So.., who are US fighting in Iraq against?

oh yes

 

I assume you disagree with what I said?

Btw, when I stated the bit about 'deluding yourself'. it was not directed at you personally

-glas-

 

nope, my yes was just plain yes.. ; that meant I found it very true, what I quoted; well don't let yourself be distracted by the fact one sentence appeared in that quote twice, that was error

 

This is quite untrue. This civilization in most of Europe is thousands of years younger than that in certain other regions like Sothern Europe and Middle East, yet peoples there seem to be more war-liking.

In Europe itself war was at high esteem during the Romantic period up until 1916. From 1917 to 1950s, though no more romantic, war continued to be considered as fully-justified instrument of practical politics by the wide public.

The pacifism of later IMHO is result of WWI and WWII. Even the countries which eventually won suffered severe psychological shock (as well as other). USA did not. Battlefield never reached the american people, they conscripted relatively small % of the population, and relatively few of them were lost - in places far away from the eyes of the civillians.
But they emerged from the war far more powerful than they entered it. In fact everything that is USA today is result of WWII.
Willingness for war in such society is logical consequence.

 

Has anyone considered that Religion is also a factor.

UK & most European Countries (e.g France, Germany) are very tolerant or indifferent in terms of Religion (as in it dosn't rule our lives).

Whereas in the Middle East and America religion is still a very dominant part of peoples lives.

Didn't Bush say that God talks to him?


Mal

 

Well that is just expression of much broader socio-cultural background of certain region/country.

Religion is very dominant part of peoples lives in countries which are not very fond of warfare too.

One has to track the evolution of particular society back to history to understand.
In case of America, more of problem seems to me to be a "property issue". This thing formed religion there or to say formed how the religion is perceived and used.
I suggest anyone to read Max Weber's "Protestant's Ethic and Spirit of Capitalism" to understand the role of religion in euro-american space.

Such perception of role of religion is however inapplicable to different socio-cultural spaces

 

Man, all those peace protesters and most of the guys here are really cracking me up. I could start and argue with you on a moral point, since as you cry out when there are bullets flying in Falluja, and could ask you what about the mass graves. You guys concur with the "Under Saddam, everything was better" approach. But this would be just too lame. You didn't give a damn about what Saddam did in Iraq, you condemned UN sanctions without recognizing that it was Saddam's refusal during all the 90's to cooperate appropiately with the UN which kept those sanctions in place. But, as I said, this would just be too lame. You didn't give a flue because you are hypocrites, but because the media didn't report much about it. Because there was no media of the free world allowed / given the opportunity to report on everything in Iraq until the Coalition liberated it. Now the media is free to pop up cameras in everyone's face, get themselves captured. So you see plenty of ugly stuff that happens in a war.

Now, many here say Babek was right with his doomsday predictions. Well, look back into the 1 year old (or whatever) discussion, and you will see me telling him he's a pessimist, and that I believe that the Iraqi people, once given the opportunity to become a prosper state again, would be not that stupid to drag themselves into a civil war (which would be the follow-up of the now occuring fight against the coalition). Maybe I was wrong at that point. But this doesn't change the SLIGHTEST. My consideration was never "might some extremists in the Arab world not be happy with coalition forces?" as a primary. I don't even care. When this happens now, it will just give this war a longer endurance, and show even more what lots of ill-minded people are running around in the Middle East.

But what Babek came up with mostly was his "tribes" stuff. I believe even he would agree with me when I say that currently (!) there are three elements in Iraq: The Coalition forces, the Iraqi people, and the Extremists. I simply do not believe that the majority of each Islamic tribe in Iraq are willing and wishing to slaughter each other. Lots of you guys confuse the Iraqi people with those Extremists. Point is again the media: Those camera guys don't go knocking on the door from house to house to grap Iraqi impressions. They sit in their hotels, and when they hear a shot or bomb go off, they run over there and grab it. Hence you get the impression that the whole of Iraq is in resistance against the Coalition. Go grab up some Iraqi opinion polls, they'll show you that the majority wants the Coalition forces to stay to provide stability, until Iraq can govern itself. BECAUSE of some mad-heads within their religious groups who are looking for a civil war. Within this majority, there are some differences though as to how long it should take. Well, seems fair enough, no country "enjoys" to be occupied. And the Americans are well aware of that problem. AS ARE the extremists. Their strategy (extremists' one) is good: Get the Iraqi people on their side. They have a simple means to achieve that goal: Fight the Coalition, and threaten off contractors. Make Iraq a from civility abandoned warezone (this is why they take hostages or kill people from ALL countries, such as Russia, China - some aid-workers are already pulling out for example), make the Americans take violent actions, make them desperate. They cannot annihilate the Coalition forces, but by simply waging war in the cities of Iraq, they can already achieve their goal, since souvereignity (doh, probably wrong typing) of a non-extremist Iraq will be dragged further an further into the future. So, when the Americans now move around and kill those thugs, it's a good idea, but this alone will not help their cause. The next very important thing which has to happen is to give as much power to Iraqi interim-government forces as possible, which would mean robbing the ground of the extremists, which play the "you are either supporting us, or are a traitor" card. The Americans are working on that though.

Just an ugly (very ugly) sidenote here: In Germany of immediate post-WWII, you had many people understanding the insanity of the Nazis. Because it was for the Nazis policy and action that the German citizen was bombed to hell. The Germans were tired of violence, tired of war. They were really fucked up, almost everyone lost not only a dad, a son, or a husband, but also a mother, daughter or wife. So, democratic, moderate, pacifist parties had a lot more support in the public, and were not seen as traitors. The German public was truely "pacified" (which longs through until our days). Pacifism has become a tradition in Germany after WWII. "Rather red than dead" was a motto during the Cold War.
Not so the Iraqi people. Unlike some media geeks (and ironically: Pacifists) would want you to believe, both the Gulf War 1991 and the recent one were damn clean. OF COURSE civilians were killed. But by no means is it comparable to the devastation brough onto the public in WWII. It's about what the majority thinks - and the majority of Iraqis did NOT lose relatives in either war, unlike the Germans in WWII.
The suffering that affected all of the Iraqi people though was that which was brought upon them by the UN sanctions (provocated and enhanced by SH, who made sure by his propaganda that the sanctions were that what he wanted it to be) - which equals "the West". Exactly that West, which is now in part in Iraq in form of the Coalition forces. So note: Western forms of policy, of democratic western governments, brought this suffering to them. Not a war. So, the point is, some Iraqis (the extremists) still have "their war" coming in their head, while the Germans HAD it. And they had enough of it.
Ugly and unfortunate idea, that Iraq has not been "pacifised" enough - mainly to rob ground of violent forces there - but probably true. Not exactly a mistake by the West - just the reality.

Now, in the beginning I said you peace protesters and forum guys here crack me up. Will say now why that is. You guys all want to see a peacefull world, you don't see why countries "still" go to war. Hm, so the US (or the West, since except for Iraq, there are not too many differences in the western mind concerning terrorism - except for you pacifists, but that's the point I'm coming to now) should not "stick their nose into other (Arab) peoples' business"? Many of you want the US to pull out of Iraq right now (after all, they are only there to grab the oil and this is why they're still there...), right?

OK, let's spin it further. Your mistake is that you think only in terms of some mere months. Before the war, you thought hell would break lose in the Middle East when the Coalition attacks Iraq. Then, during the war, you thought the US will get stuck in the desert and get slaugthered when a plane was shot down and there was a sand-storm. After the war, when the statue of Saddam was brought down, it was rather quiet here. I think only the US flag on the statue's head was good enough to be another bad-mouth topic here, iirc. When insurgence fighting started, you again thought it's doomsday (finally). This is where we are now. So, I'm curious: What's gonna happen next? Tell me! Not just the next two months. What's in twenty, thirty years, out of all this? Not only Iraq, but fight on terrorism, pressure on regimes like Syria's? Well, I can't tell you either. But I can give you two scenarios:

Keep opposing the Coalition, give those forces that are now fighting the coalition in Iraq your "good to go", tell YOUR west to shut the fuck up on Arab matters. What you'll get is this: An Iraq with an extremist government. Since you guys don't like sanctions and no-fly zones either, cause indeed mostly the population will suffer from them, this government will be ready to staunch up their military the BIG way. Remember, they are also sitting on a lot of oil down there, and you don't want their oil either. Well, you'll need it, but to the price they tell you. Not only the Iraqi extremist government will live in heaven, but also the one in Syria, Libya, Iran. Saudi-Arabia will probably join the fray. Point is: When the Islamist extremist approach in Iraq will show itself as extremely successfull means of opposing the West and bring back "Arab culture", not many countries will stay moderate. If we are lucky, they will be bzy for a while fighting each other over oil fields / who has the biggest palace, penis, the most wifes. If we are not lucky, there will be a new Israeli-Arab war before long. I know, you guys here don't give a fuck about Israel, so never mind. Two things will occur then: Either a nuclear cold war against Israel, or a hot war. If you ask me - if anyone would actually be ready to use nukes and accepting getting nuked himself as a result, it must be Islamism with its Jihad and paradise / 70 virgins after dieing in Jihad-phantasies. Even the Warsaw Pakt and NATO almost nuked each other on more than one occasion. Now imagine a similar situation down there in the Middle East. Remember, sometimes there are circumstance when it's just up to a commander of a submarine. Anyway - so, big parts of the Middle East will be a TRUE desert then, a nuclear one. You see, I think Israel would lose that one. Easy maths. And of course, taking into consideration that you think Israel sucks big time, you don't want to support it either. I can see you walking on the streets with "No War" and "Peace" signs - again. But tell you what: It wouldn't even matter if you support Israel or not. If you don't support her, you will be safe a bit longer. BTW: Meanwhile, the US and Europe (that's you, folks!) would probably be in dissharay, because - listening to their peace marchers - they would have no more realistic economic connections to important oil reserves. So, probably, as it happens in desperate times, you will have a right-extremist government there. Readying the nukes against the Middle East, most probably. But no, you are peacefull, so you'll just suffer it (dream on). So, coming back to the Middle East: The next one to fall will be Turkey. Remember: A true Arab is what they are in Iraq, Syria, Lybia, Saudi-Arabia. If Turkey sticks to the "EU line", it will suffer just as well as the EU and be subject to the will and threatended by nuclear armed, oil governing regimes in the Middle East. Sure enough there will be enough true Arabs and pacifists found in Turkey so that a "true Arab" regime will gain power there, too. And a better life comes in handy for the moderate Turk, too. So, now we have them at the front door.

What I want to say is this: Look back at the cold war. There you had two equally strong forces with different world views. And it was mostly about a different view on economy. That led to wars. And, in the big picture, the threat of nuclear Armageddon. When you have an Arab extremist superpower in contrast to the West, it will not only be about economy. It will be about freedom, religion, philosophy, society as a whole. Well, similar to the Cold War we had, but even more pronounced in their differences. You cannot live in a capsule in the World of today. Everything in the world today is inter-connected, you cannot go back. Hell, even in the middle age you had the crusades. You really think that an Arab extremist superpower / coalition of Arab extremist powers can live peacefully with the West? You are THAT naive? See, what I'm trying to say here is that everytime you think "well, those insurgence guys are the real Arabs just wanting to live their world, while the governing council or any other are traitors and bought by the Americans" you are not considerating further. You are instead working towards a new cold war. And then you will again be on the streets protesting. My god.

Now, the second scenario I give you is this: The West keeps his foot in the Middle East, surpresses Extremists and potentially dangerous regimes there, supporting moderate groups ("traitors") to allow the developement of an Arab World that is COMPATIBLE with the West. This is the key word: Compatibility. Where Arabs who are out in the West for economical trades are not traitors, where Turkey which is in the EU is not an infidel, where the Democracies of Europe can make inner-policy decisions without being black-mailed, where there are no nuclear weapons aimed at each other between Isreal and the Arab world, where the oil is not used as an economical weapon against the West, where Iraq has at least some kind of constitutional monarchy, where the Arab people are rather seeking to get a new car, a new house with a swimming pool, an internet connection, a good stock, than seeking Jihad. It DOESN'T MATTER whether or not some Arabs are not happy with that and would rather like to slaughter the infidels and drive them out - it matters what's COMPATIBLE! When the extremists prevail in the Middle East (or in Iraq for that matter) the future will be very dark. Don't you think anyone would live in peace! THIS is the war on terror, and THAT is why it includes political reconstruction of the Middle East. As long as the West keeps biting itself in the tail, it'll only keep hurting itself.

Man, did I write a lot? Why did I write it, I'll get lots of flak here. Well, I like entertaining a thought. Make no mistake, I read your stuff (though not everything anymore, since this forum is repeating itself in every other thread), consider it (sometimes more, sometimes less, depending on my mood), but all I see is naive pacifism, lots of socialism and dreamland. Just as I am a warmonger to you.
You guys don't have to worry though. At least in Europe, you are in the majority and can entertain and bring forward your ideas within your democracy, thanks to the fact that there were brave people from abroad and within your own countries who took up the fight for the "western world" you now like to condemn from time to time. So, your ideas will be executed more or less, until it might become very expensive again, in terms of blood bills, to defend your freedom.

Regards
heartc

P.S. Next time anyone challenges the idea of the US being a "true" democracy here again - how many commissionaries in BRUSSELS who make laws for YOUR country, YOUR house, YOUR money, did you VOTE for exactly? You should be more worried about the EU taking a democratic path or not than the US.

 

Sorry - but you are wrong - I surely dont agree in this "three elements" stuff.

It would be so easy if there would be only 3 elements in iraq.
1st the nice coalition forces who are there to help
2nd the nice people who are thankful and couldnt wait to practice true democracy and live in peacy and harmony
and
3rd the bad bad guys, the terroristic extremist who only want to see blood, pain and terror.

Thats a very simple and unrealistic point of view.

The true situation is much more complicated.

First have a look at the new government in Iraq:
The actual puppet government is not respected by the iraqui people. Many of these "politicians" are criminals - for example the personal friend of vicepresident Cheney - Mr. Chalabi who has been sentenced to 22 years jail in Jordan for criminal acts and who fled to the USA before he came back to Iraq.

How effective this so called government is, was seen after they gave the newly built iraqui police and new iraqui army the order to recapture the cities of Faludja, Kuf or Nedjaf.
The police just ignored the order while the new iraqui army openly refuse "to fight other iraquis".

Even their own instruments refuse to follow their orders !

So US-units had to fight the rebels in the cities.

There you have the political effect of this "government" for the iraqui people.
If the USA would leave the country these politicians would be lynched by the mob within few hours like it happened to afghan soviet puppet Dr. Nadjibullah, who was hanged by the afghan mob in Kabul after the soviet retreat.

There is no unified iraqui people. The reason could be find in the creation of Iraq and the differnt peoples who were mixed together during this creation which was done by european victors of WW1.

The iraqui people is devided in different groups. There are the 3 major groups
of shiites, sunnites and kurds.
And also these three groups are divided in many subunits who are making alliances or fighting wars against each others.

At this moment they are united in the wish to get the US forces out of Iraq with the hope that their specific group could get the power in Iraq.

The sunnites iraquis are supported by the other arab states like Syria or Saudi Arabia.

The shiites - also devided but mostly following the orders of the religious leaders - want to build an Islamic Republic. Thats also the reason why there cant be a fair election in Iraq: Because the shiite majority would win it easily and the first act would be to change the liberal constitution which was dictated by the USA. The shiites are supported by Iran - the only other country in the world with a shiite majority.

Then there are kurds - also devided in many groups in northern Iraq.
All neigbours with a kurd minority - like Iran, Turkey or Syria fear an autonomous Kurdistan. So their policy is to avoid more rights for the kurds in Iraq. Especially Turkey could be destabilised if the kurds in Iraq get too powerful.

And all the people of Iraq are devided in these groups.

Are they now all extremists ? No

But they all follow the policy of their specific leaders.

And so we get a total chaos, because none of these groups is able to get the power in Iraq alone.
So they try to get allies from foreign nations.
Not only from the USA but also from the neighbor states of Iraq.

There are already Hezbollah-units in Iraq, non-iraqui kurds, thousends members of the Badr-Brigades from Iran (which are exile iraqui shiites who had been indoctrinated in Iran for a decade or longer), Al Kaida-operatives and so on.

Its also a religious war:
There are only 2 countries in the world which have a shiite majority: Iran and Iraq. While the iranians are not members of the semitic arab race the iraquis are arabs (not the kurds). Shiites were seen by sunnites as heretics. So the arabs states want to avoid that the Iraq will be ruled by shiites. They also fear that Iran and iraq could cooperate - which would have great effects in the region.

And we should also not forget the oil of Iraq.

Its concentrated in the northeast and the southeast of Iraq - the areas where the kurds and the shiites live.

And so - heatc - I strongly deny your theory that the iraquis could be devided in "the people/the helpless/ the good guys" and "the extremists/terrorist/bad guys/monsters"

Actually the iraquis have become united - maybe for the first time after their country was created by some europeans after WW1. Their goal is to get the foreign occupation forces out of their country.
Not because they are thinking to cooperate after they reach this goal.
No - they want to get them away so they can start their inner-iraqian war for power. And then the full scale civil war will begin.

Pessimistic ? If you call realism pessimistic then yes , then I am truly pessimistic.

No - just face it: The policy of Bush against Iraq (and Afghanistan) was a terrible mistake. And many innocent people - US soldiers and iraquis/afghans - have to pay now the price for this stupid policy.

What solutions do we have?

Retreat ? This would lead to the civil war.

Stay and reinforce the occupation troops ? Then the losses of life will continue

Replace US troops with UN troops ? The UN is also hated by the people because of the embargo.

Replace US troops with arab troops ? Then the shiites will define them as occupation forces because these troops would be sunnites.

Replace US troops with iranian troops ? Then the sunnites would think as described before.

Make democracy in Iraq ? LOL - No chance. There is no politician who is recognized by all of the three groups of the people.

So I think we will see in 5 years a dictator in Iraq, supported by foreign nations, who gets a nice intelligence service to control and suppress the people in Iraq and who will work as a nice puppet like Saddam did during the Iran-Iraq-War, when Rumsfield visited this good-guy in Bagdad.

Until the created Frankenstein will get mad again...

 

@ babek: The only argument I would raise about your post is that how can you be so sure that every single Iraqi will fall in to one of the 3 power-hungry groups?

Yes, they can be defined in to these groups in terms of their religion and upbringing, but to suggest that every single Iraqi wants to fight the coalition forces, is eager for a civil war after the coalition leaves, etc is wrong. I dont believe this to be the case. Even if as much as 20% (a massive amount) of the population felt they could grab some kind of power, it still leaves an even bigger 80% of ordinary citizens who just want to live their lives.

If you are correct and your opinion applies to all Iraqis, including the ordinary man, woman and child in the street, then we should just get the fuck out of there and let people with such a hatred and bloodthirst to get on with killing themselves.

-glas-

 

@ Heartc: Nice post, man! And I'm serious!
I am opposed to some of the things you said, but that post is a lot more constructive than what you said in previous topics. Restecp! Glad to see there's a little less emotion there

@ All.
My two cents: The USA have invaded Iraq for the noblest of reasons, I am sure. And of course the Iraqi people will be better off without Saddam Hussein. BUT:
- George Bush is a very devout christian and has proclaimed this on numerous occasions. How do you think the muslim world thinks about that? They're afraid he's a crusader and frankly, I understand their fear. The difference is that I know the yanks aren't going to send missionaries after the soldiers are done.
- From a cultural view, governments are a lot less important to the general public in the middle-east than in Europe or the USA. "My country wrong, my country right, my country!", right? Especially american people have to relate to this. It doesn't matter if Saddam Hussein was evil incarnate or a choir-boy, he is/was THE symbol of Iraq. He's like fucking royalty there. I guess it's a combination of culture and indoctrination. Want a comparison? Imagine George Bush/tony Blair/Putin turned the USA/GB/Russia into a police state. How would you feel if the Netherlands invaded to get rid of him? You'd be hurt where it hurts the most; your national pride. Don't forget: most people in Iraq aren't used to living in any place than one where the secret police is feared and military force is omnipresent.

So all in all: if you want to troubles to stop, pull out the coalition's troops and let the Iraqi's try to take care of themselves. Go back after ten years and see if you can rebuild a country from what's left.

Damn, I've been away too long

 

Lol, babek, see the other destruction thread

This is a very strange question.
Ok, UK is a boring place in the last century or two.
But have you never read a histoical novel about a time of turmoil?

 

The stupid thing is we don't actually need the oil. More than one company has now developed a car that runs on Hydrogen.

So the only thing thats keeping us there is the oil companies.

I wonder what would happen if we did change to hydrogen run cars and then just left the Middle East to get on with it.

Mal

 

Sorry I dont understand what you mean. The part of my post you highlighted as such wasnt really a question.

What exactly was it you were trying to say Gro?

-glas-

 

20 years ago the UK was about as close to Civil war as you can get with the poll tax riots, miners strikes & Brixton riots (also Bradford, Manchester & Liverpool rioting).

You told me off for making assumptions on your history Gro, don't do the same on ours.

Malin

 

hahaha malino, good one

@ heartc -- ts ts ts, it's not that black and white,
Iraq is not Germany; Israel stuff is not blamed here; oil is not necessity for West (it's just thing on which it profits - good point mal, there *are* alternatives); ppl here didn't oppose the goal of war but how the war in Iraq emerged as far as I understand it; Arabs are not trying to annihilate West just because it is different; and more importantly than anything else - ppl, who you don'T agree with are not naive and simple so you understand how they think, act and what they feel and want.

 

Im sorry, but riots in Manchester for me somehow dont step on the same scale as the present situation in Iraq, or the Bosnian war, or the Interallied war or Ataturk`s campaigns or even the last event in Kosovo (which was quite small-scale, i admit)

ok, glas:
you need just a few tens of thousands people to ruin the lives of everyone. I am not sorry for those who serve their cause, they are happy in their own way - even if they loose.
the tragedy is for those who see the futility of pursuing any causes through force.
they have only 3 choices

- stay passive and watch how the once flourishing country of yours is laid waste. Silently try to survive through the chaos and await to see who will be the victor and adapt to the new reality. Or maybe die helplessly when some of the parties comes across your home.

- join the most powerful party. If one fair cause has to go through the wreckage of the country in order to establish rule, if the supporters of all other causes must be slaughered, jailed or exiled (never a good decision!) in order to bring final stability and peace... then let it be the party which will win the war in the shortest time possible.
besides, who knows - you may get some privileges by the new regime

- or join the party which defends your principles or class/ethnical interests or whatever. The things you have to do may hurt, but then - what are the other choices? (hint - see above ) At least you know what you are fighting for and dont betray your people.


It is a funny question - if placed in such situation, which one would you choose?




Dunno - maybe read something about Spanish civil war, October revolution, post-WWI Germany or Hungary. i guess all of them share the same features. but memoirs, diary or an artistic novel - not detached scientific book.

 

emigrating abroad and trying to forget about your former country, or becoming a buddhist in a secluded place in the mountains - fall in the first option.

but thus in a way you betray the people who remain and try to survive and who will be the future of the country after things calm down.


dunno, maybe I like tragism

 

...you can crush us, you can bruise us, but you'll have to answer to... ahhhh ahh, the guns of brixton...

sorry, continue on with intelligent discussion that will do nada

 

Gro:

Generally speaking, I cant stand by and watch something happening which I know to be wrong, without saying or doing anything about it. However, I can afford this view through the comfort and security of my desk in an office, where the only time I ever come up against a situation like this is defending my staff from the never-ending stream of stupid changes inflicted by a management who have lost all sense of reality.

If it came to putting my life on the line, I'd like to think I would still stand by my principles...but I couldnt guarantee it. Self-preservation is within us all, no matter how much bravado you put on in dealing with trivial matters. Unless you have been faced with that choice, you could never be 100% sure what you would do.

As to your original point. Regardless if you wish to pigeon-hole people in to one of the three groups you described, these are emotions that are brought on by an extraordinary and unusual set of circumstances, and therefore judging people's perceptions or beliefs at a juncture like this is false and misleading. People are being forced in to the 'kill or be killed' scenario through something outwith their control. Remove that outside power and you basically have a population who wish to live in peace, to prosper the same as everyone else.

An 80/20 split was being generous to Babek. Under a normal set of circumstances, there would be a fraction of any population who would be hell-bent on causing violence for violence's sake (or any other misguided cause that they are pressured in to supporting).

-glas-

 

ts ts ts ts, if these talks are opening new windows to other ppl like they do to me, i think there is some point in them..