I have always argued that– regardless of one’s own party-political proclivities– the movement to end the United States’ disastrous occupation of Iraq and restore reason and sustainability to a national security stance that since 9/11 has been hijacked by the militaristic unilateralists known as neocons must be, and rightfully is, a broadly non-partisan effort; and also, indeed, that there are many (paleo-con?) Republicans who have all along been making a good contribution to this movement.
I have also noted here previously that the grassroots pressure will be or become particularly strong on Republican candidates for elective office to distance themselves from the neocon cabal that has been surrounding President Bush.
So it was really excellent, Tuesday morning, to hear news of the important speech that Sen. Richard Lugar made in the Senate Monday evening. In it, he noted the unreality of much of the discussion ongoing in Washington about whether the “Iraqi” government and armed forces are capable of reaching made-in-Washington “benchmarks”. He also, even more significantly, called on the President to change course from the current adherence to a “surge” strategy that Lugar said had little chance of success, and to start planning now to
- downsize the U.S. military’s role in Iraq and place much more emphasis on diplomatic and economic options.
For those unfamiliar with his record, I should note that Lugar is an extremely well-respected voice on foreign affairs. He was the co-author in 1991 of the “Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program”, a program to work with the authorities, managers, and scientists in Russia and other former-Soviet countries to find ways to safely dismantle nuclear weapons as called for in previous disarmament agreements, and to convert the institutions once devoted to development and production of WMDs into institutions with other more useful missions in the post-Cold War era.
(That expertise should come in handy once we all start planning how to convert the US’s current huge military industries into something more useful for humanity.)
Anyway, Lugar is also the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, having previously been the Chair of the Committee when the Republicans controlled Congress.
On Tuesday, he followed up his Monday speech by sending a shortened version of it to be published in the WaPo. In addition, his Monday speech prompted the writing of this important news report in Wednesday’s WaPo, which noted the following:
- Sen. George V. Voinovich (R-Ohio), a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, sent a letter to Bush yesterday urging the president to develop “a comprehensive plan for our country’s gradual military disengagement” from Iraq. “I am also concerned that we are running out of time,” he wrote.
Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.), a member of the Armed Services Committee, praised Lugar’s statement as “an important and sincere contribution” to the Iraq debate.
Republican skepticism has grown steadily, if subtly, since the Senate began debating the war in February. One lawmaker who has changed his tone is Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.). Earlier this year, McConnell helped block from a vote even a nonbinding resolution opposing the troop increase. Now, he views a change in course as a given. “I anticipate that we’ll probably be going in a different direction in some way in Iraq” in September, McConnell told reporters earlier this month. “And it’ll be interesting to see what the administration chooses to do.”
Indeed, Republican leaders on Capitol Hill had been hoping to stave off further defections until after a report on military and political conditions in Iraq is delivered by Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker in September. However, some in the GOP fear that the White House is stalling, hoping to delay any shift in U.S. strategy until the fall. A major test will come next month, when the Senate considers a series of withdrawal-related amendments to the defense authorization bill — and Republicans such as Lugar and Voinovich will have to officially break ranks or not.
White House spokesman Tony Snow said yesterday that Bush hopes “members of the House and Senate will give the Baghdad security plan a chance to unfold.”
Lugar consulted with McConnell before delivering his speech, but not with the White House, according to Lugar spokesman Andy Fisher.
And yesterday, AP’s Anne Flaherty wrote the following:
- A majority of senators believe troops should start coming home within the next few months. A new House investigation concluded this week that the Iraqis have little control over an ailing security force. And House Republicans are calling to revive the independent Iraq Study Group to give the nation options.
While the White House thought they had until September to deal with political fallout on the unpopular war, officials may have forgotten another critical date: the upcoming 2008 elections.
“This is an important moment if we are still to have a bipartisan policy to deal with Iraq,” Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., said in an interview Wednesday.
If Congress and the White House wait until September to change course in Iraq, Lugar said “It’ll be further advanced in the election cycle. It makes it more difficult for people to cooperate. … If you ask if I have some anxiety about 2008, I do.”
In his Monday speech, Lugar was quite explicit about the link between decisionmaking on the failed policy in Iraq and the demands of the US’s already-heating-up campaign for the 2008 elections.
For now, the Bushites are just urging everyone to give the surge more of a chance to succeed, and to wait at least until the point in September when the military chief in Iraq, Gen. Petraeus, and the ambassador, Ryan Crocker, come back in person to report to the two houses of Congress on how it has gone as of then.
Petraeus, of course, is well known as a lead author of the Army and Marines’ recently updated counter-insurgency (COIN) manual. In there, one of the things he warns about is the erosion of political support for (foreign) COIN operations, from the public back at home. Dan Froomkin noted on Tuesday that Petraeus already, in the lead-up to an earlier election (Fall 2004) played an important role trying to paint the rosy kind of picture of the situation in Iraq that could help Bush’s re-election chances in that election.
Petraeus wrote then:
- I see tangible progress. Iraqi security elements are being rebuilt from the ground up. The institutions that oversee them are being reestablished from the top down. And Iraqi leaders are stepping forward, leading their country and their security forces courageously. . . . There are reasons for optimism.
If he comes to Congress this September– three years and around 2,500 dead US soldiers later– and says something very similar, we should all certainly hope that the Senators and Representatives would call him on the inaccuracy of that earlier evaluation, and ask him why we should be expected to believe a “rosy” scenario from him this time round!
I have a lot more I’d like to say about the Lugar speech. I really do welcome this sign that a solid realist wing is starting to re-emerge within the Republican party. There is actually very little difference between the general position that Lugar adopts and that adopted by the leading Democratic candidates for president. Crucially, all these people talk about things like “the need to re-establish effective US leadership in the Middle East and the world” and “the need to ‘re-set’ [i.e. increase the size of] the US military.”
My own evaluation is that the diminution in US power brought about by Bush’s reckless and quite evidently failed attempt at imperial-style power projection in Iraq means it is too late (and fairly unhelpful) to think that US policy can be successfully reconstructed in these still quasi-hegemonic terms. I wish Lugar, Clinton, Obama, and all the rest of them would speak more forthrightly about the need for the US to build a new, more solid relationship with the rest of the world that is not based on questionable assumptions about US “leadership”, but rather, on commitment to human equality and human values…
But the position that Lugar has expressed so far is already a good start. And it portends some interesting times in the Republican Party over the weeks and months ahead.
place much more emphasis on diplomatic and economic options.
To be monstrously cynical about the matter:
We could pull the troops out of harm’s way, retain our over-the-horizon capabilities, and influence the ensuing Battle Royale as best we might.
When the dust settled, we could wire a note to the victors: something along the lines of “nice oilfields you got there, what a shame if something should happen to them.”
Anyone smart enought to win the civil war would be smart enough to get the point.
When the dust settled, we could wire a note to the victors: something along the lines of “nice oilfields you got there, what a shame if something should happen to them.”
The US is hardly likely to threaten to destroy what it wants to exploit. Iraqis would see through the bluff straight away.
Bush shows yet again he is an idiot and takes his cue from the Israel lobby.
Bush Turns Iraq into Israel/Palestine;
Gaffe endangers US Troops
Bush said in a speech on Thursday that he hopes Iraq will be like Israel, a democracy that faces terrorist violence but manages to retain its democratic character:
‘ In Israel, Bush said, “terrorists have taken innocent human life for years in suicide attacks. The difference is that Israel is a functioning democracy and it’s not prevented from carrying out its responsibilities. And that’s a good indicator of success that we’re looking for in Iraq.” ‘
These words may be the stupidest ones ever uttered by a US president. Given their likely impact on the US war effort in the Middle East, they are downright criminal.
The US political elite just doesn’t get it. Israel is not popular in the Middle East, and it isn’t because Middle Easterners are bigots. It is because Israel is coded as the last European colonial presence in the region, an heir to French Algeria, British Egypt, and Dutch Indonesia– and because the Israelis pugnaciously continue to try to colonize neighboring bits of territory. (This enmity is not inevitable or eternal; in 2002 the Arab League offered full recognition of Israel in return for its going back to 1967 borders, but the Israeli government turned down the offer.) But for the purposes of this analysis it does not really matter why Israel is unpopular. Let us just stipulate that it is. Why would you associate American Iraq with such an unpopular project, if you were trying to do public diplomacy in the region? Bush had just announced a new push to get the American message out to the Muslim world, the day before.
Let’s just take the analogy seriously for a moment. Israel proper is a democracy of sorts, though its 1 million Arab citizens are in a second class position. But it rules over several million stateless Palestinians who lack even the pretence of self-rule. It is hard to characterize a country as a democracy when it has millions of disenfranchised subjects. Bush manages to only think about Jewish Israelis in the above analogy, wiping out millions of other residents of geographical Palestine who don’t get to participate in ‘democracy’ or exercise popular sovereignty.
It is true that the Israelis managed to blunt the terror attacks of Islamic Jihad, the Qassam Brigades, and the al-Aqsa Martyrs brigades over the years after the eruption of the 2nd Intifada. But there are still attacks, including by rocket. The reason for those attacks is that the Palestinians had mostly been driven from their homes and off their land, and were militarily, politically and economically subjected to the Israelis. The Israelis reduced the terror attacks by essentially imprisoning millions of stateless Palestinians in the territories, further restricting their movements, destroying their trade and livelihoods. The Israeli government continues to grab Palestinian land and put more colonists on it, even as we speak.
Israel-Palestine is among the world’s hottest trouble spots, and the conflict has poisoned politics throughout the Middle East. It was among the motives for Bin Laden’s attack on the US on September 11, so it has spilled over on America, too. A second one of those would be a good thing?
So who would play the Palestinians in Bush’s analogy? Obviously, it would be the Sunni Arabs, who apparently are meant to be cordoned off from the rest of Iraqis and put behind massive walls and barbed wire, and deprived of political power. That is not a desirable outcome and is not politically or militarily tenable in the long run.
And, let’s just stop and think. Even if it were true that an Israel-Palestine sort of denouement were in Bush’s mind for Iraq, was it wise for him to make it public?
That sort of scenario is precisely the propaganda message broadcast by the Jihadi websites in Iraq and the Arab world! They say that the US military occupation of Iraq, in alliance with Shiites, has turned the Sunni Arabs into Palestinians! Bush could not have handed the guerrillas a better rhetorical gift. I do not think it is an exaggeration to say that DVD’s of Bush’s comments will be spread around as a recruiting tool for jihadis, and that US troops will certainly be killed as a result of this speech. You could say that the US military presence is already pretty unpopular in the Sunni Arab areas. But what of the progress in al-Anbar Province? Will Bush’s speech help or hurt Sunni Arabs who want to ally with the US against the foreign Salafi Jihadis? Hurt, obviously.
If Bush had said something like that in 2002, you could have written it off as inexperience and lack of knowledge of the Middle East. But he has been the sitting president for so many years, and has had so much to do with the Middle East that this faux pas is just inexcusable. I don’t know the man and can’t judge if he is just not very bright. I can confirm that he says things that are not very bright. And, worse, he says things that are guaranteed to put more US troops into the grave in Diyala, Baghdad, Salahuddin and al-Anbar Provinces.
I don’t know whether to sob in grief or tear my hair out in frustration. How much longer do we have to suffer?
Labels: monumental stupidity
posted by Juan Cole @ 6/29/2007 06:35:00 AM 0 comments
Helena, the bad news from the Lugar statement was his emphasis on the following arguments: 1. “The political fragmentation in Iraq, the growing stress of our military and the constraints of our own domestic political process are converging to make a stable, multi-sectarian government in Iraq unlikely in a reasonable time frame.” 2. “The Iraqis don’t want to be Iraqis”. (As evidence for this he inexplicably cites, among other things, resistance to wall-building measures in Baghdad and parliamentary moves in favour of a timetable for US withdrawal — evidence that points in the opposite direction of the very fragmentation he laments!)
In my opinion the good arguments for withdrawal should be kept well apart from fallacious assertions that Iraqis are incapable of living together. Otherwise, the facile solution of an externally imposed partition will soon be seized on by demagogues who wish to establish an “alternative” policy. That kind of outcome would ultimately hurt the United States, both in Iraq and in the Arab and Islamic worlds more generally, far worse than anything seen so far.
Helena:
One aspect of the Iraq crisis that thas gotten little coverage in the West is the extensive persecution of people considered sexually “deviant” by Shiite Moslem extremists.
Iraq gays have been the target of Moslem vigilantes for years with many being killed in a most brutal manor.
Now straight internet porn surfers also are being hunted down and killed.
NEWS MIDDLE EAST
Vigilantes target Iraq porn surfers
By Afif Sarhan in Baghdad
Ibraheem Abdel-Qahar was tortured and made to drink his own urine for looking at pornography
The Iraqi Aid Association (IAA), a Baghdad-based non-governmental organisation working with displacement, children and youth issues, says dozens of Iraqis have been killed after using the internet to access erotic sites.
Fatah Ahmed, spokesperson for the IAA, said: “We have received information from many sources that militants are operating spies inside internet cafes just to find out who is browsing sites they have deemed offensive to Islam.”
Ahmed said most of the killings or abductions happen directly after the victims leave the internet cafes.
“It is very serious because in an Islamic country in which violence is spreading on daily basis, people search for some entertainment and it is found today only on the internet,” he said.
“There are no places to go so young people are making friends via chatrooms which are now also being condemned by Islamic extremists.”
Torture, beatings
Ibraheem Abdel-Qahar is a university student who gave up meeting friends and going to restaurants because of the violence and lack of security in Baghdad.
Spending most of his free time alone, he turned to browsing the internet and soon began surfing online pornography. But that is a decision he now bitterly regrets.
“They told me to take off all my clothes and handcuffed me. They started to beat me and use cigarettes to burn my legs”
Ibraheem Abdel-Qahar
Late in May, Abdel-Qahar was kidnapped after leaving an internet cafe. He was blindfolded and taken to a house he believes to be on the outskirts of the capital.
“Someone was sitting near me at the internet cafe and probably was an extremist spy. He saw when I was watching some erotic movies and when I left the place I was immediately taken in a car with three men,” the 23-year-old engineering student said.
He recalled that he was beaten with an iron bar and belt and forced to drink chicken blood and his own urine.
“They told me to take off all my clothes and handcuffed me. They started to beat me and use cigarettes to burn my legs.
“I was desperate and was shouting asking why they were doing that with me and after three hours of continuous torture they told me that it was because I was watching non-Muslim sites on the internet,” he said.
After enduring six days of torture, Abdel-Qahar says he was dropped near his house and warned that if he was found browsing internet pornography again he would be killed.
He was also advised to seek salvation in the local mosque.
The IAA has reported many cases like Abdel-Qahar’s and have called on the government to protect victims by forcing internet cafes to guarantee privacy for their customers.
The government has not yet responded and an official from the ministry of interior declined to comment.
Freedom to browse
During Saddam Hussein’s era, internet browsing was controlled by the Iraqi Centre of Information which routinely blocked access to any pornographic sites as well as barred the use of popular chat clients.
After Saddam’s expulsion, however, thousands of Iraqis began to use Yahoo, MSN and Skype, to chat with friends and relatives.
“The people who search for the internet entertainment just want to have some distraction in the middle of this hell and hypocritical society”
Yehia Ala’a,
brother of murdered internet cafe owner
This was their only social outlet in an environment removed from the daily bombings and killings.
The recent deregulation of browsing has enabled Iraq’s younger generation to visit sites previously banned by the government.
Muhammad Obeidi, owner of a private internet service, which offers cable systems to central districts of the capital, said: “People pay to use the internet and whatever is present inside has to be offered to them.
“It is the responsibility of each family to look after their relatives and in what they are browsing into. Our job is just to offer a connection.”
But armed fighters have not spared internet cafe owners.
In February, Fadhel Ibraheem and Youssef Ala’a, owners of an internet cafe in Baghdad’s Palestine Street, were tortured and beheaded for reportedly allowing access to pornography sites.
Yehia Ala’a, Youssef’s brother said: “It wasn’t my brother’s fault. He was just offering the computers and internet access for people to use. The people who search for the internet entertainment just want to have some distraction in the middle of this hell and hypocritical society.”
Schools restrict access
Current Iraqi laws and regulations do not restrict internet access and there are no sites that are barred.
A spokesperson at the Iraqi Communications and Media Commission told Al Jazeera that they are looking at ways to regulate internet use in cafes and centres – but the lack of security has hindered their efforts.
The spokesperson, who asked to remain anonymous, said schools and universities have started to block thousands of sites and the list of prohibited sites is growing.
“We offer students internet access in the colleges but on the condition that the browsing is controlled and pornographic sites are blocked,” Professor Hussam Abdallah, a teacher at Baghdad University, said.
“We have also prohibited online chatting … we do not want to give extremists an excuse to attack us.”
Reidar, as you know I am sure, the pernicious myth that Iraqis are not capable of living together has, since at least 2002 when been repeated and repeated and repeated ad nauseum by so many know-nothing pundits, talking heads, and self-appointed “experts” that it has become “received truth”. You are, unfortunately, one of the very few, if not the only academic who seems to be doing anything to try to counter it.
The other day Andrew Bacevich, who has been an outspoken opponent of the invasion and occupation of Iraq (and in a bitter bit of irony recently had his son killed over there), recently wrote an article titled “What Do We Owe the Iraqis” in which he stated that the United States does not owe Iraq anything because Iraq can hardly be said to exist as a nation-state, being awash with sectarian violence lacking legitimate institutions. I interpreted that as meaning that it has ceased to exist as a nation-state and its institutions have been systematically dismantled or destroyed – and someone needs to point out who is responsible for THAT, as if it were not completely clear. Others, not surprisely, have interpreted it otherwise.
I recently posted two fairly lengthy comments on The Left Coaster in response to this from the blogger: “His major point is that since Iraq is not a functioning country per se, we don’t owe Iraq anything.” (I disagree that the U.S. does not owe Iraq anything for destroying it, but the first thing the U.S. owes Iraq is to stop its contribution to the violence, and that means it must leave altogether), and this from a commenter: “Iraq is not a country per se, rather a group of tribes living in the same general geographical location…They are at cultural and religious odds and have been for centuries.” I may try to rework both my comments into a piece I can publish either on the web or in print somewhere.
So, what can we do to effectively counter this very dangerous and damaging nonsense-become-received-truth? I correct it every time I see it. I have become a fairly regular guest on a small, local California radio station (I have a one hour interview scheduled on Monday), and one of the standard questions the interviewer always asks deals with this. I do my best to inform as many people as possible, but it is like trying to fill the sea with a thimble.
It is just unbelievable that such abysmal ignorance is still driving the most critical decisions about Iraq’s future as a state, and therefore about the future of Iraqi people. It is beyond unbelievable that these decisions are being made by American politicians in Washington and not by Iraqis themselves.
What do we do about it, Reidar, those of us who know the reality, who see the danger of basing decisions on a pernicious myth, and who care what happens? I just don’t know.
Shirin, I think you’re right, it is probably worthwhile to continue to make this point. To my mind, the good news is that with so many presidential candidates they cannot all say the same thing on Iraq, and perhaps there is therefore a greater chance that arguments based on the long lines of Iraqi history could receive more attention in the future. At least some of those presidential candidates must realise that also US interests are better served with an Iraq that is in harmony with itself and its history, instead of becoming subjected to the contrived and artificial schemes that have mushroomed after 2003. Also thanks for the encouragement – I do hope you decide to go ahead with the article you mention and will share it with JWN readers.
Lugar’s dissent hasn’t exactly been getting much media traction…. at least one morning anchor gave it a try.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2115325,00.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VdNcCcweL0
By the way, re. this youtube clip, if you watch the time stamps, it apparently covers 3 different episodes, at 6, 7 and 8 a.m….
Way to go Mika…. Now, will she go the way of Batiste at CBS?
And why is such “independent” talent pared with the likes of Joe Scarborough???? If he calls her “such a journalist,” then golly, I want to be a journalist too. :-}
Even Jay Lenno apparently has been having a “field day” lampooning the Paris coverage (over “real news”)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LEgcKe5v8w&NR=1
Alas, the apparent bombing plot in London at last gives the corporate/neocon media something “real” to cover instead of bad news from Iraq….
Helena,
United States’ disastrous occupation of Iraq and restore reason and sustainability to a national security stance that since 9/11?
Please Helena, don’t linking Iraq war and occupations to the crimes of 9/11 by some criminals thugs. As reported GWB in early dayes when he came to the Whitehouse he was holding Iraq file in his hand that before 9/11 crimes, so its nothing to do with “sustainability to a national security stance” as Iraq was threadless to US and here national security.
Helena did you explane why or could any one enlightened constitutional lawyers explain this one in regards of classified national security information?
Helena if Sen. Richard Lugar or other Senate members stand and asked to withdraw or leave Iraq now so what the difference within political term between the Sudanese regime for four years human atrocities talking place on their land with most free world accusing the Sudanese government for their slow and careless reactions to stop the human atrocities there while those atrocities are on their land, but in case of US administrations with all Senate members Iraqi atrocities done not on their land its done by sending US troops to others land where pupils lived for more than 5000 years who gave this world the first ever Code of Law and taught them how to write.
So please for sake of this argument this is just a chewing in time while the human looses continue on the ground in Iraq who voiced loudly in September , 2006 across all their sectarians they object the US occupation and they should leave Iraq. (Full report here)
Whatever the Senate members telling about Iraq and Iraqi as friend Reidar brought up ““The Iraqis don’t want to be Iraqis” it’s not any one business, the gaol of this war as a SUN IN THE SKY its all about ME OIL if some chose to keep closing their eyes and keep believes in these flying words here and there about this war, as Hitler’s propaganda keep lies up until people belive’n in you.
Recently other odd thing come up The Defence Department issue anew decks of playing cards to deploy to troops these cards are training aids designed to help the servicemembers understand the archaeological significance of their deployed locations, what on earth they talking about if those people who coming from USA don’t knew about the first civilization on this earth, so where are they living then?
This new decks of card should be issued and handed first to Paul Bremer III with his military commanders who graduated from a very fine US military institutions who chose Babylon site as a military camp (Camp Alpha) destroyed most valuable piece of history on this earth by their tanks and trucks, filling their sand bags by soil of that very special and important place on earth.
Reidar: your In my opinion the good arguments for withdrawal should be kept well apart from fallacious assertions that Iraqis are incapable of living together.
You are absolutely right. Thanks for adding that important point into the conversation.
Btw, I have just deleted two hate-speech comments posted here by someone calling him/herself “Doriana”, and another that responded to them.
“Doriana” and all other commenters are reminded to abide by the guidelines for JWN commenters.
May I applaud the tendencies of this debate between Reidar, Shirin, and Helena? And indeed Salah.
I have never ever seen a desire among Iraqis for partition of their country, not Shi’a or Sunni, expatriate or resident. Rather a desire to remain united.
Evidently there are complications: certain politicians, notably al-Hakim, are for, though one might pose questions about their support base.
The Kurds also remain apart. I can’t say that I know their feelings very well. The expatriates are very Kurdish nationalist, and the Kurdish Regional Government also. But the breadth of public opinion ? I leave it to other commenters to tell me.
Is it the Senate members pass this bill” The supplemental funding bill”? (YouTube)
May I remark that not only did Mr Bacevitch say the US doesn’t owe anything to Iraq, as Iraq is almost destroyed, and therefore cannot receive anything, but that he said that the US owes a huge amount to Iraqis, at least to those Iraqis that seem to be resilient enough to survive. If I am not mistaken, he writes that the US should welcome the Iraqis who fought with or for them as refugees in the USA, while now they are all deemed terrorists, and granted visas to Guantanamo only. I read Mr. Bacevitch’s paper as a candid paper, not as it is reported in the above comments.
“the US owes a huge amount to Iraqis, at least to those Iraqis that seem to be resilient enough to survive.”
Oh yah, those Iraqi’s Shiites was suppressed by Sunni regime for more than 50 years see what US now by own words telling us is just a “Baghdad slum” after five years and still “Slum” this is same Iraqis that US crying for and they are still in a “Slum” under US occupation, in fact all Iraq are made a “Slum” for Iraqis.
May be our friend David who visited the same “Baghdad slum” in 2003 tells us more what he saw four years ago
I saw the postings that Helena removed and there was no hateful speech there, just sarcasm. I think we can take sarcasm and avoide censorship. Let the reader judge.
Salah, Baghdad’s slum or not has little to do with the physical appearance of the place, but rather to the will of the Iraqis to use their talent and energy to live vs. to destroy. Today the answer is clear, in Iraq in Palestine and multiple other places the maximalist ideology call for mutual destruction as the arab gambit.
David, the term “mofos”, when used to refer indiscriminately to entire groups of people, is clearly an example of hate speech. This person “Doriana” seem to find it acceptable. It isn’t. I intend to keep the discussion here civil and inclusive enough that we can all communicate in a friendly and constructive way across national, ethnic, religious, and all other inter-group boundaries.
Jean-Ollivier, yes, Bacevich DID say the U.S. owes Iraqis, but the ONLY thing he said the U.S. owes them is to welcome them into the United States, and he does specifically mention the collaborators as being particularly deserving.
Well, I agree that the U.S. owes it to those Iraqis who assisted them in their invasion, attempted takeover, and destruction of Iraq, and they are more than welcome to those collaborators.
But what about the 300,000 or so Fallujans who are still living god-knows-where because they have no city to go home to after the United States leveled most of it to the ground? Does Andrew Bacevich think the United States owes them anything? What about the million or more other Iraqis whose homes, neighborhoods, villages, towns, and cities the Americans destroyed or made uninhabitable? Does Bacevich think the U.S. owes THEM anything?
And what about the estimated 4.2 million external and internal refugees and the estimated 50,000 more each month who are forced out of their homes either by the Americans or by the chaos and violence that the U.S. has not only failed to prevent or control, but that they contribute to and exacerbate with every move they make? Does Bacevich think the U.S. owes THEM anything?
Look, I am mostly a fan of Andrew Bacevich, and it is a particularly cruel irony that his son took part and died in a criminal enterprise that the father has expended so much effort to fight against. I also acknowledge that his heart and mind are in the right place because the U.S. certainly DOES owe Iraqis – all Iraqis, an enormous amount. But the most important thing the U.S. owes Iraqis is first to get out of their country and cease any and all involvement with Iraq’s business. Second, the U.S. owes hundreds of billions in reparations to allow Iraqis to rebuild their country, their society, and their lives. Those reparations should be administered by a third party not friendly to the U.S. so that the U.S. will have no say in anything to do with how it is used.
Shirin
the most critical decisions about Iraq’s future as a state, and therefore about the future of Iraqi people. It is beyond unbelievable that these decisions are being made by American politicians in Washington
Dear Shirin, read this:
وغداً، حين يبدأ رسميا تغيير الأمر الواقع في الشرق الاوسط، انطلاقاً من العراق على الأرجح، لن تكون ثمة قوة دولية أو إقليمية ستمنع الولايات المتحدة من إعادة رسم الخرائط كما تريد، لا بل العكس سيكون صحيحاً. الكل في الشرق الأوسط وخارجه سيتنافس للحصول على قِـسم من كعكة العيد الجاثمة على “الوليمة الكبرى”
هناك التشابه الأهم الذي أشرنا إليه في البداية: الأمة العثمانية، أطلق عليها منذ القرن التاسع عشر إسم “رجل أوروبا المريض”، والآن يُـطلق على الأمة العربية التسمية نفسها، لكن مع شمولية أكبر: “رجل العالم المريض”، وهذا المريض يتواجد الآن في “غرفة العمليات”، مُـحاطاً بعشرات المباضع الدولية والإقليمية
http://www.swissinfo.org/ara/front/detail.html?siteSect=105&sid=7972423&cKey=1183193532000
Our Iraqi Kids stories…….
لم أتنبه إلى خطواتها وهي تدنو مني .
– ماما انت مشغولة؟ انتزعني صوتها مما كنت فيه وخبأت الصفحة .. لحظتْ حركتي المرتبكة ..
– ماما شنو ضميتي اريد اشوف ؟ سألت وهي تقف الى جانب الكومبيوتر
اشرت برأسي كلا متظاهرة بمشاهدة صور لها مع صديقاتها
– ماما عفية شنو اللي ماتريديني اشوفه ؟
– ماكو شيء
ناس (مايتين) مو ؟ سألت بأسى وهي تمسد شعري بحنان…
-لا.
– مفخخة ونار وناس يركضون لو ناس مطلعيهم من بيوتهم وكاعدين بالخيم؟
– لا.
– نخل محروك و بيوت مكسريها الامريكان لو صورتهم يضربون الناس بالطلقات؟
-لا.
– عرفت !! قالت منتصرة
التفتت اليها متساءلة
.. امهات يبجن على اولادهن مو ؟ ” قالت وقد اتعبتها وازعجتها لاءات بدت لها بلا نهاية ففقدت حركة كفها الحنون على شعري رقتها.. لمست غضبها وتوترها فاحتضنتها وبصوت متوسل تمتمت: – لا حبيبتي ولا شي من هذا … عوفيني هسة. ما اكدر احجي
– ماما ما اكدر اعوفج كولي شنو شفتي وخلاج حزينة وما تريديني اضوج واحزن؟
– حبيبتي شيء ما اكدر اشرحه إلج .
ردت باعتداد وغضب في آن : اني جبيرة وكلشي افتهم . عبالج ما اعرف اللي دتضميه عني؟ اني كلشي اعرف حتى لو ماحجيتي كدامي وماخليتيني اشوف الاخبار لو الانترنيت .. اعرف شنو اللي يحزنج واني هماتين احزن بس ما اريد احزن هواي علمود لا تحزنين علي .
غادرت الغرفة بغضب وتركتني لمواجهة حقيقة لطالما تجاهلتها ” لقد كبرت ابنتي قبل الاوان .. انها تعرف الكثير “…..
http://www.kitabat.com/i29171.htm
Thanks Salah.
What does the U.S. owe Iraq? Maybe reparations for having trashed their country? I would think something like $500 billion to $1 trillion would be a start. I am still haunted by the picture of the little girl, covered in blood, whose parents had been shot by U.S. soldiers for not stopping their car at a checkpoint. What can repay that?
Ned, I could not agree with you more. And anything that comes to Iraq from the United States should be reparations, not aid. For one thing, aid always ALWAYS comes with a price, especially U.S. aid. The reparations should be ordered by an international body that has the standing to do that, and administered by an entity that is not subject to the control of the U.S. (therefore, not the U.N., though I don’t know who else it would be, honestly – not my specialty).
Here is a comment I started to write yesterday and was unable to finish. It is not complete as it needs to be fleshed out and refined, but the main ideas are there:
There are three aspects of Bacevich’s article that concern me:
1. The remark that Iraq is too awash in sectarian conflict and too lacking in institutions to be considered a country anymore, which is being interpreted at least by some as part of the “received truth” that Iraq never was really a country, just a collection of people who have hated and been slaughtering each other for centuries (this despite the fact that Iraq has no history of serious, protracted, or widespread sectarian violence) and that were forced against their will by the western powers to live together as a nation. (The absurdly contra factual idea, apparently expressed more explicitly by Sen. Lugar, that Iraqis do not want to be Iraqi.)
2. The absence of any mention of responsibility on the part of the United States for the destruction of Iraq as a nation-state.
3. His main argument is that what the United States owes Iraqis is to bring a million or two of them them to the country as immigrants, in particular those who collaborated with the U.S. invasion and occupation. As I said, he can have the collaborators, and is more than welcome to them – heaven knows that Iraqis have no use for them. But who does he have in mind for the remaining Iraqis to be admitted as immigrants?
Given how these things work, the Iraqis that would be welcomed to the U.S. as immigrants will not be those broken and destitute Fallujans whose city the United States destroyed, or any of the other broken and destitute people who are refugees thanks to American destruction of their homes. Nor would they be the millions who were too poor and too uneducated to establish themselves in another country after they were made into refugees. No, the great majority of the Iraqis whom he would have welcomed into the U.S. as immigrants would be, aside from the aforementioned collaborators, those who have the means and the sophistication to manage to get into the country, and to prosper, or at least survive well there, and history shows that once they have established themselves in the U.S., very few of them are likely to leave.
Given that he has apparently dismissed Iraq as a country now and in the future, I doubt he is considering that some day, some way, Iraq will need Iraqis who are capable of reestablishing and rebuilding those institutions that he admits the U.S. destroyed. That would be the educated, the professionals, the more sophisticated – the ones who could fairly easily establish lives in the U.S. or anywhere else they went.
It is not that I want the U.S. to continue its shameful practice of admitting only a tiny handful of the Iraqis whose lives and country it has destroyed. The U.S. certainly has a responsibility to accept, welcome, and provide homes and generous assistance to any who collaborated with them. Second, it must take active steps to seek out and bring to the U.S. and provide homes and generous assistance to those Iraqis whose homes, neighborhoods, villages, or cities it destroyed. Third, it should seek out and bring to the U.S. and provide homes and generous assistance to those who were forced to leave their homes by the U.S., or as a result of direct threats, and have nowhere else to go. And finally, the U.S. should bring to the U.S. and provide homes and generous assistance to those who were forced by the general violence to flee for their lives and the lives of their families and have nowhere else to go. These are, in fact, the least likely people who would end up being welcomed to the U.S. as immigrants or in any other capacity.
The U.S. should also be required to pay reparations to Iraqis who have decent means, and whose homes they destroyed, or who were forced from their homes by the Americans, or by direct threats from sectarian and other groups, or who fled from the violence. These people, too, have suffered great loss, and should be compensated.
“I wish Lugar, Clinton, Obama, and all the rest of them would speak more forthrightly about the need for the US to build a new, more solid relationship with the rest of the world that is not based on questionable assumptions about US “leadership”, but rather, on commitment to human equality and human values…”
I’m just hoping we can stop them from committing any more really egregious war crimes…….
Why listen to a single thing Lugar says? He will NEVER vote against the administrations desires on Iraq! Why do I think that? Because he NEVER HAS! When the time comes, he will do what Cheney says.
Helena wants to believe what Lugar says because SHE finds it reasonable. This is a common human attribute. But one thing the republicans have shown is that they will toe the line when the time comes.
Once again the ‘media’ (that would be you, Helena) gives credibilty to those who have been wrong on EVERYTHING. Lugar a ‘respected foreign policy expert’? By whom, Condi Rice?
One of the earlest commenters said;
“The US is hardly likely to threaten to destroy what it wants to exploit. Iraqis would see through the bluff straight away.”
MAHAHAHA. Has NOBODY here been paying attention for the last 6 years? Not only would the US ‘threaten’ to destroy oil production in Iraq, we DID destroy it!
.
Shirin – Every time I visit this site, I am saddened by your anger and frustration towards the American people and what we are trying to accomplish in the Middle East — democracy where only tyranny has existed for 60 years. I read your posts about trying to fill the sea with the thimble and that is how I feel about you. Your ‘viewpoints’ about Iraq are so warped that I would not know where to start in regards to the Middle East. I find it hard to believe that any radio station would give you the time of day and if you are living in the United States of America, I surely hope you leave soon because we don’t need people like you who are against freedom and democracy for the people of the Middle East. In addition, I am disgusted by the fact that I have very rarely seen you compose an educated post on this site (i.e. without vulgarity or an illusion to it or some reference to violence in general). When the Americans went into Iraq (with full congressional authority) we overthrew not just a ruthless dictator, but also a political universe. Iraq is a mess because the those that held power for years now are coming to the realization that they must share power with Shiites and Kurds among others. Maybe you are so angry and violent because you do not want to see the Shiites and Kurds take part in the workings of their county? If not, that is surely how it seems..
As a final note, I would recommend reading Fouad Ajami’s book “The Foreigner’s Gift”.
Farah, every time you visit this site I am astonished that you actually appear to believe the rot you post here.
Citing Fu’ad Ajami says it all, though, doesn’t it!
I guess I overlooked the term “mofo” Helena, I was thinking about the substance of the posting solely. You may be right, I am just going by my recollection. On the other hand it is hard to demand nice adjectives for the actors in the Glasgow attack. How would a passenger in that building refer to them?
Although I haven’t been partaking, I read your posts and the discussions regularly. I haven’t needed to add anything. However, I thought you might be interested in Immanuel Wallerstein’s latest “piece”.
David, incompetent idiot wannabes comes to mind.
Shirin,
I think travelers may have stronger names for people attempting to incinerate their families while uttering the name of their god. The only named suspect is Dr Mohammed Asha, a medical doctor! Aren’t those sworn to preserve life?
David, I admit that I have not followed these events in any great detail, but I do not recall any reports of them uttering anything, including the name of “their” God, whoever that might be.
Two things are very, very odd though. People who are willing to drive car bombs into buildings rarely travel in pairs. They also rarely run from their weapons-on-wheels straight into the arms of the cops. In addition, the Mercedes in London were not exactly, as some reports would have it, “packed with explosives”. They were, at best “cars containing stuff that might catch the car on fire if everything goes right, which it probably won’t ’cause whoever set it up didn’t know what he was doing”. In other words, it looks like this was not one of your big-time Al Qa`eda operations, but more like some Keystone Kops amateur hour wannabe kind of thing.
A lot of people are suggesting a false flag operation to bolster support for the new PM, but that does not seem to me to be the most likely possibility. On the other hand, I still have not fully accepted the whole “false flag” thing, even though there is very firm evidence that such things do take place.
A lot of people are suggesting a false flag operation to bolster support for the new PM, but that does not seem to me to be the most likely possibility. On the other hand, I still have not fully accepted the whole “false flag” thing, even though there is very firm evidence that such things do take place.
I would not, as a Brit, have thought a false flag operation to bolster support for Gordon Brown. Rather it would be the reverse, a coup against G. Brown, by the secret service MI5, because GB is not strong enough against terrorism. Such a coup nearly took place in the 1970s against previous Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson. It is well known.
As for false flag operations in general, an exposé as ancient as Philip Agee’s CIA Diary on the operations in South America in the 1960s show well the trend of events. Interventions are par for the course, Mossadegh for example. It is very little further to black ops.