Hugh

Maybe you are right about pulling out of Iraq , that it could be a good strategy to set the 2 faces of the Islamic world at each others throat - but and it is a big but - what if you are wrong?

- and the result is that they fight for a while but later Iraq becomes what Al-queda and the rest want - the start of a new caliphate - what then? - are you advocating a COMPLETE pull out - or do you think we should maintain our bases - in order for example to re-engage - if the Caliphate looks like being on the cards

Either way a complete disengagement seems ill-advised - there are just too many unknowns in the equation at the moment.

Posted by: johnmac at March 18, 2007 6:11 AM

Setting up ethnically pure Kurdish/Arab Sunni/Arab Shiite areas in Iraq will achieve precisely nothing of any strategic value. What is strategic is making Iraq as close as possible to being like a European country. Technically, it is damn close to that already, at least on paper. The laws of Iraq do not discriminate against race or religion, and the government of Iraq is trying, with US assistance, to enforce Iraqi law.

The fact that it's taking longer than WWII to create an Iraqi army from scratch is also not abnormal. It nominally takes 12 years to start a US-style army from scratch. Regardless, the Iraqis are due to be in charge of all of Iraq by November 2007. THAT (ie December 2007) is the point at which it is time to move on, only leaving sufficient forces in Iraq to ensure there is no external invasion or military coup that would destroy all the hard work that has been done.

In any reasonable comparison, this war has been waged at extremely low cost. Casualties are equivalent of about one month's worth of US road toll. And what has actually been achieved - an Arab Muslim democracy similar to a European country - is nothing short of phenomenal.

Iran should not be bombed. It should be liberated. Mosque attendance in Iran is near-zero from what I have read. We really need to liberate those people to find out what it is they really think, quite apart from any obligation we have towards the human rights of our fellow man. There is no need to stay in Iran for reconstruction. So just the initial war (ie what took 3.5 weeks in Iraq), is all that is required. There's no need to disband the Iranian army, as there was in Iraq.

I recommend toppling Syria and Lebanon after that, before getting to Sudan. If some European country would like to do Sudan instead of waiting for America, that would be even better.

As for public opinion - it is the government's job to make sound decisions based on science, not blindly follow a misinformed public. If you want to educate the public so that they are actually informed about the broader strategy, you can do so. I don't think most people are interested in actually studying that, or any other government policy, though. They'd rather watch American Idol. As is their right.

Posted by: Paul Edwards at March 18, 2007 6:48 AM

A limited Caliphate, perhaps. Does anybody think that Indonesian Muslims will tolerate being governed by Arabs? Will Shia Muslims tolerate a Sunni Caliph? Nasser tried uniting Egypt and Syria; that didn't last very long. Will Wahabbi Saudis allow a non-Wahabbi Caliph?

A Caliph having sway over all Muslims, even over Arab Muslims is not very likely.

Posted by: Pelayo at March 18, 2007 6:53 AM

A limited Caliphate, perhaps. Does anybody think that Indonesian Muslims will tolerate being governed by Arabs? Will Shia Muslims tolerate a Sunni Caliph? Nasser tried uniting Egypt and Syria; that didn't last very long. Will Wahabbi Saudis allow a non-Wahabbi Caliph?

A Caliph having sway over all Muslims, even over Arab Muslims is not very likely.

Posted by: Pelayo at March 18, 2007 6:55 AM

l think leaving now would creat more of a problem, even though Hugh states it otherwise. the media protrays such a different pictures, than what you hear from people who have actually fought there. nothing is easy in life, and this is damm hard.

Posted by: ZenaWarriorPrincess at March 18, 2007 7:21 AM

"And then there is the possibility of seizing southern Sudan and Darfur, until such time as a referendum on independence can he held."

Yes I have been waiting for this for years. Finally you have begun to write on this site that the US should use its military to start liberate infidels from muslim rule and non-arab muslims from arab rule. Perhaps you will start to write more about Sudan and then Nigeria, Indonesia, Malaysia, Bosnia, Kasakhstan, Azerbaijan etc. They should all be forced to give up territory to new infidel states so that the size of the islamic world is significantly reduced. Paki occupied Kashmir, Kosovo, Northern Cyprus should be liberated and returned to Indian, Serb and Greek rule. And an independant Assyrian state should be carved out in Iraq, it doesn't matter what size it is, it can be as small as Rhode Island or even San Marino. The establishment of a Christian Assyrian state will piss the muslims so much off that it almost will be worth the entire Iraq war, and a clear signal will be send to perhaps Egypt that further support for terrorism might lead to an independant Copt state.

All over the world the physical seperation between muslims and infidels should be promoted for the sake of peace and security of infidels and population transfers of the same size that happened in 1945 should be considered. Those population transfers were one of the major reasons for peace in Europe for 45 years until war broke out when muslims started to create new islamic states on Christian European soil.
So please a couple more articles that highlight how infidel independance from muslim rule should be promoted all over the world and supported by the US armed forces. Now when the FBI has started to listen to you perhaps people with power over the US military will as well.

Posted by: European Crusader at March 18, 2007 9:37 AM

What if "Iraq becomes what Al-queda and the rest want - the start of a new caliphate - what then? - are you advocating a COMPLETE pull out - or do you think we should maintain our bases -"
-- from a posting above

Apparently what I have written a few hundred times hasn't been taken into account. Let me try again.

To wit:

"Al Qaeda" is a group that in Iraq, under Zarqawi, and his successors, is dedicated to killing Shi'a, denouncing them as "Rafidite dogs" worse than the ordinary non-Muslim Infidels. How do you propose for Al Qaeda to win over the 60-65% of the population that is Shi'a Arab (and 20% well-organized and well-armed Kurds) and that this "Al Qaeda in Iraq" has been engaged in killing? Even if somehow it managed to win over more Sunnis -- but why would it? why should the mass killing of the traditional tribal leaders among the Sunnis win the tribes over to Al Qaeda, a small but deadly group? And if they did, so what? Still more than 80% of the population in Iraq would be a permanent enemy. And those 80%, quite unlike the Americans, are capable of ferreting out intelligence, and acting on it, in ways the Americans never would. Imagine what would happen if the Shi'a militia had been able to continue to operate in Sadr City and Baghdad - and what will happen when they, inevitably, are able to do so? Why, given all this, do you keep raising the spectacle of some magical takeover, of all of Iraq, of a group, Al Qaeda, whose members the Kurds and the Shi'a and even some of the Anbar Province tribes would like to rend limb from limb?

Why do you persist in saying, or thinkiing, or predicting such a thing?

Furthermmore, why is "Al Qaeda" brought up as if that is the only worry? Isn't Al Qaeda just the most-publicized of a thousand Muslim groups, working to commit acts of terror? And aren't there far more potent weapons, at present, against the West, than acts of terror? At present, what are the instruments of Jihad the Western world needs to worry most about? Despite the bombs in the London and Madrid subways, that is not at present the main instrument of Jihad.

The main instruments of Jihad in Western Euorpe are the money weapon, used to finance mosques, madrasas, and pay for an army of Western hirelings who defend Islam, in one way or another (promoting Saudi Arabia, helpiing to disguise the Lesser Jihad against Israel, helping to fend off, sometimes through street violence (demonstrations), sometimes through political pressure (some politicians now court the Muslim vote), sometimes through lawsuits, or merely trheatened law suits, in order to intimidate and inhibit Infidel governments and institutions and individuals from resisting what Muslims believe should be the unopposed and inexorable spread of their Truth, the Truth of Islam, and will stop at nothing, are inculcated with the idea that is a duty to stop at nothing, to achieve the goal of tearing down all obstacles to the spread of Islam, for everywhere "Islam must dominate and is not to be dominated."

Daw'a, or the Call to Islam, is conducted not only by individual Muslims (all of whom are supposed to spread Islam in their own way) but through well-financed, carefully-targetted campaigns, especially among the institutionalized, that is prisoners, but also prey upon two groups -- the economically marginal, for whom Islam is presented, quite falsely, as a vehicle of "social justice" and the pyschically marginal, the johhn-walker-lindhs and yvonne-ridleys of the Western world (or for that matter, the psychically-marginal who do not become full-fledged Muslims but merely running dogs, to use the Chinese-Communist phrase, of Islam, such as Karen Armstrong).

And along with Daw'a is the demographic conquest that comes from Muslim immigration, virtually unchecked, and certainly not yet halted or reversed (and both such measures will, for the purposes of rescuing Western Europe and its civilizational legacy, have to be undertaken, and undertaken just as the Czechs, for their own safety, passed the Benes Decree of 1946 and expelled 3 million ethnic Germans, and have never been criticized for that understandable decision, save by revanchist German far-rightists).

How is the islamization of Western Europe, or the killing of Hindus in Kashmir and India, or of Buddhists in southern Thailand, or of Christians in Indonesia (East Timor in the past, the Moluccas at present), or the mass murders of Christians in the southern Sudan over 20 years, or the Jihad against the Christians in southern Nigeria before, during, and after the Biafra War, or the attacks on non-Muslims in Pakistan and Bangladesh, how is any of that dealt with by the Americans sacrificing men and money and materiel and morale to focus, so crazily, on Iraq, and to promote a policy that instead of exploiting the natural fissures, ethnic and sectarian, within Iraq which, if left to develop on their own, will lead inexorably to dividing and demoralizing the Camp of Islam, the only goal, from the American point of view, that makes any sense, or that begins to justify the enormous expenditure in men, money, and materiel (and morale, military and civilian), that has already been incurred, and for which no further expenditures need be made.

I repeat: the Sunn-Shi'a split is of such depth and duration that nothing the Americans do will patch it up. The Sunni Arabs have convinced themselves that they are more powerful than the Shi'a, despite all the evidence, and in any case, Sunnis in Iraq and outside Iraq will never acquiesce in the loss of Sunni control over Iraq, the most important place in Sunni Arab mythology, and the site of fabled Baghdad, the madinat al-salaam, for five hundred years, the most glorious years (in Arab minds, permanently fixated on the supposed glories of the distant past) in Arab Muslim history. And the Shi'a, per contra, will never again allow themselves to be subject to Sunnis, nor will they give up the power they think that is theirs by right (and certainly by numbers), and whatever they promise the Americans for now, to keep them around, it will all fall apart, the minute the Americans leave - no matter when.

Yet you think that if the Americans leave "Al Qaeda" will somehow take over. Why? Because some people repeat this phrase? Because Bush or others say, with great certainty, that "we can't leave" or "if we leave it will be perceived as a defeat" or "if we leave the terrorists will win"? The "defeat" will soon enough be seen as the intelligent move, for our purposes, that it is. The "defeat" of America will be seen, almost immediately, as leading in fact to a colossazl headache -- not for America, but for Muslims everywhere in the Middle East, and even as far away as Pakistan. That "defeat" is only a "defeat" in the rhetoric of Bush and Cheney, who knew and still know so little about Islam, and who, in their obstinacy, and even in their embarrassment -- they just can't allow themselves to imagine that they have been wrong, or that they need to change course, because they can't allow themselves to admit to such, and would rather keep on, and sacrifice others, to a policy that does not make sense, than admit to this. Anyone who worries about the world-wide Jihad, and realizes what damage they have done, and how many resources, tangible and intangible, they have squandered, will find their current insistence on remaining in Iraq unforgivable.

Do you really want to have the American army remain there, at huge expense, with American soldiers and Marines being sacrificed to a policy that is attempting to do exactly of what, if Islam and Iraq were rightly understood, is desirable from our point of view? Now that the total cost of the war (see the paper by Blimes of MIT) is estimaed to rise, once the care of the wounded is factored in, to a total of about a trillion dollars, what do you make of it? Can you think of any other ways a trillion dollars, or even $750 billion, might have more effectively been spent to counter Da'wa, and demographic conquest?

Posted by: Hugh at March 18, 2007 9:56 AM

The bottom line is: One cannot win by playing defense. Defense takes at least ten times the men and materiel than offense does. Worse, defense abdicates all initiative to the enemy.

In Iraq, we are playing by the Dien Bien Phu strategy--sit in the middle of a hostile valley, surrounded by enemies, and wait for them to attack. Worse, when they do attack, we "arrest" them and send them to "jail," after which the Islamic "justice system" either releases them outright (perhaps in celebration of Ramadan, or for some other excuse), or else arranges for them to "escape" from captivity.

The armed services in recent decades were shrunk by half, and reorganized to be "expeditionary forces." They are designed to move and to attack and to prevail. They are not sized, trained, or equipped to be occupation forces. But in Iraq, we use them as gendarmes and jailers and public affairs officers.

Instead, our expeditionary forces should, as they are designed to, be following the jihadists back to their nests--in Syria, in the Bekaa Valley of Lebanon, in Pakistan, even in Iran--wrecking their infrastructure (and the infrastructure of their sponsors, if they resist) and inflicting maximum casualties. And then our forces should immediately leave, without apology, without any nation-building nonsense. Then, repeat as necessary. Keep moving. Keep attacking. Keep the intiative.

And when the national sponsors of the various thuggish Islamic jihaist groups call for emergency sessions at the UN over this or that incursion, there must be a new incursion even before the diplomats have time to assemble on the first one. Let these phony diplomats (jihad by the tongue) scream until they hyperventilate. [Our diplomats should be playing offense, too, but that is another story.]

The only thing the enemy jihadists should be worried about is "where are the Amerians going to attack next?" Instead, we sit around and worry about "where will the jihadists attack next?"

After 9/11, President Bush came up with exactly the right concept in his "with us or against us" strategy. But he almost immediately stopped playing to win. The aggressive policy of going after the jihadist nests was well within his presidential authority. But he instead deferred to the UN and the EU in a useless attempt to build coalitions and to garner support from the left. What a waste. What a quagmire of appeasement. Neither the UN nor the EU (nor the left in general) is on our side in this fight to protect our civilization.

Posted by: Stendec at March 18, 2007 11:15 AM

Hugh posted above: "A poster at Jihad Watch recently took issue with some comments I made by saying, "No politician can stand before the people and say they want to pull out of Iraq so that the Muslims will slaughter each other. "

I don't expect any politician to say that, so baldly. I never did."

Hugh posted in another thread (Fitzgerald: Folly to move out?): "He doesn't get to my point, the point about how sectarian and ethnic fissures are not to be worried about but welcomed, and the details of how, and why, and where that would help us that have been posted here, several hundred times, over the past three years."

Yes, perhaps a politician should not state his case so bluntly or baldly if he believes in that strategy but even if he were to use Hugh's proferred speech, many voters would accuse him of "wanting to pull out of Iraq so that the Muslims will slaughter each other" and that is the talking point that he would have to defend. In the end, the verbose approach might make very little difference to critics. It is too detailed for a sound bite. Still, I wonder why it should be perceived as vulgar or wrong to advocate for the disunity of your opponents. Is it not better that they fight themselves than us?

Posted by: G. Matthew Webb at March 18, 2007 11:31 AM

The conservative columnist Diana West, practically wrote the elements of a speech Bush could give to the nation, explaining such a change of course in Iraq. Here it is, in two parts:

"....Over the past few years, then, the United States has supported fledgling democracies in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Palestinian Authority....

"With their devotion to Islamic tradition, then, these new democracies have, in effect, peacefully voted themselves into the same doctrinal camp as the many terror groups that violently strike at the non-Muslim world in the name of jihad for the sake of a caliphate -- a Muslim world government ruled according to sharia.

"So be it. What I mean by that is, it is neither in the national interest nor in the national will for the United States of America to attempt to reshape such a culture to conform to our notions of liberty and justice for all. It is neither in the national interest nor in the national will to attempt to reform a belief system that animates this culture to conform to our notions of freedom of worship. It is, however, in our national interest, and must become a part of our national will, to ensure that Islamic law does not come to our own shores, whether by means of violent jihad terrorism as practiced by the likes of Al Qaeda or Hezbollah, or through peaceful patterns of migration, such as those that have already Islamized large parts of Europe.

"The shift I am describing -- from a pro-democracy offensive to an anti-sharia defensive -- means a national course correction. Rather than continuing to emphasize the democratization of the Muslim Middle East as our key tool in the war on terror, I will henceforth emphasize the prevention of sharia from reaching the West as our key tool in the war on terror...."

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/DianaWest/2006/08/17/what_president_bush_should_say_to_us_part_1

[Part 2 talks about securing our own borders and redeploying our troops to Kurdistan.]

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/DianaWest/2006/08/26/what_president_bush_should_say_to_us,_part_2

Basically, all Bush would need to do is read this whole thing off the TelePrompTer verbatim. We could then begin to disengage from Maliki in Baghdad immediately, and it would NOT be the unmitigated disaster that both mainstream Democrats and mainstream Republicans think it would be.

Posted by: Steven L. at March 18, 2007 12:16 PM

Dear Mr. Fitzgerald,

While having great respect for you, I would ask you to please consider a few points.
People always speak of "costs", but do not look at what we have purchased in reality. For example, we are learning that the Russians have been busy beavers since the Cold War in learning how to destroy our tanks and military equipment. Iraq has been the most wonderful live fire exercise in exposing Soviet tactics and in response our equipment and surviving soldiers are evolving to become an even greater fighting force.
This lesson is not a lesson one wants to learn facing a Russian or Chicom army when the stakes are not a discussion of pulling out of Iraq, but an invasion of America if we fail in the deserts now.

The issues of NATO and others mentioned are being addressed and focused upon. Our government is huge and as you realize on any given day there are matrix threats, war games and implementation policy being conducted on a greater scale than even Iraq and no one notices.
In speaking with service members and wounded soldiers, I have found they are not that bothered by Iraq nor Afghanistan. The US forces now leading in Afghanistan have already neutralized the much touted "spring offensive" by the Taliban.
There are always problems, but considering that Clinton policy was to allow terrorists murder around 100 Americans a year as a trade off to keeping the war offshore which ended in 9 11. Policy does indicate that the terrorists are indeed coming here and require to be stopped over there.
I have written extensively of Iran as a Russian proxy has been attempting to get a Hamacuba and Hezbuealla off our coast as they are doing to the Judeans. This will then evolve as nuclear armed bases to strike at America. So yes the Islamocommunists are coming and one of the many policies of Iraq is intended to make Iraq a kill zone.

Due though to the American public abandoning President Bush, a new European policy is being implemented and coordinated in the Middle East. The "love thy Muslim" policy of trying to humanely deal with millions of furious Muslims at their horrid existence is moving into a phase of a new literal war now meant to kill vast numbers of many Middle East citizens and cement a new order out of the chaos and debris.

If the Middle East was just one policy of Sunni Islamofascists against Shia Islamocommunists after what America had as a noble act in trying to save them from themselves were let to fight it out, we as a people could have a clear conscience in we did all we could. That though is not what is being phased in by the Russians who are the most malevolent part of the Middle East strategy.
In papers, I have published they point out the National Bolsheviks intended to start an Iranian and Saudi nuclear exchange and with Iraq in turmoil would literally destroy the commercial oil supply for a decade.
This would leave Russia as blackmail control of all of Eurasia. The Chicoms would be their fodder to use against America and Europe would topple and be weaned away from America. This is NB published policy in attempting to drive America back to our ocean borders to later be "dispatched" at world leisure.

Please forgive the lengthy synopsis, but I know the White House knows this by actions I read in dispatches and because I have contacted them more than once. If this was just about the issues you spoke of then it is one matter, but America is dealing with these small fires so we do not get into a live fire with the ever malevolent Putin.
Your assessment is absolutely correct in dealing with Iran in Global Strike and Vice President Cheney has implemented this policy.
It all sounds heartless sometimes, but the policy makers are so adept at running the numbers that they know the dead already as they did in Vietnam. They use those numbers though to weigh actions and Iraq before in dead and wounded was deemed more humane than loosing American cities to sold Russian nuclear bombs.
Currently the numbers indicate it is more humane to implement kill zones in the Middle East as it is more humane than the murder which would evolve in a world war in Eurasia.
I know the media extolls it and at times our government looks like dolts, but the professionals who are working the scenarios are doing everything which you brought up in your fine article. The picture is all connected and I conclude there is not going to be stopping any of this. President Bush has delayed it, but demonic nature is working out.
We though as a people of a Republic need voices as yourself and Mr. Spencer to direct and influence our people. The time ahead is going to become even more difficult.

I apologize for the lengthy posting.

Posted by: Lame Cherry at March 18, 2007 1:21 PM

"Apparently what I have written a few hundred times hasn't been taken into account. Let me try again."

Hugh - of course I follow your argument and it does sound convincing - the logic is well thought through but it is just that an argument - the truth is no- one really knows what will be the result of a complete American withdrawal - maybe the sunnis and al-quada will win against the shia - maybe they will all get together and form an alliance - the truth is I have NO idea what would come out of the Iraq under such circumstances - and neither do you - hugh amigo!

Posted by: johnmac at March 18, 2007 2:18 PM

Lame Cherry:

Your confidence in Bush & Co. is misplaced. If they knew what they were doing, why in the world would they leave our borders wide open going over 5 years after 9/11? Do they have a secret plan to convert the millions of illegals into an army to fight the resurgent russkies? I doubt it.

johnmac:

It's true that no one can know with certainty what will happen if we quit Iraq. But considering that Hugh accurately predicted sometime after the invasion was set but before Saddam was toppled (if memory serves -- HF can correct me here) that Iraq couldn't be democratized in the Western sense & would fall into a civil war, it certainly makes more sense to let his analysis guide our decisions than to "stay the course," as Bush kept saying until even he realized the majority of Americans were absolutely sick of hearing him repeat it.

Posted by: sheik yer booty at March 18, 2007 2:32 PM

Paul Edwards said

What is strategic is making Iraq as close as possible to being like a European country.

That is the current strategy in a nutshell, and it is a nutty strategy. Iraqi history is nothing like European history. None of the struggle to end serfdom, the Magna Carta, Bill of Rights, and so on. Take a timeline of European history, lay it next to Mesopotamian history, and see how much of it lines up: it doesn't. Their religion is different, their values are different, their culture is different.

But in our hubris, we think that in 5 years we can overwrite millenia of history and culture with our own, and we can do it by getting rid of "a few radicals" at the top. Bing, bang, boom, everything falls into place. But the problem isn't the "few radicals", it is the entire culture.

The laws of Iraq do not discriminate against race or religion

Maybe the laws of Iraq do not discriminate against race or religion, but the lawmen of Iraq do. Shi'ite police/deathsquads go out and round up Sunni's, and then use powerdrills into their eyeball sockets. And Sunni deathsquads abduct Shi'a politicians and murder them. That piece of paper that we forced them to type up, promising to treat each other nice-like, is nice, but doesn't mean much to them.

Iran should not be bombed. It should be liberated.

Liberate them from whom? From themselves? Who is occupying Iran, other than Iranians?

I recommend toppling Syria and Lebanon after that, before getting to Sudan.

And what happens after we topple them? Would they become freedom-loving democracies, just like us? Just like they did in Iraq and Afghanistan? Do you really think that whatever came after them would be more to our liking? Would we, after toppling all these governments, think ourselves obligated to stick around and "help" them, until they became European-style freedom-loving democracies?

Instead of going around the world toppling governments we don't like, and then spending trillions of our money helping them to realize our fanatsy of transforming them into us, how about this:

1) Withdraw aid and support to governments that are hostile to us, including those that we now pretend are our "staunch allies".
2) If a nation that is hostile to us begins amassing WMD's or other means of attacking us, then attack that country, anywhere in the world, regardless of whether we pretend they are our "staunch ally", and completely destroy those WMD's or those weapons or those training camps. Don't leave a single enemy combatant alive. Then leave, no reconstruction, no financial assistance. If they hold a military parade, attack it. If their leaders have a summit meeting, kill them.
3) Take steps at home to protect ourselves from enemy combatants. This involves immigration policy, border security, etc.
4) Reduce (and when possible, eliminate) interaction with nations that are hostile to us. This includes coming up with non-petroleum-based energy sources. On the other hand, be even more generous with nations that are on the front line of the jihad, and who are our true allies.

While I think each of these is common sense, I believe we are currently doing the exact opposite of each of these steps.

I could not disagree with the policy advocated above by a well-meaning person, the policy that the Administration is currently following, more strongly.

Posted by: special_guest at March 18, 2007 4:15 PM

Pundits all over the news these days are moaning and groaning and gnashing their teeth over how we have "lost" in Iraq. What did we lose?

Our stated goal was to make sure they didn't have WMD's. They don't.

We wanted to "free" the Iraqis from the terrible dictatorship of Saddam Hussein and the (Sunni-supported) Baathists. We did; he, and they, are gone.

We wanted to give the Iraqi people the "gift of democracy". They had their election. They voted for pro-sharia candidates, but they voted.

We crushed their armed forces in how many days?

If we "lost", it is only because our original goal all along, unstated, was to "make Iraq as close as possible to being like a European country". If that had been the stated goal, the war in Iraq would almost certainly have never happened. Such a goal would have been seen for what it is: unrealistic, to put it mildly. So we pretended our goals were something else, and we achieved each and every one of those goals, and yet we supposedly "lost".

We "won". We achieved our goals. Our mission is complete. Time to pull out and let the Iraqis lead their country as they see fit, under their religion, under their culture, under their values. That is their right, that is what they deserve.

Posted by: special_guest at March 18, 2007 4:35 PM

special_guest--

Here's "Victory in Iraq" from Jan. 18, 2007:

"Winning in Iraq is important. And we need a return on our investment: 3,000 dead, nearly 25,000 wounded, about $700 billion so far spent or committed in future unavoidable costs, with estimates for the total ranging between $1 trillion and $2 trillion.

And winning can only be done if the definition of "victory" is first made clear.

What is the correct definition of "victory" for the United States? It is the Camp of Islam and Jihad rendered weaker than it was before. The Administration keeps saying that bringing "democracy" itself somehow weakens the appeal of what it inaccurately describes as "extremists who have hijacked a great religion," but since those "extremists" or merely the more religious and less secular have only increased their power whenever free elections have been held -- in Algeria, in Egypt, in the "Palestinian"-controlled territories -- the clash of theory and reality is never explained. How can the Camp of Islam be weakened if American efforts are directed at ensuring a united, stable, and prosperous Iraq?

And if that impossible goal were somehow attained after another few years of expensive and depleting American efforts and expense, and focus remains on Iraq while every other matter is somehow pushed to the back or the side, including that of Iran's steady nuclear project, how would this Iraq serve as a Model? How could an Iraq that was once the place of the Abbasid Caliphate be lost to the Shi'a? After all, that was where so much of that "glorious Islamic past" upon which Muslims like to dwell took place. It is a place so important to their sense of themselves and their rightful role in the universe, that if it were lost by the Sunni Arabs and came to be dominated by the Shi'a, those "Persians," those Rafidite dogs, this would be worse in the eyes of both the Egyptian press and Saudi clerics than Jews and Christians dominating Iraq. Yes, that's just how bad those Shi'a are.

How would the achievement of the stated goals of the Bush Administration in Iraq weaken the Camp of Islam?

The way to weaken the Camp of Islam, and thus to justify the incredible expense in men, money, materiel, and morale both civilian and military, is to allow a situation within Iraq to be created (and still better if that situation is entirely a creation of the people in Iraq -- not "the Iraqis" who do not exist – themselves) in which Muslims who would otherwise be waging jihad against us are divided and demoralized. This will weaken the Camp of Islam. Two of the three major fissures within Islam -- sectarian and ethnic -- are pre-existing conditions. Their origins can be found in the first century of Islam.

The ethnic fissure is that between Arabs and Kurds. The Americans did not cause the mistreatment of the Kurds by both kinds of Arabs, but a not-impossible Kurdish state would serve American interests in two ways. It could weaken both Syria and Iran, that have circumjacent Kurdish populations. And in the case of Iran, not only Iranian Kurds but other non-Persian minorities (Arabs, Azeris, Baluchis) might be inspired by an independent Kurdistan. And the very existence of an independent Kurdistan could have effects far beyond the immediate area for other non-Arabs, including Berbers in North Africa and black Africans in Darfur. They might be heartened by the example of a non-Arab Muslim people throwing off the Arab yoke. And in the "war of ideas" that some like to refer to, anything that reveals Islam to have been and to remain a vehicle of Arab imperialism, cultural, linguistic, economic, and political, is to be encouraged -- so that non-Arab Muslims will begin to view Islam in a new, more accurate, less attractive and more disturbing light.

The much larger fissure is that between Sunni and Shi'a. It goes back to the seventh century and the proper succession, after the Four Rightly-Guided Caliphs, to Muhammad. But it became a difference in ritual and in some doctrines as well, though not in the teachings about, and attitudes exhibited, toward non-Muslims. This too was not encouraged by the Americans. The war being conducted on Shi'a by Sunnis centuries ago led to the former adopting the doctrine of taqiyya (which is now essentially practiced by Sunni Muslims as well, relying on Qur'an and Hadith for justification), that is, religiously-sanctioned dissimulation about the faith. Sunni-Shi'a tensions, and Sunni discrimination against or persecution of the Shi'a, including deliberate campaigns of murder as in both Iraq and in Pakistan, will go on whatever the Americans do. These tensions can be seen in Saudi Arabia, in Pakistan, in Lebanon, in Bahrain, in Kuwait.

The "victory" in Iraq that would result from the continuation, and enlargement, even beyond Iraq's borders, of ethnic and sectarian hostilities and warfare within the Camp of Islam, is the only kind of "victory" that makes sense. And though it was made possible by the removal of the iron regime and mailed fist of Saddam Hussein, the conditions that cause those fissures were none of America's doing. All the Americans have done is try to prevent the very things that they should be deliberately not preventing, but exploiting.

A topsy-turvy strategy. A crazy quilt of plans and counter-plans that miss the essential point.

A mad world, my masters!"

[Posted by Hugh at January 18, 2007 01:07 PM]

Posted by: Hugh at March 18, 2007 5:18 PM

A poster at Jihad Watch recently took issue with some comments I made by saying, "No politician can stand before the people and say they want to pull out of Iraq so that the Muslims will slaughter each other.

Can't do that! What? Some American Dhimmitician putting America FIRST for a change?! Oh no, we must face Meka and genuflect all day!

Barf!

PS. Saw this on LGF:

Q. Why are the moslems still in the Matrix?
A. They all chose the Blue Pill.

Posted by: Allahfanculo at March 18, 2007 5:50 PM

I do not pretend to have all the encyclopedic knowledge of Islam and world cultures that Spencer and Fitzgerald have.

But I do think I have enough common sense to know when we are stuck in a rut. I was a pretty good engineer at one point in my life; and one thing I was real good at was sensing when a development project had gotten itself into trouble and needed drastic revision.

And that is where I fear we are, with Bush's Iraq War policy.

Newt Gingrich, who was the architect of the 1994 Republican revolution that took over Congress in the U.S., gave an interview to the NY Post last week in which he said that Bush's "surge" plan has only about a 20% chance of succeeding.

If nothing else, we owe it to ourselves to look at alternatives.

And yes, there ARE alternatives besides just surrendering to Islamists vs. Bush's "stay the course."

Posted by: Steven L. at March 18, 2007 5:57 PM

Hugh, excellent piece, and I'm sure, it's not the first one in which you articulated the goal and the strategy that should have been followed in Iraq and beyond. Your goal and your strategy, which I have not heard repeated by any other pundit or "Middle East Expert", was laid out by you long before January 18, 2007, if memory serves. But it is worth repeating. Because it is not about "Bush bashing", it is not about helping one domestic political party at the expense of another, it's not about "cutting and running", it's not about "saving face" or showing how we "can take it"; it is about getting us into a safer and saner situation. We're still fine now, five years and almost 1 trillion dollars later, but if we continue down our current path indefinitely, danger awaits us.

Posted by: special_guest at March 18, 2007 6:52 PM

I agree with Hugh on this. I feel Bush has failed becuase he never has made effort to name the enemy. How do ever plan to fight a war if you don't understand the nature of Jihad and of Islam in general. If you can't tell the difference between Shia and Sunni or the various ethnic groups then you never can understand how dividing them and keeping them at war with each other will give us the advantage in dealings with them.

My policy is this: When muslims fight each other it is good for non-muslims just like when communist fight each other it is good for capitalism.

Posted by: greatcometof1577 at March 18, 2007 6:56 PM

One other thing.

It is the Size of the Mistake. When a Mistake is this big, it is almost impossible for those who made it to admit, or concede in some fashion, that they made a mistake.

This Administration cannot concede that the very idea of transplanting "democracy" was an impossible task. Indeed, for a while it kept insisting that those who said this, and meant by this that Muslims do not, to the extent that they are Believers, accept the idea of locating political legitimacy in the expressed will of the people, who are mere mortals, and should in all things remain submissive to the will of Allah (and the will of Allah, which is the only legitimate source of political legitimacy, expresses itself in the Qur'an, as glossed by the Hadith and Sira).

It cannot openly admit tha the Sunnis and Shi'a have been in conflict ever since the first century of Islam.It cannot admit that the Sunni-Shi'a split can be observed as a theme that explains much of the violence within Dar al-Islam over the past 1300 or so years. It cannot admit that the Shi'a disaffection with Sunni rule goes back to the earliest days of modern Iraq, and was commented on by Gertrude Bell herself. It cannot admit that the Sunnis in Saudi Arabia have treated the Shi'a (almost all of them in the Easter Province, where the oil is located) with contumely, or that when Al-Zarqawi denounced the Shi'a as "Rafidite dogs" he was repeating what many Sunnis think of the Shi'a. It cannot admit, the Bush Administration, that the Shi'a have even been accused of collaborating with the Mongols in 1258, supposedly helping them to slip into Baghdad. It cannot admit that the depth and duration of the Sunni-Shi'a split could have been foressen (and it was all put up here, discussed many times, from early 2004 on, and possibly before -- I first began posting, at all, in November and December 2003). For to admit any of this, is to raise the obvious question: If there is this deep split, than how can the messianic idea of creating Iraq the Model, Iraq the Light Unto the Muslim Nations, possibly succeed?

So the Bush Administration, not knowing the depth of the Sunni-Shi'a hostility, was convinced mostly by some clever Shi'a in exile who wanted the Amercians to get rid of Saddam Hussein that all manner of things would be well (and then there was the egregious Bernard Lewis, assuring one and all that "democracy" is part of the Islamic tradition, when what he meant is that the caliphs did consult with others, which is a different thing, and further predicting that the liberation of Baghdad "would make the liberation of Kabul look like a funeral procession."

How can that same Administration now admit that:

1) We were wrong about "democracy" -- democracy in the Western sense cannot come to Iraq or Afghanistan, and we were wrong not because of this or that tactical error, but because we were wrong about Islam, and its effects.

2) We were wrong about the Sunni-Shi'a split. We had no idea it was so deep, because we didn't do a proper investigation. Lewis and the Shi'a, many of them charming (Chalabi, Makiya, Renda al-Rahim, Allawi) or other Arabs (that nice lady who was Wolfowitz's girlfriend, and for all I know still is, and who allowed him to think that he "knew" all about Iraq, Islam, the Middle East, when he is nothing but a glorified weapons-systems analyst, as Richard Pipes noted, who has little understanding of history or of the influence of what might be called "culture" on the Iraqis).

3) Now what can the Administration do? Can it say it was wrong? No, it can't. In fact, the remarks of Stephen Hadley betray the real feeling of the Administration. Hadley said today that the Democratic critics would end the war in "failure" (apparently Stephen Hadley et al cannot concieve of having the Muslims in Iraq at each others' throats might actually be a good think for the Camp of Infidels, because he cannot conceive of thinking in terms of the Camp of Infidels and the Camp of Islam, and the ways in which the former might divide and demoralize and weaken the latter -- it's just not the way Bush and Rice and Hadlley and Cheney and the rest of the loyalists even allow themselves for one minute to start thinking, when it is the most obvious way to think, and would have been obvious to any Americans fighting in any previous wars. This is the crazed pass to which we have come.

So Hadley says to get out now would be to admit to "failure" and to make the "sacrifices" of all who had gone before a "waste." By thos logic, no American government engaged in hostilitites should ever change course, or end them, unless there is complete and total victory, because otherwise those men who have died or been wounded will have done so in vain. But it was in vain, it was stupid, and someone has to someow stop the runaway train of people who are deluded and ignorant -- deluded about Iraq, incapable of even beginnning to tell us just how the outcome they desire in Iraq, as opposed to the outcome I desire (which depends on the Americans getting out right away) will in any way lessen the threat of Islam, not only in Iraq, but in Western Europe and Thailand and Kashmir and Israel and around the world. This is what the Adminisetration can no longer do so, having used up those idiotic phrases about "cut-and-running" and "we have to fight them over there so we don't have to fight them over here" it is now reduced to saying "we can't fail" or "failure is not an option" or other phrases that mean nothing, and simply demonsetrate a contempt for the publlc that is intolerable.

They should be treated, these people, with the contempt felt for them now by many of those who have served in Iraq, and without necessarily understanding Islam or the Sunni-Shi'a split, do see a ridiculous waste of lives and money,and know that the generals who parrot the Administration line are not worthy of respect, even if outwardly it must be shown them.

The damage to military morale -- among those officers and men who think about things rather than accept them unthinkingly -- is great, and becoming ever greater. Soon enough some officers will be speaking out, I suspect, because it simply cannot go on like this.

Posted by: Hugh at March 18, 2007 8:17 PM

Let’s make this even more palatable to some...

Let me give you analogy. In late May and early June of 1864 General U.S. Grant launched a series of silly front attacks at confederate positions. The frontal attacks were based on information that confederates were weak in the middle and a quick victory could be obtained and perhaps the end of the war. His information and gut feelings were just wrong. The attacks produced about 1800 men killed and about 13,000 casualties in total.

In his memoirs Grant stated “I have always regretted that the last assault at Cold Harbor was ever made.....At Cold Harbor no advantage whatever was gained to compensate for the heavy loss we sustained.". It was a waste of life. It happens in wars. Even the man who ordered the attacks admitted it. What Grant did was simply flank the position and the war went on for about another year.

The point of the story is two fold. One Grant did not just keep beating his head against a wall hoping for the same results. Let’s view Iraq as a battle in the Greater Islamo-Western War. This battle like Cold Harbor was a failed attempt to tackle a problem that not only did the President not understand but many in the west in general did not understand. The assault was made on faulty assumptions and bad information. It was also a waste of life. Now we can continue to attack using the same false assumptions or change strategy more in line with a better understanding of the problem. I don't fault people for making mistakes. I don't fault them even if they were un-educated on Islam at the time of the invasion. I do fault them when they keep doing the same thing over again or worse fooling themselves into thinking they are winning. It is not working and we are not winning this battle.

This leads to the second point of the story. The union still won the war. We can lose the battle of Iraq and still beat the forces of jihad and Islamic expansion if we accept the knowledge learned and the failure of the current strategy. We can save the spirit of the army from an even worse defeat and fight again another day. We redeploy our forces to better protect our nation and we will be in a better position to take out direct threats to our allies and the nation itself. Perhaps an offensive into western Pakistan to clear out some un-wanted enemies or southern Sudan to block access to jihads into Africa depriving them of valuable resources as Hugh stated in this entry.

All this will only be done if we redefine what this war is. It is not a war against terror but jihad. It is an Islamo-Western or Islamo-Modern war (or whatever) but somehow Islam better be part of it. This will allow us to ask questions and prepare the homeland with new measures like restricted immigration and pushing for secular reform of Islam. To put our forces (both military and monetary) in position to do the most damage to jihad or Islamic expansion. The Shia and Sunni divide is just one of those weak points.

So it is time call off the Battle of Iraq. Chalk it up to the fog of war or whatever but we have bigger fish to fry. We need a new strategy but first we need a new definition of the enemy and a new name for this war. The excuse that the dead will have died in vain is not enough. It was not enough at Cold Harbor and it is not enough in the case of Iraq. General Grant was man enough to admit a failure and he is still a popular figure in American history. The question can G.W. or does G.W. even get we are losing the battle called Iraq or understand what this war is?

Posted by: greatcometof1577 at March 18, 2007 10:20 PM

"We can lose the battle of Iraq and still beat the forces of jihad and Islamic expansion if we accept the knowledge learned and the failure of the current strategy."
-- from a posting above

But by leaving, we will not only not "lose the battle of Iraq" but, I maintain, will be able to finally reap the fruits of a victory, and get something out of it -- and that something is that by removing Saddam Hussein, the Americdans have set in motion -- they didn't mean to, but they did -- the possiblity of that sectarian strife, which may occur in any number of ways and levels, and not necessarily in full-scale civil war, nor necessarily, in quite the same way, affecting the Shi'a side (in the main, the Islamic Republic of Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon), and the Sunni side (especially Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, Kuwait, Egypt, Jordan, the Sunnis in Syria, and the "Palestinians").

We need a return on the investment. That return can only come when we get out. That is what the Administration just can't seem to get through its thick head, because Yesterday's Men, who still can't bring themselves to study Islam or to make sense of it (not one of them could conceivably answer the simplest of exams that could be concocted on the spot, even the most simple-minded of multiple-choice questions would show them up), and even those who attack them (the Baker Commission, the assorted scowcrofts and odooms) are just as ignorant, and silly, coming from another direction. An entirely new set of leaders and advisers is necesary, but the older ones cling to power, and instead of using their time to study these matters, simply refuse to think it matters.

Can victory be snatched from the jaws of defeat? Yes, but only by leaving. This seeming paradox just cannot, apparently, begin to be grasped.

Posted by: Hugh at March 18, 2007 10:49 PM

Hugh:

A brand new NBS/Wall Street Journal poll gives these results
.
Withdraw Now 21%
Withdraw Within Year 37%
Stay as Long As Needed 39%
Unsure 4%

See:
http://www.pollingreport.com/iraq.htm

This is not as bad as you stated. Your numbers are not complete or clear. Where are they from? If 75% want out, and many want out very soon, exactly how soon do all of them want out?

We can do many of the things you say we should be doing even if we are in Iraq.

Having a large military presence on Iran's doorstep is not all bad.

It is not idiotic, it is a good strategy to be on offense instead of defense and if we fight them over there, they have to committ resources over there.

I love your writing, but am not convinved that you have any experience or talent in military strategy. Yes, I wish it were easier to wrap things up in Iraq, but it is an evolving work in progress. I am not convinced that any of your other options will be so easy and that they won't cost a lot of money and lives and will probably also show little in imediate results.

Posted by: Papa Bear at March 18, 2007 11:12 PM

What do opinion polls tell us? Only that having begun with a great deal of support, the administration has steadily lost support, even among those, or perhaps especially among those, I am sure, who are most alarmed by Islam and by the need to do something about the islamization of Western Europe, and many other matters that are now being almost completely ignored with this manic attention given to Iraq.

I was writing exactly the same things I write now back at the end of February, and then much more intensely in March and April, 2004, about how it was now time to go. On February 20, 2004, it is true, I still thought that possibly a force of some 50,000 soldiers, in the western desert, might make sense, but a week or two later I had come to my own senses and was already arguing for a total American withdrawal -- Saddam Hussein had been captured, his sons killed, his colleagues killed or captured, and most importantly, the country had been scoured for weapons. That should have been the end.

Tell me -- would you have favored my advice then, in early 2004, having been taken then? Are you sorry it wasn't? Are you sorry it wasn't taken in May, 2004, or September 2004, or November 2004? Or in April 2005 or in August 2005 or in December 2005? Are you sorry that the advice on withdrawal was not taken in January 2006, or in July 2006, or in December 2006? What about the failure to take the very same advice, for the very same reasons, often deliberately couched in the very same phrases, in January 2007? Or in March 2007? What about in the future -- is there a point at which you think what I say might make sense?

And what does "military strategy" mean? Alone, it means nothing. That is exactly the problem with the generals and other high officers in Iraq. They have been given a task -- do this, do that. They try, as best they can, to fulfill the task. They will tell him, Bush says, "when the Iraqis are ready." What they are not allowed to tell him, or apparently are not even allowed to think about, is whether being in Iraq at all makes sense. They are not allowed to think about grand strategy. Nor are they allowed to think about, or learn much about, apparently, Islam -- the one subject that is practically verboten, in the preparation given to soldiers. I haven't been, in recent years, visiting relatives at Fort Jackson and Fort Bragg and not taking note of what they tell me, with considerable dismay.

What 'military strategy" must I know about? How to deal with I.E.D.s? I haven't a clue. How to prevent helicopters from being shot down? Ditto --a complete ignoramus. So what. I know about the One Big Thing -- Islam -- and then I have offered some evidence of knowledge about all the Many Little Things -- the sectarian and ethnic and economic fissures within the Camp of Islam, and how they will play out, and how they can be exploited, nowhere better than right in Iraq, and be exploited not by engaging in still more expensive and energetic action, but like General Kutuzov letting nature take its course, so General Winter could destroy the Grande Armee of Napoleon in the late fall of 1812. Like Kutuzov, I believe in exploiting what is already there, and letting it do the work for me, whenever possible.

I make no apologies for not having attended a service academy. Last I looke, all those bright young strategists who were pushing for the "serge" -- such people as Frederick Kagan -- have no more training in this than I do. And they haven't any traiing in Islam and, as far as I can make out, are not terriblly intellilgent. Plodding, unimaginative, not well-versed in history and without any sense of Islam on the march outside the Middle East, and no sense of the menace of Daw'a and demographic conquest, precisely because these "military strategists" and generals are just that -- mere "military strategists," mere generals. They are used to thinking of war and armies in only one way. They cannot grasp all the other instruments of Jihad.

The "military strategists" and officers who think only of war in Pentagon terms -- but a Pentagon without propoaganda, a Pentagon without thought as to how to diminish oil revenues, a Pentagon that does not have a War Room listinig all the ways that internal fissures within Islam can be exploited and encouraged (actually, in Iraq no encouragement is necesary or even at this point desirable), a Pentagon that is not keeping track of the Muslim populations in Western Europe, or encouraging European governments to halt and reverse such immigration, for the sake of their own and the West's survival.

None of that. Just war. Just boots on the ground. Just Humvees, and tanks, and helicopters, and "military strategists."

Thank god I'm not one of those.

Posted by: Hugh at March 18, 2007 11:42 PM

Papa Bear said

it is a good strategy to be on offense instead of defense and if we fight them over there, they have to committ resources over there. I love your writing, but am not convinved that you have any experience or talent in military strategy.

You doubt Hugh's ability to compose a military strategy. I think the strategy can be analyzed on its own, impartially and based on the facts, without reference to whether its author attended a military academy, and I think the strategy's brilliance is obvious. But, I doubt you'd trust my opinion either.

So, how about what Sun Tzu said in the "Art of War", arguably the most quoted commentary on military strategy:

"There is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare."
[...]
"Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles
is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting."
[...]
"Therefore the skilful leader subdues the enemy's
troops without any fighting; he captures their cities without laying siege to them; he overthrows their kingdom without lengthy operations in the field."
[...]
"[A ruler can bring misfortune upon his army] by employing the officers of his army
without discrimination, through ignorance of the military principle of adaptation to circumstances. This shakes the confidence of the soldiers."
[...]
"Do not linger in dangerously isolated positions."
[...]
"We cannot enter into alliance with neighbouring
princes until we are acquainted with their designs."

We are engaged in a protracted and expensive war, far from our own supply lines, and close to the enemy's supply lines, laying siege to the enemy's center of power. We are relying on military action, rather than the more subtle ways of fighting and weakening an enemy. We are stretching our own military to the limits, expending all our resources in one place, when they might be better used in other places. We allow the enemy to choose the time and place of battle. We call our enemies our "friends" and our "staunch allies", we put our trust and safety in the hands of those who want to kill us. We do not understand what motivates our enemy, or what their goals are. We do not understand the internal fractures within the enemy, and how they could be used to our advantage.

I think Hugh's plan is better. Much, much better.

Posted by: special_guest at March 19, 2007 3:12 AM

special_guest,

PE:"What is strategic is making Iraq as close as possible to being like a European country."

"That is the current strategy in a nutshell, and it is a nutty strategy. Iraqi history is nothing like European history."

Nor does Taiwan or South Korea. But they've been turned into European-style countries too.

"Their religion is different, their values are different, their culture is different."

The Bill of Rights and laws that THEY chose are almost identical to a European country.

"But the problem isn't the "few radicals", it is the entire culture."

Fine. So we need to set about changing their culture to match European culture. This is the first step in that process.

"Maybe the laws of Iraq do not discriminate against race or religion, but the lawmen of Iraq do."

No they don't. The security forces are under orders to obey Iraqi law, and failure to do so will cause them to end up in jail.

"That piece of paper that we forced them to type up, promising to treat each other nice-like, is nice, but doesn't mean much to them."

Wrong. The US didn't force them to write any such thing. It was what they came up with all by themselves.

PE:"Iran should not be bombed. It should be liberated."

"Liberate them from whom? From themselves? Who is occupying Iran, other than Iranians?"

Liberate them from their dictator. It is not physically possible for them to overthrow him themselves. They tried in 1999 and they got slaughtered by automatic weapons. Just like happened to the Iraqis in 1991. This is what happens with modern weaponry.

PE:"I recommend toppling Syria and Lebanon after that, before getting to Sudan."

"And what happens after we topple them? Would they become freedom-loving democracies, just like us?"

Lebanon will be reasonable. Syria will not, and needs to have a reformist dictator installed instead. Sudan I'm not sure about. Iran will be fine with democracy.

I've got more details here:
http://antisubjugator.blogspot.com/2007/01/war-plan.html

"Just like they did in Iraq and Afghanistan?"

Yep, both countries took to democracy like a duck to water, and we now have allied democracies instead of enemy dictators. That's a DAMN good result.

"Do you really think that whatever came after them would be more to our liking?"

Yep. Some via democracy, some via a dictator we install.

"Would we, after toppling all these governments, think ourselves obligated to stick around and "help" them, until they became European-style freedom-loving democracies?"

Nope. Afghanistan and Iraq were once-offs.

"1) Withdraw aid and support to governments that are hostile to us"

We don't give aid to Sudan, Syria or Iran already. So that won't help.

"2) If a nation that is hostile to us begins amassing WMD's"

Assuming you find out about it. And assuming you only care about official state actions, not the population committing terrorism.

"4) Reduce (and when possible, eliminate) interaction with nations that are hostile to us. This includes coming up with non-petroleum-based energy sources."

You're talking about a pipe dream decades from now. My plan is in current reality, and most of the important stuff will be done in years, not decades. It's time for a blitzkrieg.

"We wanted to give the Iraqi people the "gift of democracy". They had their election. They voted for pro-sharia candidates, but they voted."

They in no way voted for Sharia.

"If we "lost", it is only because our original goal all along, unstated, was to "make Iraq as close as possible to being like a European country". If that had been the stated goal, the war in Iraq would almost certainly have never happened."

That's not the only unstated goal. The real unstated goal was to identify the enemy. Was it all Arabs and all Muslims, or just Arabs, or just Muslims, or just Arab Muslims, or something entirely different? The answer was the last one - something entirely different. Specifically, dogma, non-humanist behaviour, religious bigotry, racism, subjugation. These are the enemies.

"Such a goal would have been seen for what it is: unrealistic, to put it mildly."

There is no choice. You either convert them to be like us, or you commit genocide. You must do one or the other. The fact that there were Iraqi Arab Muslims IDENTICAL to US neocons should have given you pause for thought.

"So we pretended our goals were something else, and we achieved each and every one of those goals, and yet we supposedly "lost"."

Iraq is in no way lost. It has been an astounding victory.

"We "won". We achieved our goals. Our mission is complete."

It is sort of complete. Since you disbanded the old security forces (for good reason), you do have an obligation to stick around until the replacements are up and running, which they should be by November 2007.

"Time to pull out and let the Iraqis lead their country as they see fit, under their religion, under their culture, under their values. That is their right, that is what they deserve."

It is also what they are already doing.

I recommend the following as well:
http://antisubjugator.blogspot.com/2007/02/afghan-war.html
http://antisubjugator.blogspot.com/2007/02/iraq-war.html

It explains the rest of the unstated reasons and rationale.

Posted by: Paul Edwards at March 19, 2007 4:55 AM

Paul Edwards, in a thoughtful response, said:

Nor does Taiwan or South Korea [share our history or values]. But they've been turned into European-style countries too.

I don't know much about South Korea, but Taiwan had Dr. Sun Yat Sen who created a democratic government in China; they laid the foundations for democracy themselves, on their own, with no one forcing them (as in Iraq and Afghanistan). The Kuomintang was pro-Western, and the West supported the Kuomintang in the civil war against the Communists. There is no such powerful pro-Western group in Iraq or Afghanistan; the Kurds are the closest analogy. Secondly, the Kuomintang took alot of the accumulated wealth of the Chinese government to the small island of Taiwan, and used that seed (and the initiative of the people to educate themselves and to work extremely hard) to build a strong economy. Iraq has petrodollars, from oil pumped by foreign companies using foreign-built technology; they have not shown the same initiative that the people of Taiwan have shown. They don't place the same value on scientific education and research. Afghanistan has a moribund economy, and there is no reason to think that will change.

The security forces are under orders to obey Iraqi law

I apologize I don't have time to look up the articles, but I believe it is well known that Iraqi police and military units are the ones that are doing the paramilitary attacks against civilians in their off hours. The police are the ones doing the murdering.

And assuming you only care about official state actions, not the population committing terrorism.

No, I include the population committing terrorism. For example, we all know that OBL is in Waziristan, but because Pakistan is our "staunch ally", we refuse to go in after him. I think that if they won't get him, too bad, it's our turn, and we won't make deals with the warlords living there the way the Pakistanis do.

[about coming up with alternative energy sources] You're talking about a pipe dream decades from now.

It wouldn't be a pipe dream if we were spending the approximately 1 trillion dollars on energy research instead of in Iraq and Afghanistan "helping" them. We could have come up with something. We still can, we still will, it'll just take much longer at the current miniscule rate of funding.

They in no way voted for Sharia.

Their constitution included clauses that said that all laws must be in conformance with sharia. U.S. diplomats forced them to change "the Qur'an will be the source of law" to "the Qur'an will be a source of law", but I don't think that externally imposed change will stop them from doing what they want to do. In Afghanistan, there was already a case of a man who left Islam, and was therefore arrested for apostacy, and he only survived due to Western pressure, and he had to flee the country.

There is no choice. You either convert them to be like us, or you commit genocide.

Well, no, there are many other choices between those two. I like the choice of live and let live; let them live their lives as they want, and stop them from imposing their way of life on us. The exception is when they are preparing weapons to attack us, then it's not live and let live anymore, it's kill or be killed.

Iraq is in no way lost. It has been an astounding victory.

That is a vast overstatement. If our goal was to get rid of WMD's, it was a victory. If our goal was to get rid of Saddam, it was a victory. But if our goal was for Iraq to be like a European country, it was a failure. If our goal was to weaken the forces of jihad, it was a failure (but it could still be turned around).

It is also what they are already doing [allowing the Iraqis to govern themselves].

I strongly disagree. The reason U.S. forces are still there, is because the Iraqi government is not able to govern the people in a way that we think they should. They are not able to protect the people, or protect the infrastructure, or get the economy working, or get the power grid working, etc. When the U.S. troops are no longer there to make sure everything is working, I think you will see a very obvious and very fast descent into something different than the current situation. It won't be a subtle change, it will be undeniable.

Posted by: special_guest at March 19, 2007 6:19 AM

Paul Edwards can tell us that Iraq is an "astounding victory" all he wants. What does he mean? Does he mean it is an "astounding victory" for the Infidels? Does he think that the last four years, and the expenditure of American soldiers and Marines (3,220 killed, 25,000 wounded), of materiel (so low that many National Guard units are without equipment even to train on, because so much has been left in Iraq), of money (estimates now range from $750 billion to 1 trillion dollars, including the future costs of caring for those wounded for their lives), and morale (the young officers who quit the army, the rise in the desertion rate, the lowering of standards and rise in the maximum age, for Reservists and National Guard, as well as for the regular army, in order to fulfill quotas, the great disenchantment and disaffection, among the civilian army -- Reservists and National Guard -- who should never have been asked to serve more than one time, if that, in Iraq, if the words "Reservist" and "National Guard" are to retain their true meaning).

What "victory" is that? What "astounding victory" is that? The only "victory" that makes sense is a "victory" that brings not "democracy" to Iraq (that's not possible, if by "democracy" we mean Western-style democracy, with equality before the law for women and minorities, and guaranteed rights for individuals akin to those in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights), and not "prosperity" (inshallah-fatalism prevents the Muslims of Iraq from doing much more than distributing, or fighting over, the unearned oil wealth -- as in all the other oil-rich Muslim states). The only "victory" that should count is one that results from a weakening of the Camp of Islam.

That weakening can come -- again and again I have discussed this at by-now utterly boring length -- through those fissures, sectarian and ethnic, both of which Iraq, almost uniquely, possesses and, because of other unuusual factors (though the Shi'a constitute only 10-15% of the world's Muslims, the only Shi'a-ruled state is right next to Iran, shares the longest and most porous border with Iraq, and therefore can continue to support the Shi'a who elsewhere -- in Pakistan or Yemen or Bahrain or eastern Saudi Arabia or even Lebanon -- have no immediate suppliers and supporters. This is not a bad thing; this is a good thing, because it means the Sunni Arabs cannot easily win.

And the other main feature of Iraq is its great signficance to the Sunni Arabs, and their refusal to acquiesce in its lose to the "Rafidite dogs" of Shi'a Islam. They just can't accept that the Land of the Two Rivers and site of fabled Baghdad of the Abbasid Caliphate, for five hundred years the most important place in High Islamic Civilization, the source of all that glory, real and imagined, by perfervid Sunni Arab imaginations mythologizing about the hyperglories of that hyperglorious past -- well, they just can't let Baghdad go.

And because of that, the war between Sunnis and Shi'a in Baghdad will never end, and will always attract men, materiel, and money from co-religionists outside Iraq, and always have effects on the relations of Sunnis and Shi'a as far away as Yemen, Pakistan, and for that matter, Dearborn, Michigan and London, England.

The "astounding victory" that you claim has already been achieved in Iraq cannot be achieved, until the Americans leave. You keep missing the point. You keep failing to understand the world-wide nature of the conflict. You keep thinking that the only kind of "war" that exists is that which involves armies, and you keep missing the point about exploiting the natural weaknesses of the enemy, not through greater exertion, but through less.

Why if you were in charge of the Russian army during Napoleon's invasion, perhaps you would have thought the best way to have the fight would be to just go out and fight them -- and not let General Winter do almost all of the fighting for you. Thank god Kutuzov understood, and fought, differently.

Posted by: Hugh at March 19, 2007 9:31 AM

One little thing -- or one big thing -- I missed in Paul Edward's response.

It is this:

"Nor does Taiwan or South Korea [share our history or values]. But they've been turned into European-style countries too."

In other words, after coming to this site, for months or possibly years, Paul Edwards still does noot understand the main point of this site, the point of why we should be working to destroy the nuclear project of Iran, and why we should take advantage of the natural consequences of the removal of Saddam Hussein, and why it makes no sense to keep supporting Pakistan with tens of billions of dollars when Pakistan continues not only to protect Al Qaeda, but to actively nurture and supply (oh, possibly not Musharraf, but practically everyone else in the army except Musharraf,and he does or can do, nothing about it) the Taliban, and to re-invade Afghanistan by proxy.

No, Paul Edwards, like Condoleeza Rice prating about "occuppied Japan" and "occupied Germany" and how scoffers scoffed there too just as they now do about "occupied Iraq" (what crap she allows herself to utter), wants us to believe that the examples of Taiwan and South Korea show us what can be done about Iraq.

What is missing from this? The main thing. Practically the only thing. The thing which explains why Iraq can never be like "Taiwan and South Korea" and only someone who has been paying no attention to this site, or not taking in any of what it offers as a pedagogic undertaking, could possibly ignore.

What is that thing that is missing?

Islam.
Islam.
Islam.

Posted by: Hugh at March 19, 2007 9:38 AM

Hugh

When I state:

"We can lose the battle of Iraq and still beat the forces of jihad and Islamic expansion if we accept the knowledge learned and the failure of the current strategy."

What I mean is the failure of democracy with a bill of rights and with seperation of religion in majority muslim nations. That was and is the stated objective for being in Iraq today. Of course the objective keeps changing and the real reasons no doubt is because the arabians want us to protect them from the persian horde. By getting out that would be a new strategy and with a new objective so thus yes you are right that would be a victory. I agree with that.

My statement above is aimed at all those who keep saying: "If we leave Iraq we will lose the war against terror!" or "Iran will become a super power" or "What about the oil" or "You are cruel! What about all the Iraqis who have put their hopes in America" or "You are an Islamophobe" or "You are a left wing cut and run liberal" or "Coward!"....etc....

I heard my fill of these arguments this weekened. I had all these responses for just saying Iraq was a failure. They were all conservatives and all Bush supporters. I told them I am a republican but then they called me a rino!

God help us all...

Posted by: greatcometof1577 at March 19, 2007 11:59 AM

"My statement above is aimed at all those who keep saying: "If we leave Iraq we will lose the war against terror!" or "Iran will become a super power" or "What about the oil" or "You are cruel! What about all the Iraqis who have put their hopes in America" or "You are an Islamophobe" or "You are a left wing cut and run liberal" or "Coward!"....etc....

I heard my fill of these arguments this weekened. I had all these responses for just saying Iraq was a failure. They were all conservatives and all Bush supporters. I told them I am a republican but then they called me a rino!

God help us all..."
-- from a posting above

Change as follows:

They were all [not very intelligent or well-infomred ] conservatives and all [inflexible and blindly loyal] Bush supporters."

Posted by: Hugh at March 19, 2007 4:49 PM

special_guest, "I don't know much about South Korea, but Taiwan had Dr. Sun Yat Sen who created a democratic government in China"

Democracy only came recently to Taiwan, about 1999. China was never democratic. Regardless, I'm just pointing out the fallacy of you having to have the same history as Europe in order to have a democracy like Europe.

"no one forcing them (as in Iraq and Afghanistan)."

Ok, here you have two fallacies:

1. The unproven belief that democracy can't be installed by force of arms, despite exactly that having been done in Japan, Germany, Panama, Grenada and now Afghanistan and Iraq.

2. That it is actually "force" at all. It was actually Saddam that was forcing the Iraqis to be a dictatorship. Democracy is basically the lack of force. All America has done is stop anyone from forcing the Iraqis to do anything.

"The Kuomintang was pro-Western, and the West supported the Kuomintang in the civil war against the Communists."

So there was an anti-communist group in China.

"There is no such powerful pro-Western group in Iraq or Afghanistan"

There was an anti-Saddam group in Iraq, ie the majority of the population, and an anti-Taliban group in Afghanistan, ie the majority of the population. Neither group of people has gone to war with the US. They have both cooperated with the US. They have turned out to elections, they have joined the security forces, and they support those security forces. That's actually everything that was required. Whether or not they hang pictures of Bush in their homes is irrelevant.

"island of Taiwan, and used that seed (and the initiative of the people to educate themselves and to work extremely hard) to build a strong economy."

You're now saying that Taiwan is not identical to Iraq. I never said it was. All I was doing was dismantling your theory that you need to have the same history as Europe in order to have a European-style democracy. You don't. Taiwan and South Korea prove that beyond a shadow of a doubt. Yes, every country is different, and if you look for the differences you will see them. That is no proof that democracy can't work in Afghanistan or Iraq. It is working in both already.

"I apologize I don't have time to look up the articles, but I believe it is well known that Iraqi police and military units are the ones that are doing the paramilitary attacks against civilians in their off hours. The police are the ones doing the murdering."

If you know of such crimes being committed by the police, then report it to other policemen, the same as you would do in America. If you don't get the response you hope for, report it to Iraq's free media. Also write to the Iraqi government. Also let the international media know. There are corrupt police in Iraq, just as there are in America, and the procedure for dealing with them is the same. No organization is corruption-free. Even the US soldiers have committed crimes.

"No, I include the population committing terrorism."

Ok, if you care about terrorism, then you need to ensure the education system is to European standards.

"For example, we all know that OBL is in Waziristan"

That's a large place, and no-one knows that for sure. If they had his location, he would be hit with a JDAM.

"but because Pakistan is our "staunch ally", we refuse to go in after him."

It is not strategic to invade Pakistan at this point in history. A man hiding in a cave is of little strategic importance either.

"It wouldn't be a pipe dream if we were spending the approximately 1 trillion dollars on energy research instead of in Iraq and Afghanistan "helping" them."

1 trillion dollars will not give you alternative energy. It will liberate Afghanistan and Iraq though.

"We still can, we still will, it'll just take much longer at the current miniscule rate of funding."

You can't just throw money at science and get the result you want. They tried the same thing with curing cancer. It's not so simple.

"Their constitution included clauses that said that all laws must be in conformance with sharia."

No, their constitution said that no laws should violate the well-known principles of Islam, which is a meaningless statement. Their laws are in NO WAY Sharia. Their laws are not much different from a European country.

"U.S. diplomats forced them to change "the Qur'an will be the source of law" to "the Qur'an will be a source of law", but I don't think that externally imposed change will stop them from doing what they want to do."

I think they came up with that themselves, it wasn't something that the US forced on them. Regardless, they are empowered to do whatever they want, including changing the constitution. They have done no such thing. Sharia is not in force. Iraq is a pretty decent country.

"In Afghanistan, there was already a case of a man who left Islam, and was therefore arrested for apostacy, and he only survived due to Western pressure, and he had to flee the country."

Yes, that's Afghanistan, not Iraq. Afghanistan is legally more backwards.

PE:"There is no choice. You either convert them to be like us, or you commit genocide."

"Well, no, there are many other choices between those two."

Not if you want to eliminate terrorism.

"I like the choice of live and let live; let them live their lives as they want, and stop them from imposing their way of life on us."

The way some of them want to live is to indoctrinate children that the Quran is the word of God. So long as this continues, there will (probably) always be people who read it and follow it and start killing infidels. If you're not prepared to radically change the Muslims so that they stop teaching this, you need to kill them.

"The exception is when they are preparing weapons to attack us, then it's not live and let live anymore, it's kill or be killed."

There will always be some who are looking for an opportunity to attack infidels. You can't stop them without changing their culture. And bringing democracy to Iraq is part of that process.

PE:"Iraq is in no way lost. It has been an astounding victory."

"But if our goal was for Iraq to be like a European country, it was a failure."

No, the goal was to get it CLOSER to being like a European country. ie freedom and protection of human rights. There were other goals too, and they've all been achieved. I gave you the link already.

"If our goal was to weaken the forces of jihad, it was a failure (but it could still be turned around)."

No, this was achieved too. All those people that Osama had trained were loose in the world and could have done untold damage by attacking American civilians. Instead, they all came to Iraq to suicide against the US military. You can't ask for a better result.

PE:"It is also what they are already doing [allowing the Iraqis to govern themselves]."

"I strongly disagree. The reason U.S. forces are still there, is because the Iraqi government is not able to govern the people in a way that we think they should."

It's not true. The Iraqis are governing fine, and the US is not interfering. There are US troops in Australia too. So?

"They are not able to protect the people"

Every country has crime. Iraq's murder rate is lower than South Africa's. One day it will probably be lower than America's.

"or protect the infrastructure"

Same happens all over the world.

"or get the economy working"

Well there still is a war going on. You need to make allowances. Regardless, the economy is growing.

"or get the power grid working, etc."

It is working. What hasn't happened is that it hasn't expanded to meet demand, especially with all the new appliances people have been buying with their new prosperity. That will take 6 years more. That's just how long things take!

"When the U.S. troops are no longer there to make sure everything is working, I think you will see a very obvious and very fast descent into something different than the current situation."

The US troops are not there in sufficient numbers to "make sure everything is working". That is not their job. They are only there to assist, and that is what they are doing. The 27 million Iraqis are doing the bulk of the work. The 160k US soldiers are just helping.

Posted by: Paul Edwards at March 19, 2007 5:21 PM

Hugh, "Paul Edwards can tell us that Iraq is an "astounding victory" all he wants. What does he mean?"

An enemy dictator has been converted into an allied democracy. Arab Muslims have demonstrated they can have a democracy instead of a long line of dictators. We have the feedback from the Arab Muslims we need for victory in the War on Terror.

"Does he mean it is an "astounding victory" for the Infidels?"

Yep. And for the Iraqi people too.

"Does he think that the last four years, and the expenditure of American soldiers and Marines (3,220 killed, 25,000 wounded)"

Yeah, this major achievement has been done with the loss of about one month's worth of US road toll, which isn't much different from the normal peacetime casualty rate, and it's been done with a peacetime war budget, equipment has been upgraded, and the soldiers have combat experience.

"What "victory" is that? What "astounding victory" is that? The only "victory" that makes sense is a "victory" that brings not "democracy" to Iraq (that's not possible, if by "democracy" we mean Western-style democracy, with equality before the law for women and minorities, and guaranteed rights for individuals akin to those in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)"

Wrong. They have that already.

"and not "prosperity" (inshallah-fatalism prevents the Muslims of Iraq from doing much more than distributing, or fighting over, the unearned oil wealth -- as in all the other oil-rich Muslim states)."

Wrong. The Iraqis have a reasonably strong work ethic, unlike the Saudis.

"The only "victory" that should count is one that results from a weakening of the Camp of Islam."

Wrong. The victory that matters is security of the free world. And Iraq has now become an ally of the free world instead of an enemy. It may not be as good an ally as say Poland, but it's a hell of a lot better than it used to be.

"And because of that, the war between Sunnis and Shi'a in Baghdad will never end"

You can predict the future, eh? Well done. And you support the slaughter of random Sunnis and Shiites in Baghdad - you're a terrorist.

"The "astounding victory" that you claim has already been achieved in Iraq cannot be achieved, until the Americans leave."

Wrong. Astounding victories in Germany and Japan were achieved without American departure.

"You keep missing the point. You keep failing to understand the world-wide nature of the conflict."

No, YOU keep missing the point. This list of enemies is broader than "Islam". The fact that some Arab Muslims (such as the ITM brothers) are IDENTICAL to US neocons should have given you pause for thought. Instead, you shut down your brain.

"You keep thinking that the only kind of "war" that exists is that which involves armies, and you keep missing the point about exploiting the natural weaknesses of the enemy, not through greater exertion, but through less."

Yeah, I know all about your support of terrorism. Regardless, your tactic of supporting terrorism is useless. Too few people can be killed by terrorism, that the population is simply replenished. Even if it wasn't, the Shiites can easily forcibly expel all the Sunnis from Iraq, and then you've achieved precisely nothing. The way this war is going to be won is by changing Arab Muslim culture so that they are anti-religious-bigots or at least, non-religious-bigots. And that means forcing them to be tolerant, not setting them up for an expulsion and terrorism. Really, you are as low as Osama Bin Laden himself. There's no difference between his support of terrorism and yours. If you want to kill people, be honest about it and commit genocide cleanly. Don't just kill random people via terrorism.

"Paul Edwards still does noot understand the main point of this site, the point of why we should be working to destroy the nuclear project of Iran"

I do understand why we need to denuke Iran, and it is part of my plan which I posted earlier.

"and why we should take advantage of the natural consequences of the removal of Saddam Hussein"

Oh, I understand why YOU support terrorism. I just don't happen to agree.

"and why it makes no sense to keep supporting Pakistan with tens of billions of dollars when Pakistan continues not only to protect Al Qaeda"

No, YOU don't understand that Pakistan is losing its own soldiers arresting Al Qaeda and handing them over to the US, so your simplistic scenario is factually incorrect.

"but to actively nurture and supply (oh, possibly not Musharraf, but practically everyone else in the army except Musharraf,and he does or can do, nothing about it) the Taliban, and to re-invade Afghanistan by proxy."

The fact that he is unable to eliminate the Taliban, who operate in an area that has never been conquered, is an issue that needs to be dealt with eventually. But the Taliban are small potatoes. They have minimal capacity to do damage. There are more important tasks, such as liberating 70 million Iranians from state-slavery. Not that you care about liberating people. You're more interested in finding ways of committing terrorism against them.

"No, Paul Edwards, like Condoleeza Rice prating about "occuppied Japan" and "occupied Germany" and how scoffers scoffed"

Which is exactly what happened in Afghanistan and Iraq too. Turns out you were the one prattling, and far more disgusting, encouraging terrorism.

"there too just as they now do about "occupied Iraq" (what crap she allows herself to utter)"

You're the one uttering crap.

"wants us to believe that the examples of Taiwan and South Korea show us what can be done about Iraq."

I didn't say that. Afghanistan and Iraq are experiments in progress. So far the results are excellent, although they certainly have room for improvement. But as a first draft, they are a phenomenal improvement from what used to be there.

"What is that thing that is missing? Islam."

Go and read the ITM blogs and tell me what is missing from it.

http://www.iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/

This should have been your primary source of research. Understanding these Arab Muslims. It was my primary source of research. And is what I used (along with the other Iraqi blogs) to develop the list of enemies. Which isn't Islam, but instead dogma, religious bigotry, non-humanist behaviour, subjugation, racism and some other stuff.

Posted by: Paul Edwards at March 19, 2007 5:48 PM

special_guest, Islam being A source of legislation was I think part of the Transitive Administrative Law (TAL). The US may have had a hand in drafting that, I don't know. But it's irrelevant, because it was only temporary. It was replaced by a permanent constitution created by a democratically-elected Iraqi government, and approved by the Iraqi people via referendum. The US's hands are clean. Not one thing, not a sausage, has been forced onto the Iraqi people. What you see now is Iraqis in their natural state. And we now have freedom of speech opened up so that we can negotiate with them about what is required to live in peace with them.

Posted by: Paul Edwards at March 19, 2007 6:12 PM

"Go and read the ITM blogs and tell me what is missing from it.

http://www.iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/

This should have been your primary source of research. Understanding these Arab Muslims. It was my primary source of research."

Really? Was that blog your "primary source of research"? Not the Qur'an, not the Hadith, not the Sira? Not "The Arab Mind Considered" by John Laffin? Not "Islam and Dhimmitude"? Not "The Decline of Eastern Christianity Under Islam"? Not "The Myth of Islamic Tolerance"? Not "Onward Muslim Soldiers" or "The Origins of the Koran" or "Why I Am Not a Muslim" or the biographies of Muhammad by Sir William Muir, or Arthur Jeffery, or Tor Andrae? Not the recent biography of Muhammad by Robert Spencer, the one that relies entirely on what the Muslim sources themselves say?

None of that? Not "The Political Language of Islam" by Bernard Lewis? Not Snouck Hurgronje on the Acehinese? Not Joseph Schacht on Muslim Law? Not Antoine Fattal on the legal status of non-Muslims under Islamic rule? Not the valuable anthology of Muslim (and Western scholarship) on Jihad, compiled by Andrew Bostom, called "The Legacy of Jihad"?

Your main source of research is a single blog, by a perfectly nice Iraqi living in Baghdad, one who is most unrepresentative in thought, word, and deed, a complete secularist and what's more the son of a very forward-looking father and with a handful of friends who think as he does? On that basis you are going to make high policy, or judge a policy that has already cost 3,220 lives and 25,000 wounded, and $750 billion dollars? On that basis?

Do you think I don't follow all the goddam blogs, and that I haven't noticed that in the list of the ones that started out, almost all of them have simply stopped altogether, and that "Iraq the Model" is practically the only one still going? And why should I think that American policy should be based on what an Iraqi wants for Iraq - a most unrepresentative Iraqi, one who if he were here would probably be attending the St. Petersburg meeting of apostates.

I'm not about to collapse into sentimental gush about this or that singular creature, any more than I would have formed policy based on the winning ways of Ahmed Chalabi, or Kanan Makiya, or Rend al-Rahim.

Good God.

Posted by: Hugh at March 19, 2007 6:22 PM

No, this was achieved too. All those people that Osama had trained were loose in the world and could have done untold damage by attacking American civilians. Instead, they all came to Iraq to suicide against the US military. You can't ask for a better result."
-- from a poster above

This is false. There are all kinds of Muslim terrorists all over the place. Many of them never have set foot in Afghanistan, nor were trained by Osama bin Laden. The ones who were in the Moscow theatre. In the Beslan school. In the Madrid subway. In the London subway. The man in Chapel Hill who on his own tried to kill Infidel students. The dozens and dozens of people rounded up in this country, and charged, and sentenced for involvement in terrorism.

And there is no fixed number of terrorists. Their numbers are endlessly replenishable from the ranks not only of fanatical Believers, but of less fanatical ones, who become over time more militant in their faith - and all kinds of things can set off such militancy, including personal problems over which Infidels have no control and can do nothing to prevent. People who have a pre-existing grid, or prism through which to view the universe, and who readily blame Infidels for whatever setbacks or even perceived insults in life that they receive, do not need to run around a camp in Afghanistan.

But in any case, your notion that it is just wonderful that all kinds of suicide bombers have congregated in Iraq to kill American soldiers is bizarre. Why is that a good thing? Why shouldn't we hope that these suicide bombers, presumably those of al Qaeda in Iraq, an organization devoted to killing "Rafidite dogs" (which is what they call the Shi'a), should concentrate solely on that, and not have to also attack and maim and kill American soldiers. Why shouldn't the Shi'a be attacked and, in turn, attack the members of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, without Americans taking casualties from both sides, like some kind of good samaritan who gets between two parties in a bar-room ball, and tries to prevent them from harming each other, but in the meantime is stabbed repeatedly by each of them, and not accidentally, but because each of the parties also hates the good samaritan for their own reasons.

But what takes the cake is this:

"The unproven belief that democracy can't be installed by force of arms, despite exactly that having been done in Japan, Germany, Panama, Grenada and now Afghanistan and Iraq."

Do you not see something absurd, in your list of six examples of "democracy" that you think can be "installed by force of arms" the mini-states, where in any case the returns are not in, of Grenada, for god's sake, and Panama? Are you serious? Why not through in Andorra and Monaco while you are at it?

In any case, this business of likening the Muslim peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan to the totally destroyed countries, absolutely conquered and their wartime regimes crushed, with both Tokyo and Berlin bombed-out cities, and other cities -- Dresden and Cologne, Hiroshima and Nagasaki -- and many others reduced to nothing or close to nothing. That never happened in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Islam prevents the peoples in these countries from accepting or even quite understanding Western-style democracy. The Shi'a were enthusiastic about those elections not because they were sudden converts to democratic theory, but because they knew that by voting they could obtain power without having to fight the Sunnis -- and the Americans were there to guarantee that the ballot-box results would be followed. The Sunnis barely participated, and for the opposite reason: they realize they are outnumbered 3-1 by the Shi'a Arabs (of course, at the same time, being completely illogical, they also remain convinced that they constitute 42% of the population of Iraq).

As many people have repeatedly pointed out, Japan and Germany had regimes and ideologies that were totallly discredited. The ideology of Iraq -- Islam -- has not been, and cannot be, totally discredited. It is the source of the widespread hostility, instead of gratitude, toward the Americans. No real friendship will ever be offered the American government, save by a handful -- a few percent -- of the people, at most, and those will be the westernized, secularized sort, the ones who may still call themselves "Muslims" but essentially are Muslim-for-identification-purposes-only" Muslims.

You are not more absurd when you write such things than Condoleeza Rice or George Bush. But you are just as absurd.

And that is fairly absurd.

Posted by: Hugh at March 19, 2007 6:44 PM

Hugh, "Was that blog your "primary source of research"? Not the Qur'an, not the Hadith, not the Sira?"

It was both. It was finding out why these Muslims were not following the Quran, in the same way that Christians don't follow the bit in the bible that says to stone your own children to death if they are disobedient.

"Your main source of research is a single blog"

It was one of several blogs. Others are the Mesopotomian, Road of a Nation, Healing Iraq (before Zeyad turned) and Iraq at a Glance. Also SandMonkey (Egypt) and Religious Policeman (Saudi Arabia).

"by a perfectly nice Iraqi living in Baghdad, one who is most unrepresentative in thought, word, and deed"