So says Meir Javedanfar in "Iraq Rolls Out the Red Carpet For Ahmadinejad" at Pajamas Media, and he's right.
The smile on Ahmadinejad’s face said it all. His was the smile of a victorious leader, being greeted warmly by a country that had been Iran’s sworn enemy in the 1980s.Back then, the Iranian president was an officer in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp (IRGC). Now he was returning as the the most controversial and right-wing extremist political leader Iran has ever had; a fact that didn’t seem to bother his hosts.
The United States has every reason to be extremely concerned about the friendly tone of Ahmadinejad’s visit to Iraq.
Had a Soviet premier been warmly greeted in South Vietnam in the late 1960s, at a time when the US was providing South Vietnam with forces to fight communist North Vietnam, there would have been uproar. The South Vietnamese would have been accused of being ungrateful, at the very least. Some may have gone as far as calling the South Vietnamese as traitorous back stabbers.
The very fact that Iraq does not think twice about inviting Iran’s president, accused of financing the deaths of hundreds of US soldiers in southern Iraq, clearly demonstrates that the US is losing influence in Iraq and in the Middle East in general. This is on top of the fact that some Shiite militias are wreaking havoc against their own countrymen in Iraq.
Read it all.
Priceless.
But, surely Dubya and all the "Operation Democracy" crowd should be thrilled as it's just demAAAAcracy in action.
The elected gov't of Iraq are bestest of buddies with Iran. And I mean the bestest in the whole wide World.
The Keystone Kops weren't even slightly close to the incompetence we're witnessing here.
Mind you, their director didn't have a budget of three trillion to play with.
Marvel at the 24 carot gold ineptitude. Marvel and wonder.
I just read in jpost.com that Condi thinks that there can be an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal in '08. This is right after Israel encountered American arms weilded by Hamas.
I also read that the rockets fired from Gaza came from Iran.
This friendly Iranian visit shows that installing a democratic infrastructure in Iran without suppressing Islam first has only enabled more Islam. Maybe that's what Condi means by peace.
Just goes to show, Hugh Fitzgerald was right all along! ;D
Dubya and his chums increasingly look like the more out-of-touch Roman Emperors. Free market fundamentalism and left wing political correctness that controlls debate maybe the key factors that bring down the West.
I thought the author was on to something until this:
"One way to prevent it and push back Iran’s growing influence is to embark on a reconstruction “surge”, similar to the military one which we saw in Iraq."
And who's money should be spent on this infrastructure surge?
Not another stinking dime from the U.S. Treasury should be allotted for the "tar-baby". What have we received as a return for our investment so far? Appeasement,kindness and good will has delivered nothing. As this meeting shows, the Iraqis are incapable of returning the favor ( a $1 Trillion favor) with some allegiance and loyalty. And the author suggests we haven't spent enough yet.
McCain says we should stay in Iraq for another 100 years if we have to so we can achieve "victory". In other words, if he wins, we should plan on staying in Iraq for another 100 years. Neither he or anyone in Iraq bothers to identify victory and how we will know about it when it arrives.
Monkeyman has to be next on the going down parade, because if you think he is being welcomed warmly now, it pales in comparison as to how he would be received if he has nuclear arms.
He tries to give the impression that he already has them, like Hussein (not the presidential candidate) did, and this reflects the stature he is seeking and which nature did not give him.
Hey frustrated BDS sufferers out there, continue living on hope and regrets of "if only we hadn't a done this or that" - keep your head firmly swivelled on the past so you dont notice the barn door you'll be running into.
Including a big zero candidacy, the Oprazisation of US politics.
The C-SPAN crowd is at it again. Everything is Israel's fault.
Had a Soviet premier been warmly greeted in South Vietnam in the late 1960s, at a time when the US was providing South Vietnam with forces to fight communist North Vietnam, there would have been uproar.
This is a different time. We can't compare apples and oranges. We were fighting for our existence, which depended on our allies not being crushed by Soviet Communism. Back then, you were with us or you were with the Communists. We also had a Democratic Party that believed America and American ideals were worth defending.
Bush started that way after 9/11: you were with us or you were with the terrorists. But then the realities of the present caught up with him. He couldn't "condemn Islam" when only a few wayward souls had "hijacked their religion".
Sorry for beating the same drum but another reason is globalization. We were more self-reliant in the bad old days. Our goal after the Cold War became a world united by commerce, in the belief that trading partners don't make war. The Arabs had already proved that theory wrong in the 1970s but we're going to continue pursuing that course even if it kills us. Political correctness demands that we fall on our own sword.
Politics makes strange bedfellows. Just wait until Iran has nuclear weapons.............everyone in the Middle East will be their buddies.
Except for Israel.
"One way to prevent it and push back Iran’s growing influence is to embark on a reconstruction “surge”, similar to the military one which we saw in Iraq.
Oh, yeah--There's a good idea. Why don't we also cut out the middleman, Ahmadinejad, and give Iraq nukes, while we're at it?
We shouldn't be reconstructing a single thing, over there. The essence of war is to kill as many of the enemy as possible, destroy as much of his homeland as possible, leave him demoralized, in a heap of ashes, and trying to figure out how to put it back together, thus removing him from our "hair".
I'm with USorThem--Not another dime, for reconstruction!
Maybe Saddam wasn't such a bad guy after all. Who would have thought that getting rid of him would give the midget with the Napoleonic complex carte blanc to do what he's doing now.
Don't worry, be happy, soon Obama will become president and lead us out of this valley.
To the promise land where life is wonderful all the time...
In the meantime, this incident should be considered a slap in the face to the US occupiers, who now should start acting like occupiers, or get out,
preferably get out. Let them have each other.
Each other is something they richly deserve...
Fitzgerald: The Iraqi policy is sure to fail
"A fledgling group of Sunni and Shiite religious leaders met for the first time in Baghdad last week to condemn sectarian violence in their country, a move US military officials framed as a first of its kind and a small step toward broader political reconciliation." -- from this article
Why are they even attempting this? Not only is it likely to be fail, but it is part of a policy that is likely to fail. That policy involves the attempt to make Iraq into a unified state, with a civic-minded and informed and intelligent citizenry, full of the hardworking and the prosperous. Iraq will therefore offer Sunni Arab states a model of how to be, and everyone will be happy. For the first time in 1350 years, Muslims will take no interest in much of what Islam teaches, though as never before in history, despite their clear military inferiority to Infidels, Muslims are now capable of conducting the Jihad to spread Islam until it dominates and Muslims rule, in large parts of the non-Islamic historic West, through other non-military means, through utilization of the Money Weapon, well-financed and carefully-targeted Campaigns of Da'wa, and demographic conquest.
Meanwhile, the great cost continues to mount. It begins with the $880 billion spent in Iraq [now estimated as between one and two trillion dollars]. That is more than the total cost of all the wars, save World War II, that the United States has ever fought. But the cost also includes loss of life and of limb that might be acceptable even at far higher levels, in a war such as World War II, a war that made sense, but enrages because the war in Iraq, for the goals stated, not only does not enhance American security and that of its true allies, but worse, it actually requires the American soldiers to work to attain goals that, were they to be achieved (they won't be), would hinder rather than promote American security.
The exploitation of the sectarian and ethnic fissures within Iraq, if not opposed by the Americans, would inevitably lead to further divisions and demoralization within the Camp of Islam, and that, in turn, can only help the Americans and other Infidels in their own war of self-defense -- not a "war against terror" -- against the Jihad that is a permanent feature, not a temporary one (there is no "after Jihad," pace Noah Feldman, and Gilles Kepel, both of them as misguided guides to Islam as can be imagined), of Islam.
What is described in the article above shows the failure by those in Iraq to think beyond Iraq, to think of Iraq only as one theatre in the war of self-defense against the Jihad. The United States has no stake in bringing together Sunni and Shi'a. The Bush Administration, unable to recognize its mistakes about Islam and about Iraq, appears determined to continue to invest more and more, of money and materiel and men's lives -- to pursue a wrong course. In this respect it reminds one of the stubborn, crazed policy pursued during the hideous trench warfare of World War I, for no reasons that made sense, but because, once the thing started, no one could figure out how to stop it.
The generals who have opposed the war for the right reasons (not the zinni-ish line of appeasement, but because the war aims in Iraq make no real sense, for the "mission" cannot be ckearkt articulated by Bush because even to try to do so would show up how misguided the whole thing is) should speak up. And those who are with tunnel vision thinking only of the "job we have to do" right here in Baghdad are not serving the country well.
As for those who say things like "on average, insurgencies last about ten years," to them one can only reply: what would you think of someone who self-assuredly proclaimed that "on average, American wars last an average of 2.1 years" or "on average, wars around the world since 1500 have lasted about 13.16 years" or "on average, civil wars last about 3.7 years"?
You would see right away how vacuous and jejune are such remarks. But for some reason, those "counterinsurgency experts" who make such statements, and then as well think they are little-lawrence-of-arabias with their knowledge of the "Sunni tribes" and their ability to really get to know those sheikhs because they are aware of how to sit, and which hand to use, and what formulae to utter, and how to listen patiently as the local Arab, continue to utter them. Yet that local Arab knows exactly how to manipulate the American army officer who is under the impression that it is he, the American, who is doing the manipulating. He presents his wish-list for still more money, still more of those nice advanced American weapons and, oh yes, some more raids by American soldiers on that particular sheikh's particular enemies, whether or not they belong to Al Qaeda, which is not, pace Patraeus and Bush, the only problem -- for there are a dozen different, mutually hostile, constantly shifting in their allegiances groups in Iraq, but all of them, in the end, consist of Muslims, and therefore none of them, in end, can conceivably be won over, not their hearts, and not their minds, to be real, as opposed to temporary and feigned, friends of American Infidels.
The article above makes one furious, and sad. Furious at the stupidity. Sad for the troops, sad for the soldiers being asked to be there, fighting for something, trying to do something in Iraq, that makes no sense -- none.
[Posted by Hugh at June 25, 2007]
I suspect we will stay in Iraq as long as Iran is considered a threat. US convention weapons are capable of striking any target in the middle east from there.
Just the fact that Ineedajob told us to get out is reason enough to stay. It kind of tells that little man to go F himself.
We have been at war with the Iranian Islamic Government since 1979. We have self-tied our own hands behind our back to keep: the oil flowing, not offend Islamic/Arab sensibilities and bring about Peace in the Israeli-Palestinina conflict...
I initially supported the invasion of Iraq for a couple of reasons: remove a brutal dictator, "free" his people as (I belived the reports) that they were the most educated, best suited for "democracy", and place a large bootprint in the region anticipating a much more aggressive Iran. Thousands of dead American servicemen and women later, permanently disabled servicemen and women, billions of dollars and about all we seem to have accomplished is have the "freely' elected government of Iraq rub our faces in manure. Oh, I forgot, our other accomplishment - the rescue of many stray dogs that our troops have taken into their hearts and homes back to this country for humane treatment and love since we infidels don't despise dogs as "unclean."
Thanks Hugh for your argument penned before the success of the surge.
Puts in mind the takeout of the jihadi in Somalia days ago who engineered the embassy bombings.
Or the takeout of Mugnyah in Syria two weeks ago.
Some people just hate to win.
Hugh, if you landed in Paradise, no doubt you would be pissed off at the service.
Room service, that is.
"Look Ma, it's Robin Hood."
(exclamation by a kid from a multiculty family on seeing B.H. Obama at a rally)
(exclamation by a Pakistani kid on seeing a poster of Osama B.L. on a street wall in Lahore)
Is life a cartoon or what (lol)?
Is the world safer or more dangerous since we entered Iraq?
As far as what we should have done, we should have dumped 100k troops into Afghanistan and chased the Taliban/Al Qaeda all the way through Pakistan until we met up with the Indian army on the other side.
And left Saddam alone.
As it is, at the very least, we should encourage the Sunni/shiite rift in Iraq and anywhere else we find it (including Dearbornistan), let Obama pull us out of Iraq and let them kill each other.
For each muslim killed by other muslims, there is one less muslim for us to face later.
What we will do is keep giving them money and lives until we have managed to defeat ourselves.
I deplore the way this Javedanfar seems to blame America for all the faults of his fellow Muslims. Somehow the impossible burden is layed at our feet yet once again to salvage other Muslim areas like the West Bank and elsewhere as he suggests in multiple places.
Why do Muslims feel so comfortable always demanding that we, and not they themselves, are responsible for fixing their disgusting societies? Why are Muslims so comfortable laying every bit of blame at America's feet for all their legendary Islamic shortcomings while barely mentioning the complicity of themselves, and their mindsets, and the vileness of Islam? They furiously blame us for their failures, and then truculently demand that we pick up the brokenness of Islam and give them more toys and money and schools and hospitals.
Why does the author perpetuate the monstrous lie that Muslim hearts and minds can ever be "won"? He asserts that Iran, with very little investment, and by simply building a few hospitals and a few roads is winning the hearts and minds of the Shiite Muslims in the South. He proposes that we embark on a spending spree to outspend and thereby, presumably, out-win the hearts and minds of those Muslims who are otherwise "won" so cheaply by the Iranians in the South. He does not discuss whether this will ever really work -- after all -- we've already spent nearly a trillion in Iraq, and look at how much they love us now.
The article above does not even hint at the fundamental Islamic basis for the backwardness and idiocy in Iraq, in Gaza, in Iran, the West Bank, in Saudi Arabia, in any place where Islam dominates and rules. Above, no blame is placed on Muslim shoulders for Muslim failures, but rather, more and more aid, and handouts, and another "a reconstruction “surge” similar to the military surge, and even "investing in health and education programs in countries such as Lebanon, the West Bank, and when possible, Gaza. "
Blame is reserved for America. More demands are placed on America. It is revolting.
Is the world safer or more dangerous since we entered Iraq?
Posted by: Big Luke
It's more dangerous. Whenever you squeeze a big pimple you have to watch out for flying yuck.
I wonder who's paying for and providing security for the esteemed president Monkeyman?
The Iraq War will be a textbook example in the future of how to lose a war that you had won.
It is of course the idiotic idea of bringing U.S.-style "democracy" to a fragmented country in the Moslem world--an artificial country with a clear-cut Shi'ite majority.
The U.S.-Iraq war is a text book example of why fighting a war for the benefit of the enemy--the people whom you are fighting, the people who were and are killing your troops--is a no-win war.
The example that must be followed is the U.S. war against Japan 1941-1945, see “Gifts from Heaven”: The Meaning of the American Victory over Japan, 1945.
I shall be analyzing the aforementioned article in the near future, comparing that war (Japan-WWII) with the confusing surge/surge-back situation in Iran-friendly shi'ite Iraq. When that analysis is complete, I shall post it where it will be accessible to all interested.
As I have access to the complete "'Gifts from Heaven': The Meaning of the American Victory over Japan, 1945" article, my analysis will contain cited material not available from what is shown in The Objective Standard writeup linked to above.
I agree with USorThem--Not another dime, for reconstruction!*--and Abscedere who said:
"The essence of war is to kill as many of the enemy as possible, destroy as much of his homeland as possible, leave him demoralized, in a heap of ashes, and trying to figure out how to put it back together . . . ."
We need to make more people aware that General William Tecumseh Sherman
knew how to fight a war and win it--Geoge W. Bush (mixed loyalties, simplistic ideas of what is "democracy") does not.
________________________
*"Neither he (McCain) or anyone in Iraq bothers to identify victory and how we will know about it when it arrives."
--USorThem
Their meeting was a business deal on consolidation of the two nations under the shia banner. Ties of electricty and oil pipelines etc.
When the US pulls out the sunnis will have a fight on their hands.
And what's with the Hugo Chaves (Amadinajahd's buddy) starting a war with Columbia. Another unification of countries in South America? What will the US do? Allow Columbia to come under the sway of the leftists?
I feel the noose tighting.
I agree with you. Chaves is taking his direction from Iran on this military buildup along the Columbia border.
As an ally of Columbia, we would be expected to come to their aid during a war. This military response would strain an already over-extended voluntary military. (We don't have enough people to staff our current committments without a lot of national guards and contractors.)
If Iran attacks Israel aerially, Syria hits Israel from its territory, Hezebollah attacks from S Lebanon, and Hamas hits from 1) Gaza, 2) North Sinai - a protected area due to Israeli agreement with Egypt) and 3) Fatah West Bank, you'd have to wonder if we have any resources to help them.
Israel should be worried about deals between Iraq and Iran. No matter how many Dolphin-class subs they have armed with nukes, and how many Arrow anti-missiles they have, Israel is going to be significantly depopulated once Iran and its surrogates press the "trigger."
Israels’s Rabbi's (the real ones, i.e., the ones who actually believe in God) should seek God's blessing on their nation because they’re going to need a miracle, i.e., God intervention in the natural course of events, to save Israel. Israel should start relying on God - not American anymore - to save them. America is being tied up by Israel’s enemies and will soon become completely bound as a captive. As you know, we are increasingly dependent on foreign sources of money and oil; in particular, from the Middle East, Russia, and China (no friends of Israel.)
You let the vanquished write their own religiously-based "Constitution" (Sharia Law) and you are asking for unchanged madness.
We asked for it (via our political class of idiot functionaries who agreed to the "Islamic State of Iraq") and we got it.
For not installing a secular state, we will gain nothing from this whole enterprise but future Jihad terror.
It's the Islam, treasonous clerks!
You don't crush it, you lose.
Iran Is Our Old Teacher On This Planet
With what ever the cleverness, the corporate western media portrays and try to articulate the case of ‘Global war on Terrorism’ and keep on hiking up the flimsy pretexts to invade the sovereign countries like Iraq and Iran in the Middle East or grab Afghanistan and go beyond; it is bound to meet its failures and end up in desperation and frenzy for the Oppressing forces. The myth of terrorism has no future and bears no ethical grounds to stand on. It is only by the vile choices of few assailants; the big wicks like United States having their vicious designs and evil choices with the aim to siphon and control the mineral resources of this area like oil and gas to run their own economies through deceit and oppression.
Iran stands as our old teacher on this planet; who was once the seat of learning, a source of knowledge and wisdom which influenced many other civilizations around it. The research and studies in the fields of medicine, physic, chemistry, mathematics and sciences that present day western world so proudly cherishes its achievements in sciences and technology; all this once emanated from this land and others followed.
But now we find that same West is all out to restrain its old teacher to even think of benefiting from the harvest that it once sowed so earnestly for the benefit of mankind. The adopted ethics and resolve of a wise teacher probably, then had not pursued him enough to think and let grow the thorns along the stems of its fragrant roses to ward off his would be oppressors of the future. Iran is forcefully being deprived and debarred from these advancements to keep her weak and frail; lest it develop some potent deterrent and challenges the western onslaught of oppression in this part of the World.
But ‘Old is Gold’; and who has ever been successful in robbing of knowledge, wisdom or been able to out smart their old teachers? The history of this planet at least does not support this.
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Love for all, Hatred for none