In the words of "Monty Python and the Holy Grail".."Run Away..Run Away"..thank GOD we don't listen to these clowns..
Posted on 01/23/2005 8:50:18 PM PST by quidnunc
Whatever the results of the elections scheduled for late January in Iraq, a new pessimism about that country, as well as about the larger war on terror, has taken hold in many circles in the United States. Serious observers, not to mention shriller commentators like Paul Krugman and Maureen Dowd of the New York Times, have concluded not only that the United States is stuck in a hopeless quagmire in Iraq, but that our unwise unilateral intervention there is having painful repercussions both for our position as an honest promoter of reform and for our diplomatic and military maneuverability elsewhere in the world.
Joining the pessimism, Alistair Horne, the eminent British military historian, recently likened the American situation in Iraq to the French debacle in the “brutal Algerian eight-year war”; his obvious inference was that the ultimate denouement will be a similarly abrupt and humiliating Western withdrawal. Horne could adduce much apparent evidence to support this depressing proposition: the instability in the Sunni triangle over the last two years, mounting American combat fatalities, a seemingly endless insurgency, the increasing reluctance of allies to support in any serious material way the world’s lone superpower, and a failure of moderate Iraqis to step forward and deny sanctuary to the terrorists in their midst. The more jihadists, Baathists, and mujahideen that Americans kill, the more of them have seemed to pour into Iraq from Syria and other places in the neighboring Islamic world, either for pay or out of religious zeal. As for the Iraqi “street,” it appears to be both repulsed and paralyzed by this terrorist barbarity, and above all uncertain whether the Americans will stay long enough to ensure either safety or the promised democracy.
-snip-
(Excerpt) Read more at commentarymagazine.com ...
FYI
The pessimism is supplied from the Left. They were against the War from Day One and have no desire to see it reach a triumphal conclusion.
In the words of "Monty Python and the Holy Grail".."Run Away..Run Away"..thank GOD we don't listen to these clowns..
Joining the pessimism, Alistair Horne, the eminent British military historian, recently likened the American situation in Iraq to the French debacle in the “brutal Algerian eight-year war”
He exactly right. Well except for the fact that
1 We're not the French
2 We're not try too conquer Iraq and keep it as a colony
3 The vast majority of Iraqis know why we're there and support it.
4 The terrorist don't have the support of the Iraqi people.
But other than that there's no difference.
I do see from reading this one that he is in the camp of those who believe that we may still be able to create internal revolution in Iran:
Yet inaction, leading to an Iran armed with nuclear weapons, could yield the same deleterious effect: a triumphant regime now feeling secure enough to deal summarily with its internal opponents. In this wait-and-see moment, it is therefore all the more incumbent on the United States to step up its covert support for democratic dissidents. Even more importantly, today’s underground reformers could be helped to evolve into openly organized groups, analogous to the refuseniks in the former Soviet Union, Solidarity in Poland, or the contras in Nicaragua—human-rights cadres capable of mounting a public campaign against the Iranian regime that might resonate in European capitals as well as among our own elites. Such advocacy does not mean we should be in the business of selecting the leaders of these groups, let alone dictating their agendas or masterminding their tactics; those who suffer first-hand repression know better than we what needs to be done and how to go about doing it. But if America is to win the current death struggle in the Middle East, we must aggressively promote democratization in Iran—and Syria—before both of them undermine it across the border in Iraq.
I don't agree with him on this point; I don't think that we can wait any longer to take military action to stop the Iranian nuclear weapons program. We cannot trust the dispelling of the nightmare of a nuclear-armed Iran to merely hoping that dissidents can displace the mullahocracy.
---Joining the pessimism, Alistair Horne, the eminent British military historian, recently likened the American situation in Iraq to the French debacle in the “brutal Algerian eight-year war”; his obvious inference was that the ultimate denouement will be a similarly abrupt and humiliating Western withdrawal.---
The situation has much in common with Algeria. While many Iraqis are working toward a just and fair society, many are not taking any responsibility for their own freedom. About the only hope of rooting out these terrorists is one, to draw them out into combat as in Faluja or two have ordinary Iraqis turning them in faster than they can recruit new members.
bttt
The choice of any course of action in matters military, political, or economic, narrows the range of options available for other arenas. In this sense our intervention in Iraq has "weakened" us in that it constitutes a choice of partially exclusive alternatives. Our widest range of options would seem to be available if we did nothing at all. This is illusory.
As Hanson makes clear, this narrowing of scope has, in fact, widened our practical options by giving them credibility. And it turns out that credibility is considerably more effective in the exercise of power than simply a long laundry-list of possibilities that everyone is certain that we will never use. Clinton's withdrawal from Somalia, for example, freed those troops for an employment elsewhere that everyone knew would never happen. While technically that increased our options elsewhere, in practical effect it throttled them.
There is a continuing chorus from the dimwits on the left that somewhow our intervention in Iraq commits us to armed conflict everywhere there is a despot who has decided to act against our interests. In fact, it does nothing of the sort. VDH's point here is that because we have done this other means are more likely of success - Libya, for example - and that despots are more likely to be amenable to them in the presence of a President who might just be crazy enough to plant an Abrams in their palace grounds.
In short, the Ghosts of Vietnam are exorcised because we didn't cut and run when difficulty arose.
Our honor will be restored. Osama said we were a paper tiger. This perception weakened our strength across the world. It made us vulnerable to attack on 9-11. With success in Iraq this image is broken. Guerrilla warfare joined in tandem with media sponsered pressure will be defeated as a tactic believed to be practiced with a 100% success rate.
This is dependent on the stabilization of Iraq into a democracy, something I do believe is occuring though not at the rapid pace others desire. Yet that slow pace ultimately is serving our national security interests.
Assuming success in Iraq, a critical test will be whether American resolve is limited to trust in one man or the committment of the electorate over the long haul. This will be determined by the person we select to govern as Bush's successor.
Can someone explain to me how the situation in Afghanistan is all that different from the situation in Colombia?
Both are governments under seige by huge drug trades partly run for profit and partly run to finance terrorism.
We are being told that our troops were looking the other way on the drug problem in order to focus on eliminating the main elements of the Taliban and secure democratic elections.
However, we have seen decades of U.S. supported and financed efforts in Colombia come to little in the way of improvements in that country.
When the allies do turn their attentions to the drug problem, will they be able to succeed in eliminating it or will they struggle ineffectively as they are currently doing in Colombia?
People keep forgetting that freedom is a force multiplier. Those in the free countries of France and Germany and the Democratic Party hope that people in Iraq, Syria, and Iran will put nationalism over freedom as their foremost motive and goal. But Iraq is showing the US means what it says; it keeps its word; and its goals are not to dominate but to liberate. We are forming a partnership with the un-free, while the slackers and sophists in Europe carp and whine.
The recent Palestinian madness was pulled from the Algerian textbook. At one point those suicide bombings were relentless--until Sharon chose to break the resistance. What the Muslim world cannot accept is humilating defeat and isolation. The Israelis achieved both.
The liberation of Iraq and the destruction of AQ is a journey that began in the slums of Jenin.
Thank you Bill. The range of options before the Coalition, while not limitless, is more numerous than most sidewalk superintendents would realize. Libya's "turning states evidence" is merely one of many ways we will create capitulation to our will for a stable balance of power in this complex interdependent world.
Your clear thinking is refreshing.
IRAQ THE MODEL
Thursday, January 13, 2005
http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/2005/01/arabicbbc-site-put-up-forum-for.html
The ArabicBBC site put up a forum for the readers to discuss the subject of some of the "militant groups" that distributed leaflets threatening the Iraqis who decide to participate in the elections, whether voters or candidates.
The total number of commentators was 141; the Iraqis were 104 and 37 were Arabs from other countries till the post was prepared.
89 of the participating Iraqis were strongly with the elections and determined to go to the boxes on the elections day in spite of the threats.
15 were against the elections, for different reasons.
13 of the Arab participants were also against the elections while the rest of them (24) were supportive of the Iraqis in holding the elections on time.
I will not try to offer my optimistic comments and views about the situation in Iraq, instead I will shut up and let my fellow Iraqis speak for themselves and let you then decide what you think about it.
"I encourage all the good people in Iraq to vote, it’s the only way to get out of this destruction"
Jasim Mohammed-Iraq
"No one can rule Iraqis but Iraqis themselves and the voting box is the only way to achieve a legitimate patriotic government which will be respected by the Iraqi people and the world and it will cut the way for these entire terrorist who come from outside the country and Saddam's orphans who support them. They are dreaming about the return of the darkness after we felt the sun of freedom"
Gati'- Iraqi in the UK
"Iraq should build a strong army and well trained police so that we can reserve the security and stability in our country and get rid of the foreign forces but how we can do that if these groups who call themselves resistance keep killing the Iraqi soldiers and policemen? Is this real resistance??"
Reyadh Mahdi Salih – Baghdad
"I am calling all Iraqis who claim to be loyal to Iraq and say that they are patriots: free your minds and head to the boxes"
Zayed –Kerbala
"I salute all the brave Iraqis and I wish them all the best on the coming elections"
Mo'ayed- Bahrain
"Who say that the results of these elections are already decided is actually insulting the Iraqi people because it means that Iraqis are so naïve and they only follow orders form the occupiers"
Abdul Rahman – UAE
"Elections must be done and all the Iraqi people should participate in it
so that we can get out of this mess. As for those Arab who says that we are going to elect an American that only has an Iraqi face, I tell them: what about the Arab leaders who are Americans, only with an Arabic face?"
Ahmed Hashim –Iraq
"The people of Mousil will vote and Zarqawee and his gang will not stop us
We will vote even if we have to do it secretly"
Ahmed – Mousil
"If those armed groups refuse the elections they should give us some alternatives and I ask them here: what are your alternatives for elections? They just want to rule the country against the will of the people as they did in the past"
Nawfel M. Ali – Qatar
"If some Arab think they are not occupied by America they are wrong, whose house is from glass should not through stone at people"
Ali-Sweden
"Elections were our demand from the beginning and we will keep working hard to have the elections even if it takes all of our lives the killing and destruction that you see now are the taxes that we should pay to get a better life for us and for the coming generations"
Hassan Kamil-Iraq- Nasyiriya
"I want to ask everyone who calls for delaying the election: is the situation now better than it used to be six months ago?
We should all support the democratic process to get rid of both, terrorist and occupiers"
Zain-Baghdad
"I consider all these groups out of Islam and they don’t want the best for Iraqis
I'll go to give my vote in spite of all the threats"
Hussain Taey –Baghdad
"I want to ask those who say that we can't hold elections until the troops leave: will they participate in elections if these troops left Iraq? And who will have the right to ask these troops to leave?
Only the legitimate government can do so and this legitimate government comes through elections which you refuse to do"
Adnan –Baghdad
"Those who wish to see Iraq unstable and those who commit all these crimes and cause all this destruction are terrorist and nothing but terrorists but they use Islam as a cover. I see that all my fellow citizen want peace and prosperity while these criminals are the remnant of the Ba'ath and the old dictator regime and I will keep saying: down with these terrorist and long live the Iraqi people and the Iraqi police and the Iraqi National Guard who work day and night to protect Iraq"
Mohammed Saleh – Baghdad
"I wish to see election happen in its planned date and the sooner the better for my country. Peace and democracy are our dreams that we awaited for a long time.
Those who don’t want elections are the enemies of Iraq. I pray to God every day for the elections to be on time"
Lamya – Baghdad
"All Iraqis should enjoy democracy but not under the American guardianship and British colonialism. The genuine Iraqi groups have the right to stop these elections from happening"
Abu Baker-Mauritania
"After I read all the above opinions, I would like to ask those who call themselves "Mujahideen" what do you want?!
For God's sake, read the comments of Iraqis; all of them reject you and call you criminals, stop the killing and the destruction and ask for forgiveness from God you and get out of Iraq. Nobody wants you there and no one wants your jihad"
Mohammed – Egypt
"I want to ask all those Arabs: do you have any suggestions that we can use instead of elections?"
Hayder Hummadi-Baghdad
"I am against any elections right now because the country is still occupied"
Saad Hussain-Baghdad
"The elections are the best way to build the free Iraq"
Karema-Baquba -Diyala
"We will not be afraid any more, we will vote for our precious Iraq"
Mohammed Baghdady – Baghdad
"I want to ask the Arabs a favor: please leave us alone and let us live in freedom and peace"
Raysan-Baghdad
"If those fighters were really Muslims they would not be killing the Iraqi police, army and innocent civilians. We will not submit to their threats and we will vote in spite of them"
Muosa Al Ruba'ey-Baghdad
"I'll shout out loudly and ask all Iraqis to vote and not to listen to the masked terrorists who came from outside, let us be one hand to build a new and free democratic Iraq"
Mohammed Al Juboury- Iraqi in KSA
"We will crush the terrorists and crush all those who try to threat the Iraqi nation and we will vote"
Anwar-Baghdad
"I'll go to the voting center even if it means that I risk my life, elections are a historic chance that we cannot afford to waste"
Ussama Alrussafy-Baghdad
"All good Iraqis should vote for a better life for our children"
Mohammed Alsamaray –Samara
"For sure the resistance will risk the lives of the voters and this will negatively effect the elections which will follow the occupiers' rules"
Hassan abdul Mu'iz – Egypt
"As Iraqis, we will go to vote even if the terrorists planted their bombs inside the boxes, because this is our dream which we paid millions of lives for it and I would like to ask everyone not to exaggerated the size of these terrorist they are only a few Saddam lovers with criminals from outside the country"
Azhar- Basra
"I swear to Allah that we will not accept anything but free elections and we will have this right even if the terrorists cut us into pieces"
Mahdy Hadi-Baghdad
"I think the upcoming elections will be a disaster for all the dictatorships in the region.
Those who try to intimidate the people are just a gang of criminals who use the name of Islam as a cover. Islam is innocent from what they do and no religion accepts their doings."
Mohammed Hayder- Iran
"They are broke orphans of the Ba'ath regime. We will not be afraid and we will not hesitate and we will vote"
Adel-Basra
"I can see that all the above opinions are pro occupation and I think that the BBC is doing this because Britain is America's partner"
Mohammed Sudky –Egypt
"I m from Mosul and I would like to declare to the whole world that I would love to vote but unfortunately it's impossible for me as my town has been occupied by Ba'athists and and the Salafis for two months now and I put all the responsibility on the Iraqi government and coalition forces. Don’t they know that there's no sign of the authorities in this city?"
Jalal Hayder –Mousel
"I'm Sunni and I will go and vote because this makes me feel alive and I will not allow myself to be afraid of the terrorists because if I listen to them then I'll be dead"
Mohammed al kurdy- kerkuk
"Go away cowards. We will go to visit our beloved box!"
Menjal-Baghdad
"Wise people will not vote, not because of the threats but because this election is an American play"
M. Uthman- Sudan
"I'll go to vote and I will not fear the terrorist. I will vote on the 30th and I don’t care if I could get killed by the bombs of the killers because my vote will be for my kids' future"
Ali Baghdadi-Baghdad
"It's hard to convince the Arabs about elections, did we succeed in convincing them that Saddam is a killer?"
Raeed –Iraqi in Sweden
"Even If they cut our bodies or burn us we will vote despite the fact that the terrorist still control my city.
My vote will go to Al Yawer and Allawi if they hang the killers who control the streets of my town before the elections' day"
Omar Wajih –Mousil
"We spend thousands of days in Saddam's needless wars that brought only disasters to my country.
How about a war of our choice for one day to rebuild our country, a war against the terrorist's threats?"
Abdullah-Baghdad
- posted by Omar @ 21:31
Well said, and I agree with you about preaching it! Amen, Bro!
Let me know if you want in or out
I'm so grateful to VDH for not going wobbly on Iraq as so many intellectuals have, even conservatives. He's going to have a whole fist full of I-told-you-so's to deal out if our effort in Iraq ends up a success.
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