NPR is now reporting widespread small arms fire in Basra as Sadr Shia are fighting non-Sadr Shia for power now that the British have pulled out. People are running around with RPGs.

It seems that the forces of ‘mar’ are winning.

Posted by: pez at March 22, 2007 12:23 PM

It is because of everything Hugh explains above that it is difficult not to simply shake one's head in hopelessness as we see Anti-Americanism merge with Jihadism merge with Left-wing Moonbatism into a witches brew of irrational rage.

Lest anyone paint the Iraqi adventure in complimentary terms consider what the outcome was supposed to be:

Shia-controlled government with Sunnis living happily ever after. Uh huh.

Oil, lots of it, abundant, cheap and flowing like hell to the U.S.A.

Halliburton stock not down 16.76% for the year, but banging 52-week highs.

Golly gee, why didn't the Iraqis go along with this plan?

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2 at March 22, 2007 12:25 PM

It is immoral for Bush and others to persist obstinately in a course that makes no sense.

The war ended weeks after the invasion. Then the benign occupation started.

Up to the point of successfully holding an election --- and maybe six months after that to give the Moslem security forces a chance to step up the plate --- the benign occupation made sense.

Since that time the answer to the experiment has been apparent: Moslems cannot be civilized.

Past that, the occupation has not only been immoral but a waste of money and attention. We can protect our oil interests over here from 100 feet beneath the surface of the Indian Ocean.

Posted by: Alarmed Pig Farmer at March 22, 2007 12:42 PM

If the US does indeed pull out of Iraq, what will ensue is a civil war that will result in the most violent strain of Jihadists in the region winning control over the Oil fields and the revenues that would flow out of them.

The retreat of the US will 'prove' that Allah supports the attacks against the infidels and in turn it will swell the ranks of the Jihad movement with those believing that the defeat of the 'Great Satan' is within reach. Terrorist attacks against US and US interests will grow in frequency due to the growing numbers of Jihadists, and will grow in severity due to the increased financing from the oil.

In looking at the situation over there, I wonder if the best course of action would be to install another dictator there. I don't see self rule working if they expect the US military carry the full load. The problem is making sure we don't end up with another Saddam.

Posted by: rancorcrankor at March 22, 2007 1:03 PM

@rancorcrankor

On what basis do you conclude:

"If the US does indeed pull out of Iraq, what will ensue is a civil war that will result in the most violent strain of Jihadists in the region winning control over the Oil fields and the revenues that would flow out of them."

I don't agree at all!

The Shia are the majority in Iraq. Right next door in Iran are their correligionists. If the Sunni hatemongers and headchoppers get the upper hand, Iran will come in like gangbusters!

Good.

Let them have a mini world war. In the end:

MY MONEY'S ON THE SHIA!

USA, OUT OF THE WAY
LET THE SHIA HAVE THEIR DAY!

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2 at March 22, 2007 1:09 PM

There is no compassion in not naming and fighting the conniving enemy that plans to steal our god given gifts for our selves and our posterity

Posted by: KAOSKTRL at March 22, 2007 1:16 PM

I read their book!!!!!

enough said...

Posted by: greatcometof1577 at March 22, 2007 1:29 PM

@Ynkedoodl2

Lets suppose that you are right. That the Sunnis launch an all out attack to seize the Iraq Gov't when we leave, then Iran rushes in and crushes them.. Are we left with Iran and the nutjob Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (with his deranged vision of bringing about the end of the world) controlling the resources of Iraq? How is that different that what I supposed?

Either way, Islam wins.

Establishing a dictator/king seems to be the only way to prevent anything less than a total disaster.

Posted by: rancorcrankor at March 22, 2007 1:41 PM

I mistakenly used the word prevent in my last line.

A dictator or king is the best solution now in light of the reactions we are seeing from the Iraqis.

Posted by: rancorcrankor at March 22, 2007 1:45 PM

I did not want to make this a long response. But Hugh has suggested things that are deplorable to me.

Fitzgerald notes:

It is the Americans who have tried, at great human and economic cost, to make the Iraqis less tribal, less selfish, more imbued with a sense of a nation -- and a nation that is not merely a place to be controlled by their sect or tribe or family. The Americans have tried to encourage entrepreneurial activity instead of reliance, as in so many other Muslim states, on either oil money or foreign aid from Infidels, and to encourage the adoption of a Constitution that would actually move away from the Shari'a.

His own response to this is a sweeping judgement:

It has all failed.

Has it? Have we not, at least recently, succeeded in that entrepreneurial adventure - particularly in the region that some have suggested might be the new "Talibanistan" of Iraq? From Wizbang, quoting Petreaus:

Another change: an emphasis on protecting of gathering places like mosques and marketplaces. "We initiated Operation Safe Markets," Petraeus said, "and have placed ordinary concrete highway barriers around the vulnerable targets." Car bombings have dropped precipitately - the limited access thwarts them.
As a result, "The marketplaces, including the book market that was targeted for an especially vicious attack, are rebuilding and doing great business. It is helping the local economy enormously to have this kind of protection in place." With jobs plentiful and demand growing, the appeal of militia armies declines proportionally.

The brothers at Iraq The Model also paint a different picture:

The city that at some point was about to become the new Talibanistan is now working hand in hand with the government in Baghdad and the coalition forces to defeat al-Qaeda. Maliki's and Petraeus's visit to the province were not only of symbolic value. The visit and the meeting with the heads of tribes marked the beginning of the return of the once stray province to where it belongs.

And Fitzgerald brushes off outside forces in this war by simply sweeping the removal of Saddam as a vanilla effort, leaving that particular savagery as something that at least "kept the populace in line":

That murderous monster, it turns out, was about what Iraq appeared to need, if the only conceivable good is an absence of the kind of strife that became inevitable, sooner or later, once the regime of Saddam Hussein was removed.

Inevitable? Is there no recognition of the proxy war that is being fought? There is no doubt amongst the Iraqi's that that is so, as per ITM:

What's been going on since 2003 is that most of the neighbors want Iraq to fail and to do that they saw that feeding a proxy war using local surrogates and foreign terrorists was the best strategy to block the tide of change off their doors. In this manner the slower progress is being made in Iraq the longer their regimes can last, so why would anyone think those little tyrants like to see a democratic federal Iraq run by a constitution approved by the people!?

When I first read this post, I was depressed, much in the same way as Cassandra has been at Villianous Company. But when I hear cherry picked numbers that suggest overwhelming anti-Americanism by the Iraqi's, I have to ask "Where did this come from?". There's no reference to the "poll". So here's another cherry picked number that suggests something completely different from Omar at ITM:

Recently there were two separately conducted polls in the news, and the results were contradictory to each other in more than one point which is not surprising at all but one item of the poll conducted for the BBC and ABC that caught my attention.
The poll shows that only about 4% of the Sunni are in favor of an Islamic rule. This is interesting and worth noting even if the error margin for this one was three times what the pollsters claimed, which is somewhat unlikely for an error margin. This extremely low approval rate is understandable given all what the Sunni had suffered under the extremists who touted the idea of Islamic rule in the Sunni areas for four years.

I think you're head over heels in the "immorality" definitions, Hugh. It's not about immorality or the parsing of what that means. It's about an experiment, given the effort by the US and the Iraqi's, that can work. Is Islam the cog here? Of course - no one will argue that. But it is a course that may take years, not weeks or months. Winning the hearts and minds IS the strategy, and we are now cognizant of all the Islamic ignorance we possess. Just because we are ignorant now doesn't mean we will stay that way. People like you, Hugh, and Spencer can change our ideas and awareness of what we are truly up against. But it shouldn't reduce our effort to try what is agreeably a "grand experiment". We've done bigger things and succeeded.

Posted by: madconductor at March 22, 2007 1:54 PM

Hugh wrote:

"It has all failed. And that is despite the enormous efforts of American soldiers, who were never taught about Islam, and yet persevered, and were puzzled when the Muslims of Iraq did not behave, as those soldiers expected them to, as a grateful "Iraqi people," but rather as a collection -- with a handful of exceptions -- of grasping, whining, greedy, meretricious people, eager to have the Americans do everything for them, eager to have them lavish them with aid money (thrown around, by the billions, like confetti), and distinctly indifferent to American losses when not taking outright pleasure in such losses, yet always willing to blame the Americans for everything."

I have never read a better summation of the quagmire in Iraq than that.

Use our current bases to break the backbone of Iranian and Syrian infrastructure, then leave the region entirely. That's what I would do, right now, starting today.

Shock and Awe and Withdraw.

Posted by: Foehammer at March 22, 2007 1:57 PM

Marshal Tito anyone? Only if there is some benefit to staying there...

Definitions of marshal tito on the Web:

Tito: Yugoslav statesman who led the resistance to German occupation during World War II and established a communist state after the war (1892-1980)
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

Josip Broz Tito (May 7, 1892 – May 4, 1980) was the president of Yugoslavia between the end of World War II and his death in 1980.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshal_Tito

Posted by: squire at March 22, 2007 2:01 PM

@rancorcrankor

The Sunni-Shia war is a thousand-year war (and counting). They could fight for another 1000 years. Why not?

There is no solution, no cure for those who want to murder for allah-cadabra.

Americans can't think more than 4 years into the future. The fact that you're grasping for solutions shows you don't fully grasp the depths of depravity of the fractious cult of Islam.

Let them both go to hell!

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2 at March 22, 2007 2:04 PM

Dear Mr. Fitzgerald,

I don't know if you have spoken to any of the soldiers having served in Iraq or having been wounded, but the only unfairness they see is Democrats and Americans abandoning them. I have written here before of a light colonel who was wounded and is now healing stating he was thinking of leaving America for the simple reason Americans were so ignorant on Iraq.
Iraq has not been a failure. Except for the well designed kill zone meant to lure terrorists to their deaths in the 30 mile perimeter, Iraq is quite as normal as any state in America.
The Kurds are flourishing, the Shia in the south are in their typical mode and most of the tribal Sunni are behaving.

It is though difficult in the MSM always showing the worst when 94% of Iraq is actually working.
To illustrate a comparrison, it is much touted about the Taliban's spring campaign which is already being neutralized by the American forces. What you never hear about though are Afghanistan's archeologists restoring the Buddha shrines and the artists building institutes where women are now becoming artists. One never sees normal Afghans doing normal things as that is not news.
The same case is in Iraq. One never hears about oil pipelines, oil flow, water treatment, telephone, food supply etc... because all of that is a success in Iraq.

We do differ on success and failure in our estimations, but that is debate and what this site is moulding in civil discourse. Iraq though is being looked at in this next time period of war in the scenario of, "If Iran and Saudi Arabia destroy each other's fields and they are contaminated by nuclear fallout, then Iraq will be the only major field left along with the south Asian fields to offset Russian domination of all Eurasia.
If Russia gets that stranglehold, then the world is going to plunge into battles where ten thousand Americans will be dead in a battle an not in 5 years of battles. It will also be a time when people will be in oil shortages crucifying Democrats for having American forces pull out of an oil supply which could have fueled our allies in Japan and England.

None of that is about immoral or moral policy. It is about a chessboard which is being set up for a Eurasian world war which the policy makers are trying to set up where Egypt will hold the western flank, Pakistan the eastern flank. The war is intended then to be fought on the south Asian steppes into Iran where American firepower will be employed for maximum effect on forces with no place to hide. This area is allot like eastern Wyoming and Montana. It is a perfect battlefield for advanced firepower.
This is about a war where American policy is trying to keep our dead out of the millions KIA and into the thousands.

None of us as caring people likes Iraq no more than we like seeing Muslims used as fodder in Gaza or the West Bank. Iraq though is there and we tried to leave it alone and Saddam was in bed with al Qaeda, funding chemical weapons use on Christians in Darfur and as I have written had almost 2 tons of weapons grade uranium in Iraq which America hauled out which France had refined for Saddam. (that is about 100 Hiroshima bombs).

If it was just about Iraq in leaving it alone, it would be like Jefferson thinking French Revolution was wonderful until millions of French were slaughtered and concluding that a better solution could perhaps be employed. Loosing oil supply would topple Europe and widespread atomic weapons in Shia and Sunni hands would have them ending up all across America, Europe and Asia in games of blackmail.
Those scenarios bring the conclusion that Iraq is worth the effort and expense when instead of billions spent and thousands dead and wounded compared to trillions gone, a radioactive hot zone in what was New York and a million dead with multi millions more cancerous children in a generation....Iraq has been cheap.

Thank you for your article today as it allows all scenarios to be weighed and considered.

All of my best, LC

Posted by: Lame Cherry at March 22, 2007 2:10 PM

@madconductor

you say:

"We've done bigger things and succeeded."

Bigger than what?

According to you, if the USA stays the course and remains in Iraq for an indefinite amount of time, we can repair the Sunni-Shia theological split. Righto!

If you believe that, I have bridge in Brooklyn I'd be interested in selling.

You know, madconductor, the Crusades ended when the infidels finally vamoosed.

How long did that take?

Oh, about 250 years.

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2 at March 22, 2007 2:26 PM

"I don't know if you have spoken to any of the soldiers having served in Iraq... but the only unfairness they see is Democrats and Americans abandoning them."
--

1. Yes.
2. Not true. Many soldiers have lost all belief in the "mission" which they have never quite understood in any case, because it makes no sense. Not all of them know what the words "Jihad" and "dhimmi" mean, or know what the phrase "various instruments of Jihad, including Daw'a and demographic conquest" means. But they certainly are acquiring a good sense of what a society, or societies, sufffused with Islam are like. It is not an edifying spectacle, one not soon to be forgotten.

Posted by: Hugh at March 22, 2007 2:39 PM

Lame Cherry,

You have said things better than I can. It is not the morality that should be the culprit in this war - though the left would have you think that. This has been, and will continue to be, a dynamic theater of operation. That there is nothing good happening is only attributable to the lack of news stories. If one does not read the blogworld, the good that goes on doesn't exist. Polls rule while never having the desired effect one way or another.
The larger question, I suppose, is how do we really measure our effort? After the military victory, the rebuilding has to have success points somewhere. I see that ocuring in the control by the Iraqi Army of areas that the MNF formerly had responsibility. That area has continued to grow - which points to the "surge" effort at those areas that continued to be problematic. And everything I read indicates increasing success.

I thought Fitzgerald wrote a very good article - I just don't agree that the cut-and-run effort ought to be dressed as though there is no "moral" implications. There are, particularly with the current spineless trend of the Congress in hatching new ways to achieve defeat while claiming moral high ground.

The Vietnam War and this war are totally different in cause, enemy, and environment. But the political motivations and tools have not changed. And when that "defunding" tool was used in Vietnam, a war that we won militarily, nearly 4 million people were slaughtered. Not for being soldiers - for being alive. Where was the "moral" high ground then? And are we set to repeat such a devastating debacle again? I don't want to, particularly when the slaughter capacities of the terrorists in this war are well known.

Posted by: madconductor at March 22, 2007 3:02 PM

A population that elevates Al Sadr to a leadership position has little hope. The thought of a functioning Iraqi democracy is delusional.

Iraq’s population doubled under the stability that Saddam provided. Large numbers may starve before the gyroscope returns to equilibrium.

The Iraqi's should be grateful to us for the chance they were given. We owe them nothing more than a large northern airbase and maybe a division of Halliburton operating in the south under the Ethiopian flag.

Posted by: pez at March 22, 2007 3:15 PM

@madconductor

You're smoking hopium!

How many years, how many lost American lives, how much wasted money before you decide to call it quits.

Just curious. I knew this invasion was a mistake within 4 months.

Four years and counting and you still have hope. Maybe I need what you're smoking.

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2 at March 22, 2007 3:29 PM

Democrats only know and want defeat, their hatred for Bush has them blinded with rage, and they will risk all that is good about the US to get their revenge. Leaving Iraq now is a big mistake. it will make the US and west weak in the eyes of islmaist.
this war is being fought on many fronts. Democrats have no backbone, and are using the "slow bleed" method of taking down Bush. Bush did say this war will outlive his presidency, and we can all see that. The media is in line with the democrats, and some of you are falling hook line and sinker with their news. There will be many steps back, and before progress is seen. Walking away now will only make the French look good. (that was a joke).

Posted by: ZenaWarriorPrincess at March 22, 2007 3:36 PM

It's funny that we debate whether we are "winning" the war in Iraq when it's clear that there is no accepted definition of what victory looks like. We hear lots of sound bites about "democratic elections" and "Iraqi security forces taking the lead." The fact is these are all nonsense, we didn't start this war so that Iraqis could elect their corrupt politicians who seem to have no interest in a unified Iraq.

As has often been discussed here we failed to define this war, it is not a war on "terror" it is a war on Islamism as a political doctrine. Until the objective is defined victory can not be defined. As long as we can't define victory we won't be able to say if we are headed towards success or failure.

Posted by: Harpua at March 22, 2007 4:43 PM

I have to agree with LC. All the Troops deployed in Iraq at the current time have been exposed to a non stop assault by those of their own Country that have trashed every thing the American Government has tried to do.

The entire Diatribe by the subversive elements with their phony "love of America" has done more to inhibit success than any other aspect of the conflict. Incredible Hypocrites for every thing Freedom stands for and what is necessary to insure it's survival, let alone its spread.

The Leftists show their contempt for the President because he made an about face with American Foreign Policy.

At least it started out that way and is a Major contributing factor as to why the Presidents approval ratings were as high as any President ever had. The President had made it clear from the get go that the War would be Long and it would be difficult, and implied it would last well beyond his term of office.

I submit to all, the Presidents ratings soared simply because the general population was aware of what was going on in the past, and when 9/11 occurred it was the final straw. The American People saw in the President someone who was finally going to do something about these people after 8 years, if not all the years of attacks since 1979. Especially considering the whole issue of Bush winning the office and the backlash putting him behind the 8 Ball from the very beginning.

Removing Saddam in the Time, Fashion, And means was exactly how the US Armed forces have been trained to do their Job. Of which Rumsfeld was never given his proper do. The whole nonsense about needing a Half a Million Troops to remove Saddam was nothing more than Rhetoric to prevent us from doing anything at all, EVER. The simple reality was, and still is. There was never a chance of deploying the entire US army in Iraq. Even if they Had, there was never going to be an option of rotating any Troops out of Theater after the 1st year of "occupation".To think it was, shows your drinking far to much Koolaid than is healthy for you.

The real grim reality in all this is, We had no real Allies in the effort because all our "friends" were milking the Cash Cow that Iraq was to them. The Coalition of the willing, in practical matters, were Countries who allowed Overflight rights for Strategic assets to be deployed from Bases in the US. Just look at a MAP. Quite frankly, we should bless our lucky stars we received the accommodations from Pakistan that we did. Shooting our way through Pakistan to get Afghanistan would have been one really ugly affair. Quite likely ending in a Nuclear exchange.

We rant all the time here about the evil of Islam and those who live by it in its fundamental principles. But ignore the forces within our own Country that are determined to see that nothing else be done to confront it. From providing effective policies to ensure our safety, to directly combating the enemy, right down to demoralising the Troops who VOLLENTERED to put their lives at risk to fight it.

One can have no clue how demoralising it is for someone who has been there and done that becomes, when upon returning home, finds that what they were doing is considered a crime by the MSM while the MSM champions the Enemy. Their deployment is just a part of the PTSD they suffer from.

If, in the end, were just going to pull out and call it a lost cause. Then there is only one way to do it so we need suffer from them no more. Flatten the country like a pancake. If were going to lose the Investment we have already made. Then we should insure they retain no benefits from our effort.

We won WWII despite making an astronomical number of tactical mistakes, incredible Intelligence failures, Many sub-par weapon systems, often with much needless loss of life. But we still won the war, simply because the Press was not allowed to lose it for us.

Can anyone imagine what the press reports would have read like if today's MSM were to report the Normandy Landings?

Posted by: flowerknife_us at March 22, 2007 5:27 PM

Expressed above is a curious theory, that goes something like this. If a military action begins, no matter how pointless, or how wasteful, it turns out to be, we must not criticize it, nor attempt to stop it in the only way that, apparently, is constitutionally permissible -- by cutting off funds -- because, you see, that would not be "supporting the troops." And that argument can be repeated for any military intervention, no matter where or when, as long as one can say "we can't cut off support to the troops." And thus a President and his Administration are apparently unstoppable, the runaway train of their policies not ever to be brought to an intelligent halt, even if they appear to be going right towards a cliff, or a wall (choose your metaphoric end).

Posted by: Hugh at March 22, 2007 5:42 PM

Anyone comparing the war against terror to WWII just doesn't get it.

Folks, the last time we tried to "defeat" the Muslims in their own backyard was during the Crusades.

We lost. It took 250 years, but we lost.

We are fighting a new crusade. George Bush's crusade. A crusade in which thousands of lives and billions of dollars will be wasted on the bonfire of George Bush's vanity. Anyone who dreams of an American "victory" is absolutely clueless.

The bedrock truth is this: If we leave now we will be handing victory to the Shia.

Personally, I wish that Saddam were still in power to do our dirty work vis-a-vis Iran. (The enemy of my enemy is my friend, but Dubya was too dumb to understand.) Alas, too late.

So now our tune should be:

USA, go away
Let the Shia have their day!

Payback's a Bitch, you know.

Posted by: Ynkedoodl2 at March 22, 2007 5:49 PM

Many soldiers [...] are acquiring a good sense of what a society, or societies, sufffused with Islam are like. It is not an edifying spectacle, one not soon to be forgotten.
Posted by: Hugh

Let's hope that as many of them as possible will run for and hold public offis ASAP!

Posted by: Allahfanculo at March 22, 2007 5:55 PM

office

Posted by: Allahfanculo at March 22, 2007 6:04 PM

.

Posted by: Morgaan Sinclair at March 22, 2007 6:29 PM

Bush should bring the American soldiers back now.
There is no point remaining at all.

Bush is thinking, "They will stay until Iraq is a success".

Success???
It will never happen. The Sunni & Shia will keep decimating each other (and all non-Muslim minorities when they feel resentful).
This will go on for decades if need be.
It is the same with Afghanistan
Do we want to be there for next 40 years?

At some point, a US, UK, German, Italian...
government will face facts and say that there is an endless stream of Muslims willing to fight us in Afghanistan and we cannot ensure permananent success. At whatever point in the future we pull out, someone will fill the void and impose some Islamic values on the country again. It will never be otherwise.

Only a change within Islamic countries might change this in some way.

Given that Iraq and Afghanistan will fail, militarily, politicians need to ask, "do we want the battles here?" If not, we need to do something about Muslims in the West.

Posted by: UK Infidel Lover at March 22, 2007 6:50 PM

ZenaWarriorPrincess

"Democrats only know and want defeat, their hatred for Bush has them blinded with rage, and they will risk all that is good about the US to get their revenge. Leaving Iraq now is a big mistake. it will make the US and west weak in the eyes of islmaist."

If we stay however we will slowly lose the overall war. The current strategy of trying to make them love each other and bring democracy will not work UNLESS you do away with their entire civilization. Are you willing to kill about half of the population accomplish that?

So what if the Islamist think it makes us look weak. Islamist also think we are weak because American businessmen keep doing deals with Islamic states (see the port deals, immigration etc). Islamist once again use any excuse to get a point across.

At some point you have to put your pride in a box and do things for the best of the nation and the army. It maybe will make us look weak at first but after the Shia and Sunni slaughter each other it will make us look smart. Let them fall on their own swords. They will do the job for us.

Even better yet we can keep a few small bases in the new Kurdistan. That way we can claim to the world we never left Iraq.

We just redeployed!

See you make the history anything you want it to be.

Posted by: greatcometof1577 at March 22, 2007 7:17 PM

greatcometof1577, l was very young during the Vietnam war, and only remember the funk that the US was in after leaving Vietnam with so called honour, it was years after Vietnam generals said the war was lost by them, but they won the war from Wash. politics. yeah let politicians run a war and you have disaster. It took many years and a great president like Ronald Reagan to bring the greatness of the US. Although he made mistakes, (quite Lebanon, without pounding the crap out of them), but you dont want another Vietnam. The media protrays all things bad with a Republican as president, and people fall for it all the time. My main contempt for Bush is that he is not fighting aggresively enough both politically and militarily, but then you have to look at the extreme leftist bias in the media, hand in hand with the defeatist Democrats. It saddens me that Western government are so PC to let these islamist appologist change the way we live. So we cannot back down, someone earlier posted we lost in the Crusades, actually no, but stopped islam aggression into Europe. We need more strong men like Churchhill!

Posted by: ZenaWarriorPrincess at March 22, 2007 7:37 PM

President Bush argues that if we were to leave Iraq, (1) the Middle East would erupt into a regional war, (2) the Jihadis would be emboldened, and (3) they would follow us home.

1. A prolonged regional war is what Reagan engineered and I don’t remember too many threats against the west in the 1980s. It drained Islam’s energy and resources for a decade. Also, Saudi’s war strategy would likely include dropping the worldwide price of oil below Iran’s profit point of $50/barrel to starve them.
2. Jihadis are far more manageable when they are emboldened than when they are subdued. Bold Jihadis continuously tell us and show us what they plan to do.
3. The Jihadis are already here. It would be healthy for our democracy to see what they can do.

Posted by: pez at March 22, 2007 7:43 PM

flowerknife_us

"I have to agree with LC. All the Troops deployed in Iraq at the current time have been exposed to a non stop assault by those of their own Country that have trashed every thing the American Government has tried to do."

Of course the left and the media has been no help and they never will help BUT the fact is the greatest reason for the trashing of Bush and co. is because it is a stupid strategy.

Jeeze that is why when you make plans for battle you better get them right. You better win.

"He who wishes to fight must first count the cost. When you engage in actual fighting, if victory is long in coming, then men's weapons will grow dull and their ardor will be dampened. If you lay siege to a town, you will exhaust your strength. Again, if the campaign is protracted, the resources of the State will not be equal to the strain. Now, when your weapons are dulled, your ardor dampened, your strength exhausted and your treasure spent, other chieftains will spring up to take advantage of your extremity. Then no man, however wise, will be able to avert the consequences that must ensue. In war, then, let your great object be victory, not lengthy campaigns." Sun Tzu

Lets repeat the last part again...

"other chieftains will spring up to take advantage of your extremity. Then no man, however wise, will be able to avert the consequences that must ensue."

Other Chieftains...

Iran, Left wing, moonbats, Islamist etc...

Bush did not count the cost of this battle.

Posted by: greatcometof1577 at March 22, 2007 7:50 PM

who are you talking to? que vieux dire "tout en faisant"?

Posted by: StillBreathing at March 22, 2007 7:52 PM

All at JW:

I will tell you one thing that happening that might slow Islam down:

HIV/AIDS. Also Hepatitis.
All the blood diseases in short.

I keep very close track of what goes on in every country on a daily basis.
I read the UN annual report that is published late November every year by UNAIDS on the state of the disease on the continents. I read the UN biannual report that is published June on the state of each country. Anmd I have read the CIA report published a few years back for Bushs consumption which warned of massive projected security problems in 5 countries (the most populous) : India, China, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Russia.

Briefly:
Different countries succumb to HIV/AIDs by different means. South of the Sahara in Africa it is mainly promiscuity. In China it is illegal blood plasma selling + promiscuity. In Russia it mainly through drug injections.

South Africa currently has 900 dying a day of HIV/AIDS. It is reckoned it will be 1200 a day by 2010. In places, cemeteries are full, they have run out of room (East Durban). These days, 3 people are buried in 1 grave with just a metal marker. Zimbabwe has 3000 people dying a week.

And it is pretty hard for thse countries to function. Some have well over 1 million orphans (parents died a long time ago). Grandparents of 70, 80 years old are the heroies. they should have retired a long time ago. Frequently they are the parents. By 2020, I think some African countries will be almost non-functional. If you have removed the middle layer of Farmers, Teachers, Engineers, Judges, Civil Servants, Police, Doctors, Nurses : how will what remains function? Teachers are dying faster than they can be replaced.

India has the most people with HIV/AIDS (6 million), South Africa is next

Russia, Ukraine, the Baltic States are the fastest in terms of recent gains.

This is slowburn disease with a long fuse.
It is remorseless.
I expect by 2020, you will hear this in newpapers, TV, radio, every day.
And by 2050, it will be affecting 100's of millions.

Back to Islam:

Mostly the Muslim world has been unaffected.
But not completely. It is making inroads now.
It is very hard to get data as Islamic countries do not collect this data.
It is making its way in Saudi Arabia (not significantly. If native they are treated otherwise they are deported). Countries that are reckoned to have a significant HIV/AIDs population are : Nigeria, Indonesia, Iran (also, surprisingly, very enlightened. They have a significant amount of drug addicts), Pakistan.
The most "successful" Islamic country from the point of view of HIV/AIDs treatment is Senegal.

I have seen figures where 60% of Muslim men commit suicide. Their thinking is, "I have brought shame on my family and Allah". They cannot face the Islamic community.

Articles of Interest are
http://www.ockenden.org.uk/index.asp?id=1106
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/africa/03/aids_debate/html/key_countries.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4058383.stm

Extract from BBC report
>>
NORTH AFRICA & MIDDLE EAST

Once known as a region with relatively low levels of HIV, its advance is continuing, although sometimes poor availability of information does disrupt efforts to build-up a comprehensive picture.

There is evidence of increasing infections in countries such as Algeria, Libya, Morocco and Somalia. The main route of transmission is unprotected sexual contact, although injecting drug use is becoming more significant and is the primary route in both Libya and Iran. The prevalence of HIV in all populations is low, except for Sudan where despite recently intensified prevention efforts, HIV knowledge remains generally poor.
>>

Posted by: UK Infidel Lover at March 22, 2007 7:56 PM

I'm a Republican, voted for W twice. But this is pathetic. Our troops deserve BETTER leadership. I don't give a crap what Pelosi and any other dufases think here. Helping the Iraqi people 'stand up' is amoral, it is wrong. This is a war where our 'leader's' childeren will not fight, only the poor, rural. They, the troops, deserve better than a leader who cannot admit a mistake.

Do I have this right? Everybody knows this war is a crock, that the "Iraqi people" want us dead, laugh at our dead, and we cannot "cut and run" because then they will fight us here, instead of "there." Did I get that right? Our we going to stick to the mission? Spend a few more billions to refurbish Iraq as the light onto the nations of the middle east, downtrodden because of lack of democracy(Not Islam), but lack of freedom. If only.... If only freedom would ring for the middle east, then all would be peachy. And for what? For an inability to admit a mistake?

Posted by: biorabbi at March 22, 2007 8:05 PM

Hugh, everyone, view this clip of Iraqi MP Al-din;

http://youtube.com/watch?v=HzLnMk-bO8w

This new voice, the voice of Democratic Freedom, is being heard in Arab political debate for the first time in thousands of years.

If we leave, the voice of the Al-dins will be silenced by the professional evil element that has enslaved the Arab peoples for thousands of years.

Staying will allow the debate to continue, and if it continues the Al-dins will win.

Posted by: Jesse at March 22, 2007 8:23 PM

Regan let Sunni and Shi'a fight it out for 8 years. Does anyone recall it making any difference? He helped both sides to one degree or another. Two years later we found ourselves directly involved. We have been directly involved sense in one way or another. All one can really say about those 12 years is we didn't have any Pilots shot down from the Military Equipment our "friends" sold to them. The same "Friends" that sucked off Saddam's Tit.

Islam has been doing the hack and stab to each other for 1200 years. Weakening itself, as it were. But they still managed to find the time to do the hack and stab on us. Given that historical perspective. Assuming letting Islam hack and stab themselves a little bit more in to days day and age. Is no assurance that they will be preoccupied enough to keep them from continuing to hack and stab us.

Especially considering how the MSM is putting all the effort possible to insure Our House is open for them to do so.

There once was a time when we Moralized the removal of the Native American Civilization. Only today, the men of letters have used that to denounce everything we, as a Nation has accomplished since. Using it as a pretext to tear our Country down.

So how does one expect history to view us at some future time if the only option we chose was the path of Genocide? Of a magnitude unheard of in all of Mans History.

Actually, what is the point of Roberts efforts to get Islam to reform if we willingly walk away from the only Governmental system that even has a hope of bringing it to fruition?

1200 years of Islam killing each other has not changed it. Wishful thinking will not make it go away. Pretending it doesn't exist is foolish, and Surrender isn't a viable option.

I would much rather have our future History written in such a way that it can be definitely said that we exhausted all the options available before we were forced to vaporize them.

I would say that doing anything less would be Inhuman.

Posted by: flowerknife_us at March 22, 2007 8:34 PM

Hugh:
Would it be immoral for Americans to leave Iraq...

Nope. Abandon them. You showed good faith.

But lets point out one other thing:

9/11 happened. 19 men.
And USA response was to
-go to war in Afghanistan
-go to war in Iraq

None of those 19 people were from Afghanistan or Iraq.

They were
15 Saudi Arabian, 2 United Arab Emirates, 1 Lebanese and 1 Egyptian

On the basis of that, it is perfectly adequate for the USA to go to war against Saudi Arabia.

Posted by: UK Infidel Lover at March 22, 2007 8:39 PM

More from Iyad Jamal Al-Din;

-------------------------------------------------
"You cannot plant democracy in a country that rejects it. Freedom does not come through learning how to read and write. Freedom, like love, is an inner feeling. If you are not free, no force in the world can liberate you. Freedom is a will within the individual, and, unfortunately, this wonderful and beautiful individual in our countries has been distorted by the fraudulent Islamic culture."
-------------------------------------------------

-------------------------------------------------
"Democracy is the religion of the dollar and serves its global interests. This dollar has a spirited life – it is dear, honorable, and loveable. It gets vexed real quickly, get it? Dollar has a religion. The religion of the dollar is democracy. This applies to the entire world, because the dollar cannot thrive in dictatorial countries, but only in democracies. For the sake of their global economy, [the Americans] establish democracy. We, the oppressed and slaughtered peoples, have seen nothing but stupid dictators or wise dictators. It's one of the two. Wise dictators pave roads and build houses, but they are still dictators. On the other hand, there are stupid dictators, like our friend who has gone. We are very far from democracy. It is inconceivable that we endured this humiliation and tyranny for 1,400 years, yet we are unable to create a democracy. Even after 1,400 years, our culture is still..."
------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------
"We do not hold ourselves accountable. This is why America came to demand that the Arabs be accountable. We must have more self-confidence and be accountable before others hold us accountable. we must discipline ourselves before the Americans and English discipline us. We must maintain human rights, which we have neglected for 1,300 or 1,400 years, to this day - until the arrival of the Americans, the Christians, the English, the Zionists, or the Crusaders - call them what you will. They came to teach you, the followers of Muhammad, how to respect human rights."
-------------------------------------------------

-------------------------------------------------
"Arab countries, especially those bordering with Iraq, can do a lot. We know that Saudi Arabia is also afflicted by terrorism. Many Arab countries are also afflicted by terrorism. But they are both the victim and the hangman at the same time. I was surprised when the crime in Sharm Al-Sheik occurred, those terrorist attacks. I followed the events on one of the Egyptian channels, and saw Egyptian intellectuals publicly justify terrorism, although the crime took place in their own country, and they were its victims. They said that this was the result of the Arab-Israeli conflict and the outcome of the situation in Iraq - as if we have nothing to do with terrorism and the culture of hatred. We produce terrorism."
-------------------------------------------------

-------------------------------------------------
"What is happening in Iraq is a real massacre and a real war between truth and falsehood, between a democratic government which relies on the public, and the remnants of the Umayyad, Abbasid, and Ottoman tyranny. Iraq will be a cemetery for them and for those behind them. "
-------------------------------------------------

Posted by: Jesse at March 22, 2007 8:41 PM

To all; please watch the clip in my March 22, 2007 08:23 PM post.

Can any of you can say we should leave after watching that????

I'm told most Americans would be surprised by how many feel just like Iyad Jamal Al-Din does.

We must not abandon them.

Posted by: Jesse at March 22, 2007 8:45 PM

flowerknife_us:
So how does one expect history to view us at some future time if the only option we chose was the path of Genocide? Of a magnitude unheard of in all of Mans History.

There are other options.
What many Americans do not realise (and other nations) is that America is very generous with financial help. It gets a lot of complaints. But little praise.

For all its ideological faults, Bush's PEPFAR fund has helped many countries with health problems.

All it would take is for the USA (sand other Western countries) to withdraw their help.
And make energy deals with non-OIC countries.
OIC countries would wither.
There is no reason why our big pharm companies should operate in OIC countries. Reduce technology deals. It can be done.

So without a "war", but a war nonetheless, we can prune the Islamic countries, right down.

And we should cut Saudi funds to Western Mosques overnight.

Posted by: UK Infidel Lover at March 22, 2007 8:49 PM

I agree with Hugh's position 100%.

I have read all posts challenging his thesis (in this essay and previous) and none of them persuade me otherwise.

Giving Irag a chance at democracy after Saddam's removal was a bold and noble policy. Without knowing then (invasion) what I know know about the true Islam and the Jihadist threat, I supported my President 100%. A Gore, Kerry or Clinton would probably not even made the attempt to democracize Iraq, let alone remove Saddam for the threat that he was.

But it has been over 4 years. It has failed and it will never succeed. I have since educated myself to know what the threat of Islamic Jihad is all about and it scares the hell out of me.
I can only hope that my President will take the time to the errors in his belief the Islam is a reigion of peace that has been hijacked yada yada yada...

The reasons why we must leave and why it a democratic Iraq cannot succeed is very simple:

1. Iraq's own new consitution adopts Sharia law!

2. The deep seated hatred of Islamist against themselves (Sunni v Shia) and the West will not be remedied by anything that we can do.

You cannot maintain a democracy under the strict precepts of Sharia law. Democracy requires more than one voice in the administration of government. Dissent and debate are essential. Freedom of speech is therefore required, so is a free press, and equality of rights among citizens. Those rights cannot and will not be recognized. Without them you cannot honestly call it a democracy.

We are wasting our time over there if Iraqis plan to use Sharia as a basis of law. They will be right back to where they were 5 years ago and democracy will be rejected.

Also, I don't understand Hugh to suggest a "cut and run" strategy of the type advanced by the left and as some have attributed to him. I beleive he said that withdrwal with a clear statement of a new policy and startegy.

Along thos lines, the our president could contain in an announcement of withdrwal, in part, the following:

"At home, the line of defense is clear. It is our border. My new strategy calls on us to think of our border as more than just a line on a map. We need to see the border as a cultural line also, a defining line of freedom against proponents of sharia, which, I cannot emphasize enough, poses a direct threat to our founding principles of liberty and equality. It is that simple. There is a crucial military component to the anti-sharia defensive, which I will outline momentarily. But without taking civil precautions at the border, even a decisive military victory abroad could be nullified by non-violent means at home.

How? Through largely unregulated immigration of peoples from "sharia states" -- those regions whose governing traditions derive, wholly or in some important part, from the edicts of Islam. If such an influx continues, Islamic law will be accommodated, adopted and even legislated, at least in some jurisdictions, according to majority will. We know this to be true because such a "sharia shift" is already transforming what sociologists call post-Christian Europe into an increasingly Islamic sphere. If we do not want to see such changes here, we must act. Accordingly, I am asking Congress to amend our laws to bar further Islamic immigration, beginning with immigration from sharia states. This, the most crucial domestic component of my anti-sharia program, will undoubtedly be regarded as the most controversial because it necessitates making a definitive judgment against the laws promulgated by Islam, a religion. This may appear to go against our cherished tradition of religious tolerance, not to mention good manners. But if the laws promulgated by Islam directly threaten freedom of conscience, freedom of expression and religion, women's rights and key concepts of equality -- and they do -- it is a sign of intellectual rigor mortis not to say so. And I do say so, but, again, not to launch a transformative military or cultural offensive against Islam, but to initiate the mobilization of a defensive movement to prevent the Islamization of American law and liberty. "

The above paragraphs was written by commentator Diana West at townhall.com (8/26/06) as a proposed written statement from the President addressed to the citizens of the US and the world upon announcing withdrawal.

Withdrawal and a policy statement like the above would put the US in a better position to deal with Iran in a way that we must deal with them. Who among us would argue the IMprobabilty that a nucleur bomb in the hands of Iranians will be used against the West or Isreal eventually?
By the time any such policy annoncement of the type mentioned could be announced nucleur Pakistan will most likely have new leadership with no one we would want as leader with his hands on the BIG button. We need to deal with that threat as well.

Our concentration of efforts against the Jihadist threat can take place first at our borders, second at the threats outside our borders.

We need to exit Iraq now and concentrate efforts against the bigger picture presented by the global jihad threat.

Posted by: Al E. Baba at March 22, 2007 9:24 PM

Jesse
Can any of you can say we should leave after watching that????

I'm told most Americans would be surprised by how many feel just like Iyad Jamal Al-Din does.

We must not abandon them.

And do what exactly Jesse?
Your letting your emotions run you.
Lets consider from reason:

What exactly do you propose?
That America has soldiers staying in Iraq for 40 years, 60 years? That it stays until the job is done (in Bush's thinking)?

Hugh is 100% right.
And this is falicious reasoning.
The job will never be done.
Have you seen the latest polls?
With the exception of the Kurds, the Iraqi Sunni and Shia want all foreign troop out.
That is unlikely to alter.
There will be constant stream of Muslims waging war against the coalition until they are gone.
You were sold a lie that Iraq could ever have democracy as we know it.

Unfortunately we cannot support individuals or communities in the Middle East. We can hope that Muslims might become less savage but it is unlikely. Wecan possibly accept refugees, but that is it.

Our best option to save the West as a whole is pull out, reevaluate the position, pass laws and reconsider the Muslim problem. If they wish to kill each other, let them.

Staying, just means prolonging the agony for our troops. There is and never has been no "winning", it is an illusion. It relies on Muslims wanting the same things we want - which they dont.

Posted by: UK Infidel Lover at March 22, 2007 9:47 PM

Jesse says:

Staying will allow the debate to continue, and if it continues the Al-dins will win.

I respectfully disagree.

I am moved by this gentleman's statements. But what are the chances that his voice will continue to be heard. The millions of other Iraqis who disagree with him may, when given the opportunity, silence him, in the most violent way, without fear of punishment under Islamic/Sharia law.

Is not speaking against the Islam religion blasphemy which the Koran prohibits upon pain of death? I wonder what the other 3 persons ( of what appearred to be a 4 guest panel) were going to say to him in reply? I didn't see anyone shaking heads in agreement. My money bets they were salivating at the chance to rip this guy apart (in the figurative and the literal) at first chance. I wouldn't sell Mr Al Din a life insurance policy after that speech.

I feel for the Al Dins of the Islam world. They are courageous but too few in number. The odds are stacked against him.

If we could cherry pick those Muslims who we would accept as immigrants to our country this guy should be on the top of that list.

How many American soldiers should die on the outside chance that the Al Dins of Iraq will
be in the majority some day when their own laws, which they were free to accept or reject when adopting their consitution, assist in keeping the minority view silenced?

Posted by: Al E. Baba at March 22, 2007 10:16 PM

"Hugh is 100% right."

How do you or Hugh know that to be true?

Who would have guess that east Europe/USSR would change the way it did, and in such a short amount of time?

Who would have guess the hundreds of years old warrior culture of Japan could change the way it did after WW2?

The Arab world has been held in dark ages by its leaders up to now - voices like Al-Dins have never before been heard. and now the light of Democratic Freedom comes, many are seeing that light for the first time, the debate is young, and yet many here would abandon them after four short years.

I can't believe it, and will never agree.

I guess I need more apathy, need to care about my new brothers in freedom less, to see it your way.

Posted by: Jesse at March 22, 2007 10:16 PM

"But what are the chances that his voice will continue to be heard."

Leaving will assure it will be zero.

"The millions of other Iraqis who disagree with him may, when given the opportunity, silence him, in the most violent way, without fear of punishment under Islamic/Sharia law."

Got hard data about the "millions of other Iraqis who disagree with him"?

What I hear outside the MSM is that "most" Iraqis think like him.

The Iraqi professional criminal element continually making MSM headline news has already tried to silence him, and failed.

The guy in the upper left (Dr. Walid Phares) does agree, he knows and embraces the concepts of Democratic Freedom. The others were listening at least, who knows what they were thinking.

The situation and political debate in Iraq is still very fluid, some of you act like it is static, like minds not in agreement with Al-Din will never be changed.

Oh well, it looks like we will be there until 3-2008 at least, let's continue this converstion then.

Posted by: Jesse at March 22, 2007 10:39 PM

If the Americans stay, and squander another 150-200 billion, and take another 800 dead, and another 7,000 seriously wounded, what would be the result? Suppose, for a bit, the Shi'a pretend to offer the Sunnis what the Sunnis, for a bit, pretend to accept? So what? How does that further the interests of Infidels world-wide?

The Shari'a is already the final law of Iraq. Just as no law, in this country, will stand that is held to violate the American Constitution (that's what constitutional law is all about), in Iraq, no law can violate the Shari'a. And this in a Constitution which, if anything, will be ignored in one direction and one direction only - in favor of Islam.

Already, throughout Iraq, one can see the reappearance of the women forcibly dressed in the chador (or burqa, or abaya, or whatever it is called in the Iraqi rather than the Iranian or full-body version of the Saudis or the Afghani women). Already liquor stores have been destroyed and salesmen, usually Christians, killed. Already the country has re-islamized, in the south, and in the west, and to keep thinking that the country is full of advanced secularized chalabis and makiyas, or the bloggers with their brave but unrepresentative blogs (at another thread, a few days ago, someone kept insisting that the "representative" Iraqi was the man who runs "Iraq the Model" -- utter nonsense). \

Bush has a history of making bad investments, and then being bailed out by others. He doesn't know when to "cut and run." He doesn't understand how one takes in new information, and acts upon it. He may think he's got Islam's number, but it is clear, from both public and private evidence, that he is precisely as bewildered, as unwiling or simply unable to comprehend, that the whole world does not want what he thinks (possibly also incorrectly) what he, Geoge Bush, the unthinking child of privilege, assumes everyone wants, and will satisfy everyone. Muslims, in particular, are taught to inhabit a very particular mental universe. Some manage to ignore, or ignore in part, the habit of mental submission, and begin to think for themselves. But in the Muslim lands, it is a very rare and very difficult thing. A few even of the richest Arabs, living in London, a very few - for so many simply accept and wallow delightedly in the most decadent aspects of the West, and find nothing hypocritical about, at home, cutting the limbs off of domestic workers for the most minor of infractions, while they engage in wholesale sinning of every conceivable kind.

Bush isn't up to it. And apparently, many people who become more incensed by those who hate Bush -look at some or many of the so-called "conservative" websites, are not "conservative" at all. Or rather, they are "knee-jerk conservatives." Bush at Any Cost. the War in Iraq At Any Cost.

They are fools. And they will find that other things, things that really matter, will suffer if they continue this mad policy of supporting Bush's...mad policy.

Posted by: Hugh at March 22, 2007 11:17 PM

Hugh - as a follow-up to the previous thread, just wanted to say thanks for posting this.

Al E. Baba: "I feel for the Al Dins of the Islam world. They are courageous but too few in number. The odds are stacked against him. If we could cherry pick those Muslims who we would accept as immigrants to our country this guy should be on the top of that list."

And the brothers from ITM as well. Of course the glaring question is - why can't we "cherry pick" Muslims such as these as immigrants? That is precisely what we should be doing. Presumably its because we've lost control of our immigration services. Islamists must have deeply penetrated them, insuring that we get a large influx of Hezbollah-type supporters while denying entry to the likes of Assyrian Christians trying to flee Iraq. It's truly sickening.

Posted by: Caroline at March 22, 2007 11:19 PM

At whatever point in the future we pull out, someone will fill the void and impose some Islamic values on the country again. It will never be otherwise.

[...]
Given that Iraq and Afghanistan will fail, militarily, politicians need to ask, "do we want the battles here?" If not, we need to do something about Muslims in the West.

Posted by: UK Infidel Lover

I am with you on all points. VERY logical. All the rest is conjecture. When Bush proclaimed MISSION ACCOMPLISHED that was the time to leave.

SHUT OUR BORDERS and let alla sort 'em out.

Posted by: Allahfanculo at March 23, 2007 1:09 AM

Thanks Hugh,
I totally agree that it would not be wrong for Brits,Americans,Australians and all other western nations to withdraw from Iraq.It would also not be a defeat, just an acceptance that "you can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear".
With the state of the world it makes more sense for the western nations to withdraw and protect their own borders,whilst keeping a good weather eye on the behaviour of the Middle East and making STRONG preparation to step in hard and fast when things become too stupid, as they undoubtedly will.
The main duty now is to our own countries. To remove the dangerous elements within them and to get western civilization back on track. To stop continuing appeasement of those who cannot be appeased and to refuse to allow all those with the 7th. century,Arab mentality to live in our shores.
Long live democacy.....but we have to work at it.

Marilyn

Posted by: marilyn at March 23, 2007 2:59 AM

flowerknife_us said

1200 years of Islam killing each other has not changed it.

What has changed over 1200 years is the level of (infidel-developed) technology, and the amount of money available to support the jihad (supplied by infidels via petrodollars). 1200 years ago, a jihadist was limited to the number of people he could stab to death in their sleep (see numerous examples in the hadith). Today, a jihadist can crash an infidel airliner into an infidel skyscraper, killing thousands. That same level of technological advance works on intra-Islam violence as well. True, they hate infidels more than they hate each other, but they do really hate each other. Don't underestimate the ability of a thrill-kill death cult to turn inwards on itself, an ability that must be nurtured at every opportunity.

Posted by: special_guest at March 23, 2007 5:33 AM

Hugh Fitzgerald might be right that the best policy would be to leave Iraq. But such a policy, however announced -- and especially how it would likely be announced (i.e., not as Hugh would announce it) -- such a policy would be understood

1. by much of the world as a profound failure of American power and

2. by jihadists worldwide as a HUGE victory for jihad. Our withdrawal would likely do wonders for jihadist morale everywhere. Imagine jihadists defeating, or thinking they have defeated, the hyperpower that created airplanes, nuclear weapons, computers, and so much else that the jihadist finds terribly humiliating about the modern world! The jihadists would so to speak beat their breasts like King Kong and surge forward in ever greater numbers.

Furthermore, if we leave and all out civil war emerges in Iraq, or a wider regional war opens up, I see little indication from past behavior that any sizable number of Muslims will, as Hugh has sometimes suggested, look inward and blame Islam. Some studies show that religious fanatics only become more fanatical when reality disconfirms religious expectations or makes the religion look like it has failed. Also, dictators of the Middle East, in control of their press, media, and public opinion, will assure that that opinion places most blame for wars on outside factors, especially on the U.S. And that tendency to shift blame for one's problems onto the U.S. will only be encouraged by much of European and world opinion, which for its own reasons seems likely to blame the U.S. for whatever happens following a U.S. withdrawal.

All that said, Hugh might still be right in advocating withdrawal from Iraq.

Is the so-called surge failing? Is Baghdad being pacified? There are some signs of success in pacification. In any event, for better or worse, the administration is apparently going to get at least this one last chance to get Iraq "right" -- not to establish Iraq as a democratic light unto the nations -- but to create a relatively decentralized and moderate system in Iraq. But if the new war leader, Petraeus, fails with the surge, all this discussion will perhaps be moot, because Americans have been growing increasingly anxious to be done with this war.

Posted by: traeh at March 23, 2007 6:24 AM

Apparently, we are dammed for being there and we will be dammed for leaving.

What options available to us are more difficult to achieve.

Staying in Iraq, or closing our borders to Immigration and kicking the Muslims out?

Posted by: flowerknife_us at March 23, 2007 7:17 AM

Whether one agrees with what Hugh Fitzgerald has written or not, one must give him credit for this text because in the environement where the artificial divide between followers of George W. Bush and the neocons on one side and islamic apologists and leftist moonbats on the other is being imposed on the general public, Mr. Fitzgerald with this text has presented us with an example of a patriotic dissenting discourse. That said, it is a sad state of affairs when such a well-reasoned text is relegated to the web and blogosphere while the mainstream publications hold only the rantings of Kagans and Kristols on one hand and Michael Moores and D'Souzas on the other.

For the record I mostly agree with what you said with one reservation. It concerns Iran taking over thi Shi'a areas in Iraq and possibly the whole country. Before the US withdraws they must make sure the sunnis and the Kurds are strong enough to repel anything Iran might throw at them and thus keep them busy for a long period. Otherwise, it might be disastrous for the interests of our civilisation.

PS. Just one technical remark, Mr.Fitzgerald. The 6th paragraph starts with "It is immortal for Bush and others..." I assume it's a typo and you meant:"It is immoral for Bush and others..."

Posted by: Witch-king of Angmar at March 23, 2007 7:39 AM

"Just one technical remark, Mr.Fitzgerald. The 6th paragraph starts with 'It is immortal for Bush and others...' I assume it's a typo and you meant:'It is immoral for Bush and others...'
-- from a posting above

Yes. It has been corrected.

A mistake I've made before, incidentally, but always in the other direction, and only in my thoughts:

"I have immoral longings in me..."

Posted by: Hugh at March 23, 2007 10:58 AM

Witch-king of Angmar:
For the record I mostly agree with what you said with one reservation. It concerns Iran taking over thi Shi'a areas in Iraq and possibly the whole country. Before the US withdraws they must make sure the sunnis and the Kurds are strong enough to repel anything Iran might throw at them and thus keep them busy for a long period. Otherwise, it might be disastrous for the interests of our civilisation.

It wont matter Witch-king.
Believe you me, there are other parties in the Middle East willing to keep Iran in check.

Saudi Arabia has already announced that if the USA & UK pull out of Iraq, then they will support the miniority Sunni.

You might remember last year war between Israel & Hezbollah. What you might not remember was that Saudia Arabia, the rest of peninsula and North Africa were silent. They did not like what they saw, that is, the Shia becoming dominant. But they could not say anything as they were acting against the old enemy - how could they disapprove? But they WILL do something.

So all we need to do, is pull out, Bush and Blair can suffer some serious face loss, make sure our damaged soldiers have a good holiday and whatever they need in terms of long-term healing and enjoy the Middle East fireworks.
Watch Islam weaken. And dont take in refugees that are Muslim, only non-Muslim

Posted by: UK Infidel Lover at March 23, 2007 1:35 PM

"Watch Islam weaken. And dont take in refugees that are Muslim, only non-Muslim"

But right now there is zero evidence that the US at least would adopt such a policy. In contrast, there is every indication that if Iraq collapsed in anarchy, we would let the refugees in here. This is a major flaw in Hugh's overall strategy for encouraging strife in the Muslim world, as long as this (our overall immigration policy) remains the way it is. And certainly there are no signs of it changing in the near future. In fact, someone posted the other day a projection by the UN of continued unprecedented immigration of 3rd world countries into more advanced countries for the next 30 years or so. In fact, one could argue that a stable, peaceful, prosperous ME would cause a reverse exodus of Muslims back to the ME, especially if some minimal pressures were put on Muslims here that made it difficult to practice their religion. In such a case, if they had no other excuse, they would be obligated to return to the ME where they could practice Islam more freely . I'm just playing the devil's advocate here. The news a while back that we might take in hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees came as something of a shock. Obviously the international community would throw the Pottery Barn thing at us and insist that we take them in and I find it difficult in the current PC climate to imagine a scenario in which we would refuse to do so.

So Hugh - while I theoretically agree with what you are saying, if pragmatically it would lead to an influx of Iraqi refugees to the US (and I very much doubt it would be the Christians) how do we deal with that? It isn't enough to say that well then, we shouldn't take them in! Because there is a strong probability that we would actually be forced to take them in. I don't know the answer. I just think the refugee question is going to have to figure centrally into every decision we make with regard to how we proceed in the ME and I'm not sure that the course you advocate has factored that in in any realistic way. At the very least, every time you advocate standing back and letting the natural divisions in Islam flourish, you probably ought to at least mention that we should take no refugees resulting from any crisis caused because I'll bet that a great many people reading your prescriptions and taking them to heart and appreciating the basic logic, will simply not have thought that far ahead to the refugee consequences. But the 2 issues go hand in hand so I think it would be helpful to mention this potential side effect to warn people that if they indeed accept your advice here, then they need to recognize this likely secondary consequence and be prepared to say NO. But then, as I have indicated previously, I would certainly want to take in the ITM brothers. But there must be many others that our military knows in Iraq - many people they have personally bonded with. How many such people are there? There could be a great many. Who would vet them if they needed to flee here? So it all goes together - the morality issue goes hand in hand with the refugee problem as well.

Posted by: Caroline at March 23, 2007 9:23 PM

"it [American withdrawal from Iraq] would lead to an influx of Iraqi refugees to the US (and I very much doubt it would be the Christians) how do we deal with that?"
-- from a posting above

Are you suggesting that the American government has no way to keep Iraqis claiming ot be "refugees" out? It has no way of getting other surrounding countries to take the Sunni Arabs who may leave? The Shi'a Arabs can stay right there; after all, they've inherited Iraq. The Christians and Mandeans can go to Syria, where no doubt the Alawites would welcome more Christians as a barrier against the Sunni Arabs, or to the Christian parts of Lebanon, or -- I have written about this -- possibly to the so-called "West Bank" but only in an exchange of populations with the local Muslim Arabs, who at this stage should be encouraged to leave by being presented with the permanent bleakness of their future prospects -- a bleakness that the Israelis, backed by a more intelligent West, can offer in the best possible way: by saying that Israel is there to stay, and that's it.

And it is important for there to be a Christian, but not an islamochristian presence, in what Christians consider to be the Holy Land. Ideally, it would consist of non-Arab Christians, or at least of non-"Palestinian" Christians -- Maroniites would be fine. What would those Chaldeans and Assyrians be like? I don't know, but if they are fleeing what is now too-Muslim Iraq, I suspect their understanding of Islam as a permanent menace has suddenly increased. And they might find the role of being Christian witnesses, or physical embodiments of Christianity, in the Holy Land a task that not only would give them support abroad, but they would be helpful to the West, as translators, as agents, as "comprehenders" of Islam -- quite unlike the MESA Nostra apologists, and the Muslims now being employed, incredibly, to "teach our troops" about Islam.

Yes, Christians from Iraq, properly vetted, might be useful in the Infidel war effort, from here on out. Nota Bene: Properly vetted.

Posted by: Hugh at March 24, 2007 9:49 AM

Caroline:
In fact, someone posted the other day a projection by the UN of continued unprecedented immigration of 3rd world countries into more advanced countries for the next 30 years or so.

Very very likely. For the past 40 years, the UN has funded development in Africa (World Bank, ILO etc) and there is precious little to show for it. It is quite depressing. They are all decolonised, but nearly every country is a basket-case. Kenya, Nigera, CAR, Cameroon : mired in corruption. Tunisia, Togo, Egypt, Libya, Uganda, Zimbabwe are all dictatorship, some slightly more benign than others.
Others have Wars (Lords Resistance Army in Northern Uganda, Congo) or famine or genocide. The West is obsessed with Darfur in Sudan yet the war in Congo has been going on longer.

The telling thing for all of these countries is little respect for the rule of law.

Caroline:
In fact, one could argue that a stable, peaceful, prosperous ME would cause a reverse exodus of Muslims back to the ME, especially if some minimal pressures were put on Muslims here that made it difficult to practice their religion. In such a case, if they had no other excuse, they would be obligated to return to the ME where they could practice Islam more freely . I'm just playing the devil's advocate here.

Again very true.
But how do we get the ME stable?
It is impossible for us to sort out someone elses country. it has been tried before and I cannot recall any successes.

So tightening the borders are a must.
And exempting our countries from certain clauses on the 1951 Helsinki convention on refugees is a must. It can be argued that it has been abused and these days we are seeing more and more of economic migrants - not true refugees.
None of the ME countries are quite in the league of certain African countries south of the Sahara, therfore I see no reason to accept them.

In the case of Iraqi refugees, many of them are in Syria, Jordan & Saudi Arabia - so hopefully they will continue going to these countries.
I think the ones knocking at Western doors are well educated - doctors, bankers.

Posted by: UK Infidel Lover at March 24, 2007 11:03 PM

Reducing a Populations ability to conduct the everyday acts of life in a comfortable manor. Would be the best way to keep them occupied on endeavors other than wishing us dead. Well, they may actually dislike us even more. They just will be unable to do much about it.

No Power, no Communications, no Sewers, No running water, No fuel for transportation...

Make Al Gore happy by making Iran go "Green" over night.

Then spread the program to other Countries as the need arises.

Let them fight over their Daily Bread and the search for comfortable Stones.

Posted by: flowerknife_us at March 25, 2007 11:07 AM