq’s best hope for some kind of beginning to democracy …
    The caucus plan was the original American proposal for “democracy” in Iraq, in which the constitution was to have been written …. prior to elections. The first order of priorities after the “cessation of major hostilities” was for the US to appoint friendly faces to local caucuses that would in turn select delegates to a constituent assembly. Thus it was clear that American intentions in the beginning were to deny the voice of the people in forming the new government. Not very democratic, and the country’s previously disempowered Shi`a majority rose up under Sistani’s instructions to call for popular elections prior to the formation of a constitution-writing body. Thus the spirit of “democracy via elections” was thrust upon the US occupation authorities.
    Helena writes:
    But if the (perhaps paradoxical, perhaps only dialectical) outcome of the decision to undertake that war is actually to dent and start to roll back the global hegemony of the US military machine …
    Yes, this is the point that needs to be emphasized. The US has become caught up in its own web and the entire Iraq project has been a huge waste, as John C. suggests of resources and credibility, hard and soft power. For this reason Helena is on the right track when she says we should use the elections as a time to persuade the US to withdraw. Let the Bush administration take credit for “enabling elections” in Iraq, but give the Iraqis their credit for insisting on “democracy.” Given the conflict that is likely to accompany the post-election bargaining among the main Iraqi parties, there is only a very slim chance that actual democracy will follow. However, if it happens, then the credit for “democracy” should be given where credit is due.
    This seems to be the only way to salvage the meaning of “democracy” out of the mess we created.

19. I think the exchange above between John C and Helena reveals a good critical point that can apply to quite a number of articles I have read recently about the “decline” of the USA.
    From my point of view the USA is not “declinining” so much as returning. At least I hope so.
    One of the slogans of the SA liberation struggle was “Mayibuye iAfrika!” which translates as “Come back Africa!”.
    I can’t tell you how people long for the USA to “come back” in this way. It would be so beautiful.

20. “Rule by the will of the people is totally incompatible with foreign military occupation”
    Just a note that democracy in Germany (nee West Germany) and Italy and South Korea hasn’t been restricted by the mere presence of US bases. The next phases in Iraq will be to reduce the US military role but keep some bases for at least a while to help suppress the insurgents. Just as bases in South Korea were a counter to Northern aggression and the bases in Germany a counter to invasion from the East.
    And the mere presence of US bases doesn’t imply a “Foreign military occupation”.
    Real elections are a vital and necessary part of democracy. So far as I can observe, the absence of real elections means the absence of real democracy. Do you have any examples of democracy without elections?
    It ain’t over ’til it’s over but the fat lady is warming up her voice and the Iraqi people are holding on to their power as tightly as they can. I do hope the constitutional issues can be resolved as intelligently as possible…

21. On the nature of Islamic anti-Semitism, see this very interesting article: European Roots of Antisemitism by Matthias Kuntzel. It describes how Islamic anti-Semitism is in part a transplant of European anti-Semitism and in part home-grown.
    It isn’t that the Arab-Israeli conflict has created Arab anti-Semitism, but that anti-Semitism grew and changed as a result of contact with the West, including Nazism. And that Arab/Islamic views of Jews and hence of Israel and the US are distorted by this prism of prejudice.

22. More on Radio Zeesen and the Nazi-Islam connection from the same German author: Matthias Küntzel.
    This guy has some astonishing finds on his website. Read the whole article. If racial attitudes in the Middle East had been different — who knows? — there might be peace in the Middle East and there might never have been a war in Iraq.

23. Who said anything about anti-semitism, WarrenW? If every discussion ends up being about anti-semitism, doesn’t that become anti-semitic in itself? I mean, it’s as if you are insisting that when Jews are present, the only topic that can be discussed is anti-semitism. That can’t be right, even for you, can it?
    This thread is about US ideas af victory and decline, and alternatives to these ides. Please, man, restrain yourself for once in your lifetime.

24. On the Iraqi elections:
    Instead of focusing on the personal shortcomings of George W Bush, we should have perceived the strengths of the Iraqi people. They have grabbed this one chance at democracy and are holding on tightly. They will evict the insurgency and perhaps then tame the US into a mere trading partner and regional ally.
    Note again that Germany manages to take very non-American positions on domestic and foreign policy while retaining US military bases on it’s soil.

25. The reason why the British anti-war movement is as you described it is due to the fact that most people back home opposed the war from the start. Thus setting up a movement was relatively easy because it had so much talent to draw on. Remember that when Balir was fored to allow the Commons to vote on the aggression, opponents of the war came from all three main parties.
    In the USA the war was very popular, untill the casualty figures mounted. Thus is is no surprise that the anti-war movement there is narrow and sectarian, because only the far left were organising anything. That will change as time goes on, so don’t lose heart.

26. Dominic:
    Henry James, above, quoted the Freedland article in the Guardian, which raised the point.
    “Frontpage mag”, which HJ also mentioned, occasionally has good articles, and should be looked at from time to time. I found Phyllis Chesler’s articles enlightening. But FP has it’s faults, and some of its writers are mediocrities.

27. Islamic anti-Semitism
    Who are you speaks this rubbish here?
    What you call this rubbish and acquisitions is it racism? You prod of freedom and democracy and westernise live? This what we got in your head about Islam all lies?
    Helen this come to the point I think to far and against your rules here some one spreading hatred and lies thoughts and criminalise a religion here in your site.
    Could you shut up WarrenW and stop your acquisitions and stop these bathetic thought.
    Can you tell me when Islam and Muslims slaughters the Jews?
    Can you tell me when and where the Islam calls to kill the Jews?
    Its the Israelis occupied land belong to a people of Palestine , any one on this plant accepted be slaughters and pushed out from his land and give up with slime his land for invaders or to the killers or criminals like Gahanna and all sorts of Israelis they clams falsely what they call Holly Land.
    Yes it’s a Holy Land for Jews, For Christians, and Muslims that’s it.

28. Victory Is…Negotiable
    As more people in the United States, including members of Congress, understand that the Sunni resistance is not the enemy, but is the necessary ally in the elimination of Al Qaeda’s ”terrorist haven” in Iraq, political support for continued U.S. military presence is likely to shrink even further. Why, it may be asked, should U.S. troops stay in Iraq to fight Sunni armed groups who are willing and able to turn in the real enemy in Iraq?
    http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20051216/victory_isnegotiable.php

29. “The next phases in Iraq will be to reduce the US military role but keep some bases for at least a while to help suppress the insurgents.”
    The “insurgents” (a misnomer for sure) exist because of the U.S. The “insurgents” (so-called) are, for the most part fighting against the U.S. and its occupation. The “insurgents” would not need to be suppressed if the U.S. were gone.
    “the mere presence of US bases doesn’t imply a “Foreign military occupation”.”
    In this case indeed it does. Or perhas no one has told you that one of the main reasons for invading Iraq was to establish a permanent military presence there?
    “Real elections are a vital and necessary part of democracy.”
    And maybe one day there will BE real elections in Iraq. So far, though, we haven’t seen any, except perhaps some of the local elections that Bremer overruled.
    “Do you have any examples of democracy without elections?”
    There are plenty of examples of elections without democracy, of which Iraq is a big one.
    “we should have perceived the strengths of the Iraqi people.”
    Thank you for bearing so well the white man’s burden, oh great white father.
    “They have grabbed this one chance at democracy and are holding on tightly.
    LOOL! Is THAT what you think this is all about? Oh my! LOLOLOL!
    “They will evict the insurgency”
    EVICT the “insurgency”? Do you have even a scintilla of a clue?

30. “keep some bases for at least a while to help suppress the insurgents.”
    Ah – I guess the U.S. is building (by their own admission) four huge permanent military bases in Iraq that are in fact small American cities with all the comforts of home because they intend to say just for awhile – to help “suppress the insurgents (sic)” who came into being and who continue to exist because of the U.S. presence.

31. “…Islamic anti-Semitism…”
    “the Nazi-Islam connection”
    “If racial attitudes in the Middle East had been different — who knows? — there might be peace in the Middle East and there might never have been a war in Iraq.”
    ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

32. “keep some bases for at least a while to help suppress the insurgents.”
    “The UN, the international HR organizations, WHO, Doctors sans frontiers…and all who it may concern are called upon to do something to help these, and other Iraqi doctors, and to prevent similar treatment in the future. Dr.Walid and Dr. Jamil believe that they may face the arrest and beating in the future. They demand that the American troops stop occupying the hospital and destroying it every time they attack Haditha. They also believe that the Iraqi authorities are incapable of protecting them.”
    http://www.brusselstribunal.org./

33. For those who haven’t seen the Guardian article on the US empire, see The “US is now rediscovering the pitfalls of aspirational imperialism” by historian Linda Colley.
    Two quotes that catch my eye include the following, something I have covered in my review of the movie, Walker:
    “This week’s elections keep open the prospect that Iraq might also ultimately be regarded as a success. But there is an obvious difficulty involved in this kind of aspirational imperialism. It is hard to convince people that you mean them well if you are looking at them down the barrel of a gun. Moreover, imperial idealism frequently loses out to the practicalities of rule. Instead of exporting what they perceived to be rational, modern, humane government to their colonies, the British often found themselves propping up deeply unattractive and corrupt princelings and client rulers because this was the cheapest way of maintaining control. It remains to be seen how far, and how durably, the US will achieve anything better in Iraq.”
    And the following provides some insight into the role of fear in instilling resepct and security of any imperial venture:
    “Adam Smith, who distrusted empire, argued that only when “all the different quarters of the world” were able to inspire “mutual fear” would nations finally begin to respect the integrity of each other’s borders. In the most horrible of ways, al-Qaida is after a fashion testing this very premise. In the past, the imperialism of the west, like that of the rest, was often difficult – for the doers as well as for their victims; but western states were none the less usually able to dispatch forces overseas against non-western peoples without any fear of being attacked themselves. That kind of immunity is probably now a thing of the past.”

34. ‎“Adam Smith, who distrusted empire, argued that only when “all the different ‎quarters of the world” were able to inspire “mutual fear”‎
    Today in the news, some kids asked SANTA of World Pease!!!‎
    We live in a world that our kids live with fears from Imperialism I guess…. ‎

35. Another Victory to US in the Gulf
    ‎“We trust Iran but we don’t want to see an Iranian nuclear plant which is closer in ‎distance to our Gulf shores than to Tehran causing us danger and damage,” GCC ‎Secretary-General Abdul Rahman al-Attiya said ahead of the opening on ‎Sunday.”‎
    http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2005-12-‎‎18T160532Z_01_MOL857882_RTRUKOC_0_US-MIDEAST-‎GULF.xml&archived=False
    Yah now start anew problem there…‎
    Call me naïve and conspire, I think this is the way they will haded for the next drama ‎with Iran.‎
    These Gulf States the common phenomena that they frightening from Iran Khomeini, ‎so supported Saddam for 8 years of war, now they support US against Iran……‎
    The reality as I see it the high oil prices brings a lot of revenues to these states which ‎they do not had the ability to use there money wisely, so Iran’s threats and stupid ‎speeches “out of date” by Iranian president all in same veins of US keep militarising ‎those states and suck their money from high oil prices.‎
    As we saw Saudi Arabia planing to spend and singe weapons deals reached to total ‎amount US$91.0 billions (US$71.0 Billions with UK and US$20.0 with US).‎

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