Iraq, Round Three

Flesh420 said:

Though Saddam was a dick he kept order...

Sorry, sorry, I couldn't resist.

Flesh420 said:

Though Saddam was a dick he kept order...

By murdering his own people, sure. But even if those things were to never have happened, some kind of brutality would likely have been necessary. In these parts of the world where blood ties and tribalism and religiosity define cultural identity and not european-like nationalism or nation states, how does one expect to really create order and peace?

Quast said:

By murdering his own people, sure.

Not really. Saddam was a Sunni from Tikrit, which the ISIL terrorists just conquered with ease, because the army gave up and left. He kept "peace" in Iraq mostly by oppressing the Shia (Persian, non-Arabic, pro-Iranian) majority and straight out gassing the Kurdish minority. His own people, the Sunni, were privileged class 1 citizens. It was sectarian and tribal violence all along, except he added an extra layer of privilege for members of the Baath party.

TheCupboard nailed it at the start of the thread - the biggest issue is that the Brits and the French drew nonsensical borders for their zones of interest throughout the entire Middle East in the Imperial era. They didn't respect the religious and tribal dividing lines and they made different people live together forcibly. Then after WW2 the West left and stopped caring about these issues entirely, the only importance was that whoever's in power keeps the oil flowing, no matter how much they oppress their own people.

Maybe the middle east was better off in the Turk's hands.

Well, so much for not sending troops to Iraq:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_UNITED_STATES_IRAQ_TROOPS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-06-16-18-42-48

Man, this Obama guy is damn funny. He says one thing and does another!

dew said:

TheCupboard nailed it at the start of the thread - the biggest issue is that the Brits and the French drew nonsensical borders for their zones of interest throughout the entire Middle East in the Imperial era. They didn't respect the religious and tribal dividing lines and they made different people live together forcibly. Then after WW2 the West left and stopped caring about these issues entirely, the only importance was that whoever's in power keeps the oil flowing, no matter how much they oppress their own people.

That's pretty much what I said. European lines in the sand don't mean anything to these people.

doom_is_great said:

Well, so much for not sending troops to Iraq:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_UNITED_STATES_IRAQ_TROOPS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-06-16-18-42-48

Man, this Obama guy is damn funny. He says one thing and does another!

Less than three hundred people to secure the embassy. Not really a counter-insurgency force.

Gez said:

Less than three hundred people to secure the embassy. Not really a counter-insurgency force.

275 superior American Master Chiefs? Next week, there will be no Iraq to speak of.

FWIW, I recently watched BBC 4's series "Holidays in the danger zone", the cycle "Holidays in the axis of evil". It included Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, and all of those "nice" places.

The documentaries were shot between 2002 and 2003, before the fall of Gheddaffi and even before the fall of Saddam, shortly before the 2003 invasion.

It was creepy to realize that at least 3 of then, Iraq, Syria, Libya were "goners" by now. OK, Syria still seems to be standing, but it was depressing to realize how much Iraq had changed for the worse.

Yes, the documentary portrayed a personality cult. Yes, there was repression. Yes, there were militarized zones, and regions where obviously the love for "Sadi" was not as great as he'd like. But, by and large, what was portrayed was a functional and peaceful country, with people going on with their lives, having fun, no terrorist attacks, etc.

The "before" and "after" contrast is really stark. One would have to try really hard to argue that now is "better" for the Iraqi people, by any definition of the term.

Maes said:

The "before" and "after" contrast is really stark. One would have to try really hard to argue that now is "better" for the Iraqi people, by any definition of the term.

How about the definition where "better for the people" is "better for Halliburton"?

Gez said:

How about the definition where "better for the people" is "better for Halliburton"?

That's why I wrote "better for the Iraqi people", Mr. Machiavelli. Sure, there might be the one or two oddballs that found employment as Halliburton collaborators, but those tend not to last long once they are targeted as such.

Quast said:

[Saddam kept order] by murdering his own people, sure.

This is admissible even in so-called democracies, granted, under very specific circumstances (e.g. police operations, counter-insurgency, death penalty). Who's entitled to bin state-sanctioned murder as "righteous" and "not righteous"? George W. Bush?

The second Iraq war was a grave mistake for the USA. Nevertheless, since we have brought them to the point they are at now, I believe we're obligated to help them establish order. But instead of sending troops to re-occupy, we need to help out by sending aid in various forms. We need to help them become self-sufficient. Of course every relationship in global politics is a symbiotic one at the bottom-line. However, it would be in the best interest of the USA, to fix what we have broken. For our reputation, and for more stability in the world.

Kontra Kommando said:

But instead of sending troops to re-occupy, we need to help out by sending aid in various forms. We need to help them become self-sufficient./B]

You had nearly 10 years to do that, with 100k+ of your own citizens (even if mostly military personnel) on the ground and for some reason it didn't quite work out.

Starting all over now? Yeah, good luck with that.

Maes said:

This is admissible even in so-called democracies, granted, under very specific circumstances (e.g. police operations, counter-insurgency, death penalty). Who's entitled to bin state-sanctioned murder as "righteous" and "not righteous"? George W. Bush?

To certain degrees, yes. Though comparing the death penalty to ethnic cleansing or even genocide is quite the stretch, particularly when the united states is no stranger to all 3 such things.

Ultimately, the state must have the power of force in order to have authority and legitimacy. Otherwise it is nothing but a limp noodle easily pushed aside by some other entity that is simply going to enforce it's own will to whatever ends.

Quast said:

To certain degrees, yes. Though comparing the death penalty to ethnic cleansing or even genocide is quite the stretch, particularly when the united states is no stranger to all 3 such things.

What about the situation in Ukraine? Can anyone tell for sure which the actors are/who's enabling and who's dishing out the violence, and, most importantly, who's legitimized to do it?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iraq/10910868/Iraq-crisis-Obama-may-launch-air-strikes-without-Congress-amid-calls-for-Maliki-to-go-live.html

Hold the fucking phone, what?

I thought it was 'proven' beyond a shadow of a doubt that Saddam didn't have 'wmds'. Now ISIS suddenly does?

Haven't we heard this one before? Oh yea I forgot Obama, the great wise saviour and a clone of honest Abe; his administration would never lie would it? God bless political playbooks.

TheCupboard said:
Isn't that the sad truth? It was never self-determination, but at least it omitted a giant excursion into a foreign land with a basically alien landscape and different ethnic heritage from ours.

Iran has a good deal of self-determination, regardless of its alliances with Russia, so did Libya before you destroyed that to try to ensure "the market" could exploit it at the expense of its people.

Belial said:
US airstrikes to support Iranian Revolutionary Guard's offensive in Iraq?

Strange bedfellows.

In the Iraq-Iran war, the US gave material support to both sides. Sure, more to Iraq, but it was also the weaker country. Now, the US might send its planes while Iraqis and Iranians play the roles of canon fodder in the streets.

The US and Iran have been in good terms with the Iraqi government for a while now. Naturally, as the US must rely on the Shiites because they kicked the Sunni out of power hideously with their invasion, and Iran is Shiite, so it has natural ties with the current government rather than its opposition.

dew said:
Iraq may be bad, but it's nowhere near the lawless hell of Libya.

A lot of the chaos in Libya is tribal and union protests that block oilfields, duct systems and ports, compared to the amount of xenophobic bombings and shootings in Iraq. Perhaps Libya is more lawless and the central government is weak, but that also gives more room for actual ground-up demands that could lead to autonomy. Libya is "worse" because its oil production is disrupted, unlike Iraq where the oil-rich South is controlled by the US-dependent central government and a good deal of oil flows out easily.

bytor said:
What I find sad is that so many think the U.S. has the option of staying out of it when what we are seeing is the result of U.S. foreign policy and the actions of the U.N.

Not think, demand. The more you stay the more it snowballs. For aid and repairs, you could send unconditional financial aid to repair damages, paid doctors and engineers to reconstruct their countryside and towns. In addition, send all the US politicians and military involved in crimes against humanity and war crimes against Iraq to prison and close any and all torture or illegal (by international law, not the fascist mess some Dick-in-the-Bush couple introduced) detention facilities.

If you want to stop the "terrorists", go against the source, such as your oil whore and OPEC parasite Saudi Arabia, not to butchering some ill-equipped blood-crazed nomad warriors in the desert spawned from the desperate cracks of an abused region, who have brothers and mothers who will mourn them as heroes.

Gez said:
Point for a Western intervention:

• This mess being largely our fault (mostly the Brits and Americans, though), we owe it to them to fix what we broke

It will never happen unless you reform the West politically, or force it to repay damages peacefully as an offender, never as a savior.

geekmarine said:
I just... what are you supposed to do when you're asked to answer for a government that doesn't represent you?

If the damage your government has done hasn't damaged these people beyond reason, the answer will depend on how you're seen acting in respect to that government. If you do things to oppose it and change it, better, If you're practically indifferent or supportive, for the worse. In any case you are always responsible for your government and if you get the impression that you aren't, you need to push for a more participatory society where involvement in politics and what happens to your neighbors and the public, and especially the poor and vulnerable, is important.

myk said:

It will never happen unless you reform the West politically, or force it to repay damages peacefully as an offender, never as a savior.

The part of that post you didn't quote was about how the likely outcome of an intervention would only be a worsening of the situation.

Right, I agree with that one, and wanted to point out why I think that the quoted "we're responsible so we should fix it" side of the coin or view doesn't work. The US is responsible, but not as some form of fatherly force we all need to be there. More like a pedophile abuser we all need to start staying the hell out of it and serving his sentence.

Technician said:

Maybe the middle east was better off in the Turk's hands.