There's such a huge gap between the politically possible and the facts I'm not sure anything can bring the "West" (liberal democracies) back to reality. The Left is courting those who wage the jihad conquest through funding, da'wa, demography, dhimmitude, litigation, and political activism. The Right sometimes finds common ground on moral issues. Anyone could be vulnerable to the Saudi-Arab golden parachute (State Department, GHWB, and WJC, to name three). Academia, critical in a "long war," has sold out almost completely.

The rational middle is getting crushed from all sides.

Posted by: Beagle at May 28, 2006 10:33 AM

On the other hand, opinion polls suggest the majority of people in the United States and Germany, among other nations, have learned a thing or two about Islam. The political elites have never been so disconnected from their subjects, ahem, citizens.

Posted by: Beagle at May 28, 2006 10:44 AM

Your essay should be published in every American newspaper and sent to every U.S. soldier in Iraq and Afghanistan. A microcosm of the real Islamic world is playing out right now in Gaza -- a paralyzed government, a failed economy, and rival militias shooting it out in the streets. Meanwhile, Muslim refugees from this chaos are pouring into Western countries bringing with them their baggage of premodern customs, tribal separatism, and high birth rates. It's like watching a train wreck in slow motion.

Posted by: Chris at May 28, 2006 11:02 AM

Hugh:

I post here very rarely, but I always enjoy reading your missives, especially when Turkey and the slow demise of Kemalism is the topic.

I am the son of a retired U.S. diplomat, and I happen to have been born in the same city--Salonika, Greece--as Mustafa Kemal. I also spent 5 years of my childhood in Turkey--in Izmir and then Istanbul. My brother is married to a Turkish woman, who became a U.S. citizen several years ago. Our family connection to this country runs deep.

I am distressed by the resurgence of unvarnished Islam in Turkish politics and society. It has always been there, just beneath the surface, just over the horizon. Forget, for a moment, the world-class tourist resorts, the Turkish Westernized elite ensconced in their palatial Bosphorus abodes, and the EU process. Turkey is still Turkey--99% Muslim, thanks to historical purges of Christians and Jews that was largely complete by the 1950's.

Ataturk was a secular, hard-drinking, womanizing genius. He was also a benevolent dictator who fully understood the power of Islam, and did everything within his power to constrain it: the changes he imposed on Turkey in the 1920s and 1930s were breathtaking.

I still love much about Turkey: the beauty of the country, the remarkable hospitality of its people, and the food that is, by any measure, probably the best I have ever had. But 99% Muslim is just that.

Turkey's decision to disallow U.S. troops from using the country for a northern front in the Iraq campaign was not really a rebuke of the United States so much as a fear of further igniting the Kurdish situation which had plagued the country for decades, and was only recently pacified shortly before the Iraq war.

My bigger fear is the ever-growing Islamist presence in politics and even business. If Kemalism is further weakened, the country will spiral downward. Of that, I have no doubt.

Iraq is a completely different story. It's not even a real country, and never was. It is 3 or 4 Ottoman provinces sewed together and first called a "country" by the British after WWI. There will never be a unified democratic Iraq. Never. Only a thug like Saddam could even maintain the semblance of Iraqi nationalism.

I did not disagree with the invasion of Iraq. However, the goal should have been to remove Saddam, capture him, and kill him on the spot, and then retreat. It know this goes against the "Pottery Barn" rule (i.e., you break it, you own it), but too bad. We could have sent 150,000 Mother Teresas into Iraq, and we still wouldn't have a prayer of "winning hearts and minds."

Maybe the silver lining in the Iraq fiasco is that we can say, "look, we actually tried, but they're not capable of democracy." It may set a precedent that is valuable in the long run.

Our military, God bless them, is primarily meant to break things and, yes, kill people. 20 year old Marines are not diplomats, nor should they be.

Have a great Memorial Day Weekend, everyone.

Posted by: Matt at May 28, 2006 11:19 AM

"And fury, absolute fury, among the American people who watch the idiocy continue."

I'd substitute the word "see" for "watch", and "those American people" for "the American people" -- to avoid the naturally understood, but ostensibly incorrect, implication that all, or even a majority, of the American people are furious at the idiocy.

"And fury, absolute fury, among those American people who see the idiocy continue."

There, that's better: I can see a little more clearly without those infrared-tinted spectacles.

Posted by: Television at May 28, 2006 11:45 AM

Islam is it's own worse enemy'

Let us, watch it destroy itself, by our hand.
Papa Ray
West Texas
USA

Posted by: Papa Ray at May 28, 2006 12:14 PM

Having retired from the military, I personally feel Hugh’s posts are right on the money. The so-called leadership in today’s military does not understand the truth about islam nor do they really “lead”. Ask any American officer if he has actually read the koran and you get a blank stare or a quick “I don’t need too” at least from the majority. In all the time that has past since 9/11 (and even earlier attacks) they still spout the tired PC crapola and what is much worse, apparently believe it. Whatever happened to “know your enemy”? Many of my military brothers are still in the box, the ones who actively engage the enemy tell me they are truly making a difference and the ones with the safer jobs (never leave the wire) whine and complain it is a lost cause. Somewhere in the middle I expect the truth resides.

I don’t know which side is right nor do I feel any compassion for the iraqi people. I do not personally think that there is even a remote chance islam and democracy can flourish together. I do think the lack of attacks here at home are a direct result of kicking the crap out of al qaida and the rest of the muhammad worshipers. They are on the ropes, the war is costing them comparatively as much as it does us (much more so in human lives), it also shows the world the true face of islam. Indiscriminate bombings, attacking fellow muslims for wearing shorts and the constant senseless violence can not be hidden. I don’t think any American life is worth saving even one practicing muslim. Is it worth expanding freedom and I am hopeful many muslims will choose freedom over slavery and leave islam for good, I also realize it is not likely to happen in any great numbers.

I remain hopeful the one great victory of this fight will be forcing the entire world to choose a side. I am ever hopeful our younger troops being much more worldly then their so called PC leaders will one day rise to the highest leaderships roles and reverse the worshipers of mohammads control over our current PC leadership. Our troops grew up with massive amounts of data from a seemingly endless supply of techo gadgets. I have to believe they will see through the smoke and grow into the types of leaders we need to stay the course. My heart goes out to all our military families’ especially now. I realize my beer, BBQ and fun-filed weekend was paid for by our troops. God Bless you all, current, past and future.

Posted by: Ronin at May 28, 2006 3:01 PM

"I know this goes against the "Pottery Barn" rule (i.e., you break it, you own it), but too bad. We could have sent 150,000 Mother Teresas into Iraq, and we still wouldn't have a prayer of "winning hearts and minds."
-- from a posting above

1. The "Pottery Barn" rule applies to the Pottery Barn, not to Iraq. Iraq was broken from the beginning, broken when, despite the best efforts of the British in the 1920s, the Shi'a (and indeed some non-Shi'a in the former vilayet of Basra or Bassora) could not be brought to acquiesce in rule from Baghdad, by a Sunni elite, and that Sunni elite could not be brought to share the wealth, as it started to arrive, with the Shi'a (who took their revenge demographically, by breeding faster). The Americans "broke" nothing except the murderous despotism of Saddam Hussein. All the rest -- the Shi'a seizure of power, whether through purple thumbs or otherwise, was inevitable. The refusal of the Sunni Arabs to accept that transfer of power was inevitable. The desire and deterimination of the Kurds to work toward complete independence was inevitable.

Why does this matter?

It matters because there are some who would have us "remain in Iraq" because -- yes -- "we owe the Iraqis this." This nonsense, after so much expenditure of men, money, materiel, the very idea that we "owe" the Iraqis more than getting rid of Saddam Hussein, more than nursing them through their damned ridiculous elections and ridiculous Constitution, more than pretending that the endemic violence, hostility, aggression, conspiracy theories, crazed beliefs (beginning with the Sunni belief that they constitute not 19% of the population, but 42%), that our soldiers are supposed to observe the cowardice, the meretriciousness, the treachery of so many of those whom they have been training and trying to help -- no, we owe them nothing.

But that won't stop a thrusting young academic, a one-trick pony (the trick being that he is both an Orthodox Jew and at the same time an "Islamic scholar" -- he's even got a reference from Roy Mottahedeh to prove it -- one who keeps telling us about his moment of glory as practically the one-man author of the Iraqi "constitution" (meaningless, almost irrelevant as that document is). And his new book bears the telling title "What the United States Owes Iraq."

The United States "owes" Iraq nothing.

2. As to this "hearts and minds" business, here is a quote from an article in today's New Duranty Times (magazine section), about Pennsylvania National Guardsmen who have returned from Iraq, all of them willing to "do their duty" and none of them quite sure why they were in Iraq or what sense it made as policy. No one during the Cold War or World War II would have been confused, rendered mute, when asked if they understood why they were fighting, and whether it made sense. Every Amnerican soldier in Iraq, if he is not merely an automaton determined to parrot the party line on policy, must wonder.

Here is the excerpt:

"For Morgain [a Pennsylvania National Guardsman], the steadily mouting number of attacks on Alpha Company began to harden his views on the war. As a Humvee gunner, he occupied the most ddangoeurs position on the vehicle, but it was also the one that allowed the most face-to-face contact with ordinary Iraqi civilians, and this provided him with a unique window onto the baffling complexity of the place. At first, he enjoyed clowning with the children who would crowd around his Humvee, but as the months passed and tension mounted in the area, he recognized some of those same children among the ones now throwing bricks and pipes at him. On one occasion, he distributed shampoo to a group of grateful women in a village outside Tikrit; returning a few days later, he discovered that the women had been beatn by their husbands for accepting gifts from the Americans.

"Norris [another National Guardsman], too, had come to understand that his presence was not appreciated, or worse. His officers, he told me, "were always drumming into us: 'Hearts-and-minds, hearts-and-minds. We've got to win these people over.'" He gave a laugh. "These people just wanted us dead."
______________________

We didn't break Iraq; the American soldiers, and American taxpayers, did more to create the possibility for a decent society in Iraq than had ever been done by any of the local Arabs. We didn't lose Iraq. The Iraqis did.

And as for "hearts and minds" -- this madness shows no understanding of Islam, not merely of that learned in the mosques and madrasas, but that which suffuses a whole society, and affects the attitudes, the atmospherics, of that society and those who grow up in it, and cannot escape --as few can -- that horrifying division of the world between Believer and Infidel, that explains and colors so much.

There is no wining by Infidels of Muslim "hearts and minds." Can't be done. Oh, we can give them all kinds of things, and they will pocket whatever they can wheedle or inveigle or demand from us. But no hearts. No minds. And all we will have done is delay the moment when Muslims themselves will have to begin to make the connection between the failures, political, economic, social, intellectual, and moral, of their own societies -- which are directly connected to the belief-system of Islam, and the habit of mental submission that it inculcates. And still worse, we will continue to pursue a will-o'-the-wisp strategy and could, in so doing, further distract and weaken ourselves at a time of maximum peril.

Posted by: Hugh at May 28, 2006 3:15 PM

"the ones [American soldiers] who actively engage the enemy tell me they are truly making a difference and the ones with the safer jobs (never leave the wire) whine and complain it is a lost cause..."
-- from a posting above

What does "making a difference" mean? Does it mean, helping the Shi'a-dominated government against the Sunnis who are through attacks actively refusing to accept the new order, or against those outsiders who are, through attacks, showing their hatred of the Shi'a for being "Rafidite dogs" and the Americans for being garden-variety Infidels? What does "making a difference" mean in the only way that would matter, which is to further Infidel aims, and weaken the camp of Islam? Why is making a strong unified nation-state in Iraq, as opposed to letting the ethnic and sectarian fissures grow and have effects even elsewhere in the Muslim world, the right course? What sense does it make? Just because Bush and the most obedient, least questioning, most party-line of generals keep parroting this, what sense does it really make? Do any of the officers ask point-blank why it would not make more sense to leave, possibly supporting the Kurds from afar, and hoping that the Sunnis and Shi'a never settle their irreconcilable differences over power and money in Iraq, but that Iran, Saudi Arabia, and others outside are both threatened by internal disturbance as a result, and also are forced to use up men, materiel, and money, backing their own sides within Iraq?

What's the matter with people willing to risk their lives? All of a sudden, they are not allowed to think about what they have experienced, to make sense of it, to find the model that has explanatory and predictive value (hint: that model requires seeing Muslims, to the precise extent that they accept Islam, as that enemy).

Why such silence? Why such fear of telling Bush, Rice, Cheny and company that their obstinate inability to admit they misunderstood Islam, and hence began and have clung to false definitions ( a "war on terror") and false remedies (Iraq the Light Unto the Muslim Nations), and also misunderstood Iraq (believing that the Sunnis would ever reconcile themselves to the transfer of power to the Shi'a, or that the Kurds, having tasted more than a decade of total autonomy, would ever be satisfied with anything less, now, than independence).

What is wrong with officers? Will no one resign? Will no one point out that the experience of Iraq belies entirely the policy that stubborn, inflexible, and not terribly intelligent, but sentimental George Bush, insists on hewing to, no matter what the damage done to the American will to continue, at the very beginning of a very long war, and what the damage done to the officers and men who cannot, in the end, be fooled. They compare what they are told with what they experience, and eventually, despite that ingrained habit of not questioning orders and policies they are supposed to execute unquestioningly -- they question. And question.

Posted by: Hugh at May 28, 2006 3:43 PM

I can only guess what they mean by “making a difference” as they can only give me hints or risk inadvertent disclosure of classified information. My best calculated guess would be increased stability. Which means it is safer than before they arrived and probably more secure than in it has been in years. There are large portions of Iraq that are completely safe for our troops. They routinely drive around doing their jobs in complete safety. I realize the newfound stability is because the locals no longer have the forces to engage them safely. You can not lay IEDs and VBIEDs without local support. Do the locals support the US and not the terrorists because they agree with our goals or even want us in Iraq? No, of course not, they “allow” the presence of infidels because it protects them from other muslims who want them and their families dead.

Let me attempt to give you one soldiers answers to your other questions.

What's the matter with people willing to risk their lives? All of a sudden, they are not allowed to think about what they have experienced, to make sense of it, to find the model that has explanatory and predictive value (hint: that model requires seeing Muslims, to the precise extent that they accept Islam, as that enemy).

-Risk is part of the job, soldiers fight for their own, and saving others is at best a fringe benefit and a goal for higher leadership. Making sense of it all conflicts with the goal to survive it. Reflection can only be done when it is safe to do so. The individual soldier wants to maintain peace and stability in his own area if responsibility, the big picture is not his job. After returning home many feel questioning the mission somehow makes individual sacrifices lesson in importance. I am not one of those people. I want our military anyplace and everyplace we can kill al qaida and its supporters. I also want that mission to be driven home. You allow an IED to be placed near you and you do not report it, you are part of the problem and will be dealt with. I’m also not a win their hearts and mind kinda guy. Hold them accountable, no coddling, no quarter, no questions. Obey the laws of war, we are not animals but show no mercy. Pulling out of a fight because the enemies bodies are piling up is not a good policy, crush them.

Why such silence? Why such fear of telling Bush, Rice, Cheny and company that their obstinate inability to admit they misunderstood Islam, and hence began and have clung to false definitions ( a "war on terror") and false remedies (Iraq the Light Unto the Muslim Nations), and also misunderstood Iraq (believing that the Sunnis would ever reconcile themselves to the transfer of power to the Shi'a, or that the Kurds, having tasted more than a decade of total autonomy, would ever be satisfied with anything less, now, than independence).

-I wonder that one myself, I think they hire “advisors” from the roles of Ivy League academics who need a reality check. I totally agree the muslims are not salvageable, my consistent goal is they drop islam and free themselves. Spreading the word is part of the fight, you are much better at it than I am.

What is wrong with officers? Will no one resign?

-No point, we expect politicians to send us into harms way. I was asked once if I was a republican or a democrat. My answer was, “I vote for the person and have no loyalty to any party”. Both have sent me into harms way and both failed to give us the resources to accomplish what we were told was the mission. If I were king, GW Bush would have lived up to his promise “you are with us or against us.” I am 100% behind letting the entire world know our economic aid, humanitarian aid, even our immigration polices will reflect your cultures support for our battle for survival.

Your comments on questioning orders will not happen while we are engaged with the enemy no time to question it then. As you pointed out after several tours with time to reflect between them will have an impact and bring about changes. You will see many ex military members running for office, they will attempt to change things then. I think we are more closely allied than it first appears. We just differ on the details and methodology.

Posted by: Ronin at May 28, 2006 4:42 PM

I know foot soldiers in Iraq (not the desk soldiers or PR conscious/propoganda spewing types) and there job is to follow orders, but they are not stupid. They do not trust the Iraqis for one minute. They have to tell themselves they are making a difference, otherwise it would all be insane.

The boneheaded Neocon fantasy of spreading "freedom" and "democracy" is simply working to the benefit of the hardline fundamentalists and Jihadists. The fundamentalists can vote in their own members in government and the Jihadists have a real life University to hone their skills.

This is a plug, but if you get a chance check out Baghdad ER on HBO if you get a chance. My cousin is part of a Medevac Huey and part of the reason why 90% of our injured get back alive, though missing pieces.

Posted by: amana39 at May 28, 2006 7:38 PM

Desertions from the British army have tripled in the last three years and the proportion of it that consists of foreign nationals (including a lot of Fijians!) now stands at 10%. There have been several high profile cases of officers refusing to return to Iraq - one has been jailed. This war is unpopular: a lot of Brits felt they were conned into it and that it is going nowhere.

Posted by: wallyUK at May 28, 2006 7:57 PM

"They [American soldiers in Iraq] do not trust the Iraqis for one minute. They have to tell themselves they are making a difference, otherwise it would all be insane.

The boneheaded Neocon fantasy of spreading "freedom" and "democracy" is simply working to the benefit of the hardline fundamentalists and Jihadists."
-- from a posting above

It is "insane." It is a waste of men, money, materiel. As to what you call the "Neocon fatnasy of spreading 'freedom' and 'democracy,' I'd avoid that word "Neocon" for obvious reasons, but simply repeat that the True Believer in this fantasy, the one who thinks that History Will Absolve Me (the same motto as Fidel Castro), that someday People Will Look Back and Realize What I Did, is none other than George Bush.

On May 27 he gave a half-hour speech at West Point's Commencement. He spoke of Truman, and Truman's acting against the "fanatic faith" of Communism. But Communism was seldom as "fanatic" a faith as Islam so often has been, and Truman, unlike Bush, knew the importance of using all the instruments of warfare, and not merely combat, in the initial years of the Cold War.

And the other thing that Truman, and successive governments did, was to use propaganda to undercut the appeal of Communism, both to those in the West (in the late 1940s, the largest political parties in Western Europe were the Communist parties of Italy and France), and to those in the Communist bloc nations. Truman, and others, knew that defectors from Communism would be the surest guides as to what the Soviet government was up to, and also how to counter its appeal, its schemes, its plans. What use does the Bush Administration make of defectors from Islam -- that is, ex-Muslims, who know exactly the tricks and wiles of taqiyya, know exactly what Muslims say behind the backs of Infidels, or what appeals can be made to encourage division within the camp of Islam? None of this has come from Bush, whose only response appears to be to hallucinate about the nature of Islam, to insist as a matter of belief, unfounded, that Islam is merely being "perverted" by those who are using terror as an instrument of Jihad, and that the Infidel world will be roused to do all the things it must by being told, endlessly, that this is a "war on terror" -- a confusing, vague, and misleading phrase, for it leaves out, with criminal negligence, all the most important instruments of Jihad.

And Truman, and those who followed him, were not Messianic. They were not out to bring Paradise on Earth to everyone. They were determined to protect, in the first place, the United States, and then those countries in Western Europe that with the United States formed the West. They were not about to invade Russia, or China, or anywhere else. They were out to contain Communism.

What does Bush want? Bush tells us that this is what he wants:

"The message has spread from Damascus to Tehran that the future belongs to freedom, and we will not rest until the promise of liberty reaches every people in every nation."

Look at those lines above. Think about the quality of mind of someone who could utter such lines. He wants, this would-be Truman, to bring the "promise of liberty" to "every people in every nation." Good God. I don't. I want to rescue my own country, and Western Europe, and Israel, Australia and a few other places. And if the rest of the Infidel world can also be saved, fine. Did Churchill and FDR stop, during World War II, to bring the "promise of liberty" to "every people in every nation" -- or were they perfectly willing to aid, to the hilt, the Red Army, in order to stop Hitler? During the Cold War, were we determined to bring the "promise of liberty" to "every people in every nation" or were we simply trying to prevent the further spread of Communism and the power of the Soviet Union?

Bush's naivete, his obstinate inability to admit he has been wrong all along about Islam, and thus wrong about the usefulness of propping up a nation-state in Iraq (or Afghanistan) at such great cost to Infidels, rather than doing what he should be doing: using the sectarian and ethnic fissures in Iraq, and Afghanistan, to divide and demoralize the camp of Islam. He can't even think in those terms. They would disturb him. They are cruel. They imply a willingness not to bring toys and good things to eat to all the children on the other side of the mountain.

But I think we can't, I think we can't, I think we can't. Not when Europeans are cowed in Malmo and Rotterdam, threatend in Paris and London and Berlin, unable to stop the mosques and madrasas from being built, unable to deal with the exploitation of Western technology, especially the Internet, to spread inculcated hatred of Infidels among all the Believers, unable to keep their own psychically and economically marginal populations, including prisoners, from taking up Islam as a belief-system taht justifies sociopathic behavior, as long as the victims of that behavior are Infidels.

And here is Bush, claiming that we Americans have a duty to bring "the promise of liberty" to "every people in every nation."

He is Capt. Queeg at the Ship of State. But that Ship of State has turned out to be a Ship of Fools. No one is able to correctly identify what is so crazy about this (so far, all the criticisms have been for the wrong not the right reasons) or to force him to change his catastrophic course. We need cunning, high and low, and clever policies that will husband, not squander, the lives of those West Point graduates who received him with such unthinking hurrahs, the money, the materiel, the morale of military and civilians alike.

We all know now what a mistake has been made in Iraq -- or should. Why can't those in Washington state, simply, what has been stated here for more than two years -- and which, as the evidence piles up, appears more and more to have been exactly the correct view of the situation.

What are they waiting for?

Posted by: Hugh at May 28, 2006 8:40 PM

'Good God. I don't. I want to rescue my own country, and Western Europe, and Israel, Australia and a few other places. And if the rest of the Infidel world can also be saved, fine.'

So well put. that is the crux of the matter today. the heart of the problem that faces us all and hardly addressed by those in power.
In the same way as the velied juhad against israel hid the greater jihad against the west, The war in Iraq serves to divert our attention from the war in our own backyard and under our noses.

Posted by: chevalier de st george at May 28, 2006 10:51 PM

Ronin: "I personally feel Hugh’s posts are right on the money. The so-called leadership in today’s military does not understand the truth about islam nor do they really “lead”. Ask any American officer if he has actually read the koran and you get a blank stare or a quick “I don’t need too” at least from the majority."
Spot on, and it gets even worse... I managed to duck out of a "cultural diversity conference" on islam given by muslims at my unit. My CO thought the steaming pile of Taqqiya and Kitman was just awesome and told me "You realy need to attend this." Hopefuly, I can get the CO to read "The Politicaly Incorrect Guide to Islam and the Crusades." I purposefuly dodged the event because had I been there, I would have asked career enders like: Why is jihad excused for the unfit if it is an inner struggle? How could muhammad be in tune with God, the perfect man, and yet be a child molester at the same time? Why do Christians in muslim lands get treated like trash, etc? The military does not like people who point out that the emperor has no clothes.

Posted by: Armalite at May 29, 2006 12:21 AM

"These people just wanted us dead."
Yeah, got the same impression from their co-religionists in Afghanistan... One twerp tried to get me to say the shahadda, or whatever that devil-vodoo phase is called that makes you a muslim
I attended a briefing some of our returning Infantry gave to their sister battalion and one quote a Sergeant said stuck in my mind: "I don't trust muslim arabs and I hate muslim arabs." The pee-cee kool-aid the brass & State Dept. has brewed up isn't being drunk by the Troops, especialy after they complete a tour of duty "in the box."

Posted by: Armalite at May 29, 2006 12:29 AM

And now the new, duly selected Prime Minister of Iraq is saying that he thinks Iran's nuclear energy [read;weapons] program is just fine. Hey, isn't every country entitled to energy self-sufficiency?

Posted by: alexon at May 29, 2006 1:37 AM

There's such a huge gap between the politically possible and the facts I'm not sure anything can bring the "West" (liberal democracies) back to reality."

Cherishing the Zombie" logical-fallacy; so-called "liberal democracies" have NEVER been grounded in reality -- governments are not in the business of reality, they are in the business of mass-robbery, mass-enslavement and mass-murder (generally in that order on the sliding scale of tyranny). And...

The rational middle is getting crushed from all sides.

...anyone who hasn't intuited that on their own isn't quite up to the standards of "rational". Rather, they flounder about like sheep in a pen, obsessing over the competence of various "rightwing" and "leftwing" shepherds to deal with the wolves -- rather than standing up on their own hind legs to matters into their own hands as truly free and independent beings.

Introduction to Liberty

Posted by: Mike Schneider at May 29, 2006 7:39 AM

And so now many of the best young officers leave, and soldiers do not re-enlist, and the recruitment standards are dangerously lowered, and those who signed up for the Reserves or the National Guard in a burst of patriotism in 2002 and 2003 are disgusted by the behavior of so many of the generals who "do not get it" and keep prating about "winning hearts and minds" in Iraq, or Afghanistan......blahh blah blah.
----------------------quote.

you have only to look at the fact that karpinski didn't suffer one minute as a result of all the so-called abuse at abu ghraib---
soldiers guarding abu ghraib garbage doing hard time for nothing..karpinski,their bigdeal general walked,
Marines judged guilty again by the media drooling for another my lai,they tried to crucify ilario pantano and lost....so they continue in their quest.
embedded reporters,leftist media never exposed publicly for what it is...
85% of American mosques under radical leadership,moslems calling for the mushroom cloud and death to America unhindered and unimpeded in nyc,MSM somehow didn't know this either...
etc.
never mind the politicians doing al jazeera's work.
if "they" want to wage war on islamofascists why are THEY running it this way ?
door-door fighting ?
why ?
political correctness wins again
and
we lose.
who would want to be in any branch of THIS military with all this support of the enemy ?
would they have dared in 1941 - 1945 ?
this shouldn't be happening and is OBVIOUSLY part of the plan.
what plan ?
simply look at how our senators and bush have voted for this nation--illegals now legal,open borders,socialism.
you know any American veterans that fought for open borders and socialism ?
any presently fighting along these lines in iraq or afghanistan ?
iraq should have been a done deal 2 years ago.
AND you had better believe i have one of my children in this modern day politically correct war.

Posted by: catroina at May 29, 2006 9:09 AM

"They are now full of justified loathing not only for the Sunni insurgents or the Mahdi army boys, but also for so many in the general population who clearly are collaborating with those trying to kill the Americans, and who do so little, so unwillingly, to defend their own "Iraq."

So its justified to loathe people whos land you have raped and invaded because they fight back - but it is not justified for the people whose land has been invaded to hate their invaders

US troops are rapists and murderers

"Ben Griffin was a member of the elite SAS. He told his commanding officer, earlier this year, that he was not prepared to return to Iraq because he said he saw American forces carrying out what he thought were illegal acts. He was allowed to leave the military and he now says: "I was disturbed by the general day-to-day attitude of the American troops. They treated Iraqis with contempt, not like human beings. They had a complete disregard for Iraqi lives and property."

Posted by: truth speaker at May 29, 2006 10:08 AM

"It was even more important to begin to tell the Turkish government and people that they have to face up to this history, and in so doing, should put the blame right where it belongs: not on some fault inherent in Turks, but on Islam, which made Muslim Turks willing to massacre Christian Armenians whom they deemed in violation of their dhimma."

More spencer lies. The armenian "massacre" (assuming it even happened) was carried out by Young turks - a turkish nationalist movement opposed to islam and was dwarved by the genocide of Muslims by Armenians

"In that way, secularist Turks can claim that in taming or distancing themselves from Islam, they have tried to tame the ideological source for those mass murders in 1894-96 and then the later genocide (in its intent and scope, by many of those involved) of 1915-1920.""

so what was it that made Armenians slaughter millions of Muslim in Armenia and Azerbejan or other Christians in Eastern Europe commit genocide against Muslims in the 1910s when they defeated the Ottomans and got land from them or in the 1990s in Bosnia and Kosovo. It is time to begin to tell these governments and people that they have to face up to this history, and in so doing, should put the blame right where it belongs: not on some fault inherent in themselves, but on Christianity,

Posted by: truth speaker at May 29, 2006 10:24 AM

"Turkish film that became a box-office smash depicting those soldiers as Nazis (and with a Jewish doctor who harvests organs from Iraqis supposedly murdered at Abu Ghraib prison)."

I see. so presumably "Midnight Express" should indicate to the Turks that the US government is not the ally it thought it was

Posted by: truth speaker at May 29, 2006 10:26 AM

Hugh,
Spot on as usual!
The Ship of State really is a Ship of Fools, and it is impossible to steer or correct.
Career diplomats don't give a damn what any current administration says; politicians will be gone in a few years. Both the State Department and the CIA are infected be the Pro-Nazi, anti-Jewish bent of the Dulles boys. The elites they recruited from the Ivy league continue to rule the roost, recruiting persons just like themselves to perpetuate their idealogy. The decent people at State and CIA get shunted aside in any real policy making situations. Deliberately ignoring or misunderstanding Iraq and world Islamic intentions is stupid, which is dumb on purpose.
Dismay among soldiers and diplomats. WE may have a tough time fixing this. But we can show our fury at the ballot box, and make certain that we let Americans know the reason we threw the rascals out.

Posted by: cactus at May 29, 2006 11:41 AM

“US troops are rapists and murderers”
Posted by: truth speaker

Your sign on should be BS spreader. If you really want to defend islam go to iraq, be a real man and go martyr yourself. It should be easy for you to attack common rapists and murderers. Get to it. Oh, be real careful you chose wisely, those soldiers are the most powerful fighting force in the history of mankind. They trashed allahs two most powerful military machines, have al qaida on the ropes and reduced most muslims to fighting on the net because they are too cowardly to face them. I guess you already know that.

Posted by: Ronin at May 29, 2006 1:47 PM

The rational middle is getting crushed from all sides. Posted by: Beagle

That is linear thinking Beagle, I don't think that you are in the middle, nor on opposite ends of the pole. I most certainly am not.

My position, and apparently yours, is that I am standing outside the arena, outside the box, outside of it all looking in with horror and dismay.

Humans are afflicted with a bicameral mind, which leads to dichotomous, either A or not A, the Manichean, my team v your team mentality..when the answer is none of the above..both teams are worthless and contributory to the horror, waste of lives, energy, and resources.

If the choice is between a Vampire and a Werewolf, what choice is there? Heads they win, tails I lose.

What is needed is a new outlook, a rethink, an abandonment of the old business as usual eschatology...Hugh provides us with that compass that points the way to safety.

You stand in the rational middle if you choose, I refuse to join the bloody and doomed frey on the floor of the Circus Maximus.

Posted by: Nariz at May 29, 2006 3:28 PM

Ah Nariz, so you are the latest devotee of the Gnostic third way! This may explain why you are resentful of "dichotomous", "Manichaean" thinking even as your own post is full of it: the world divided between the impure inside the arena, and you, the honest outsider. You should know that there is no escape from binary thinking: it is a fundamental part of our anthropology, which is based on the difference between the sacred center and the desiring periphery.

Posted by: humanfolly at May 29, 2006 7:31 PM

On a recent trip back to England, where I grew up, I was quite amazed on the amount of Islamization of the culture. It seemed to me that most major facets of popular culture had at least a partial Islamic face, which had not existed when I emigrated 7yrs ago. It affected the visual media most obviously, but using the cover of liberal egalitarianism, it was gaining legal footholds. While I was there I read a newspaper article quoting the amount of money the prison service was spending to change the directions the toilets in a paticular prison faced, so that Moselms would not have to go to the bathroom while facing Mecca. As I understand the issue, Moslems should face Mecca while praying, and would only have to avoid praying while going to the bathroom to make this completely unessesary. Perhaps it is an issue with the prison food which would be better addressed.

Posted by: Haughey6 at May 29, 2006 8:58 PM

About reenlistment:

In the last seven months, the U.S. Army has met or exceeded all of its recruiting goals. In that time, over 160,000 people have enlisted, or re-enlisted. The total strength of the active duty and reserve forces are 1.2 million men and women, all of them volunteers.

* * * *

[T]he biggest asset in the recruiting effort has been the world-of-mouth from the troops themselves. They believe in what they are doing, and accomplishing. They believe they are well equipped, trained and led to do it. This angle has not gotten much press coverage, probably because so few members of the press know troops personally. The army recruits largely from the middle classes and non-urban areas. Just the kinds of places and people where you won't find journalists and pundits. When the media does address the recruiting situation, it is dismissed as not relevant. The troops are described as not "getting the big picture," or worse.

Hugh, where are you getting your information on soldiers' morale?

Posted by: m615 at May 30, 2006 2:19 AM

And all we will have done is delay the moment when Muslims themselves will have to begin to make the connection between the failures, political, economic, social, intellectual, and moral, of their own societies -- which are directly connected to the belief-system of Islam, and the habit of mental submission that it inculcates.

Hugh, you are accurate in your post. But it is this part that, I am afraid is not possible. The world let afghanistan be for quite a lot of time. They could replace islam only with more islam. Until the Marines landed, they were hacking each other. That is what iraq will descend into once we vacate. There are reports already of afghanistan falling again into taliban hands. We would be better with airbombing operations only.It is no use trying to build these countries. They are not interested in understanding the West, they just want to be the savages that they have been. Yes, you cannot win what is not there in the first place. Hearts and Minds.

Posted by: arjun.sevak at May 30, 2006 12:10 PM

I'm kind of glad that "truthspeaker" shares his/her fanatic effusions with us. He/she is so off the wall that reasonable people can only be persuaded of what most of us here at JW/DW think. Imagine, "ts" claims that the Armenians murdered "millions" of Muslims!!

Re the US leaving Iraq, I am afraid that in such case, the Iraqi Shi`ites might team up with Iran and spread the power [economic too] of the Iranian goons. And Iran would have a larger area in which to play around with WMD.

Posted by: Eliyahu at May 30, 2006 12:11 PM