Republicans & Conservatives: Archives

“Bush had 3 major justifications. Saddam wanted to acquire WMD…”

Actually, the justification was that Saddam had the WMD and could use them against the US or UK within 45 minutes (as Blair famously stated). Cheney, Rumsfeld, Bush, and Powell all stated unequivocably that Iraq had WMDs and could use them. His desire to have “Uranium from Africa” was a minor part of the justification in comparison to the unfounded claims of the existence of WMD.

Arguments about “the” war?

Contrary to what the Bush administration would have us think (and indeed contrary to how the press, in their laziness, inevitably refers to Anti-Iraq-War activists as “Opposed to the War On Terrorism”) there are in fact TWO wars going on right now: The War Against Terrorism and the War in Iraq. They are two different things. Please stop perpetuating the myth that they are connected.

Well, now that I think about it, maybe they ARE connected.

They began as two entirely different wars, for sure, but they are now starting to overlap as Al Quaeda has apparently moved into Iraq, a lawless state full of readily available weaponry and American soldiers to attack. It’s already a perfect breeding ground for terrorists, and when the US leaves Iraq it will become even more of a terrorist breeding ground. It’s such a tragedy that we’ve caused such a long-term disaster for ourselves and for the world.

-Cf

The thing is, Bush’s arguement for the war in Iraq has changed multiple times.

1. In the beginning it was not that Saddam was trying to aquire weapons of mass destruction it was that he had them and was able to use them against us. - That fell apart real quick with a little scrutiny and rescent information. That Uncovering the Truth video may be propaganda but no one has shown it wrong yet.

Then there was the Uranium cake issue and the documents from Niger. When that document was observed it was found to be a rather poor fake. Words were misspelled and dates did not match the days of the week for what year it was supposedly composed.

And now it has become weapons of mass destruction-related program activities. What in the world is that? That could be anything from having a chemist set to coloring books for kids. All the while, North Korea is still an issue and is one of the few countries that are testing missles.

2. Containment was never really an issue. Saddam’s country after the first Gulf War was never connected enough to do anything. It was mostly just cities around Baghdad without any real movement inbetween ro coordination - as we found out once we hit the ground. And where exactly were they going to go?

3. The issue of humanitarian reasons was for a while not even on the bill and now it has slipped in as a tertiary arguement for the war. To make things worse, while some are championing this reason we are still sending millions of dollars to Uzbekistan which is the worst country in the group of former Soviet satelite states.

So what is happening? Your statement of there being a hidden agenda because the more overt ones do not line up could be applied somewhere else really.

Afganistan was an immediate problem because it was a terroist state. Iraq on the other hand was not.

> Position 1: The War would be best fought by treating
> terrorism as a police problem. The War may from time
> to time require military force in extreme cases
> (Afghanistan) but generally it doesn’t.

> Position 2: The invasion of Iraq has forced the military
> to neglect the real War. Since Iraq was not provably
> linked to terrorist organizations which regularly
> targeted the US it is a distraction from the real War.

> These arguments are commolnly employed by ‘anti-Iraq war’
> speakers.

Um, like who? What anti-Iraq war speaker has argued that the War on Terrorism is best fought reactively, as position #1 implies? (let’s be fair and limit this question to mainstream speakers like Dean and Clark, instead of digging up extreme pacifists or something, okay?)

You are correct that many mainstream anti-Iraq War speakers take Position 2, though. And I would agree that the argument isn’t totally convincing on its face - I thought our military could fight several wars at a time?

But here’s the problem: the War in Iraq has completely dislodged the USA from its position as the world’s moral leader, a position it held after 9/11 and which, through the Bush administration’s arrogant and adventurous invasion of Iraq. We were the de facto leader of the War on Terrorism, but we abdicated that leadership position by alienating the nations which we pretty much had lined up behind us awaiting marching orders. As you alleged, we’re not getting a lot of international help for the War on Terrorism any more - but that’s because the world no longer trusts us, not because they don’t want to fight terrorism. We were the cement, the brains, the balls, the core of a potential international commitment to end terrorism everywhere, and we blew it.

I would also argue that the War on Terrorism (as fought by the USA) is not being fought as vigorously as it could be, but not because our military is spread too thin (it might be spread too thin, i mean, it is costing us a lot of money and manpower, but I don’t know enough about it). Who knows why the Bush Administration has chosen to put the War on Terrorism on the back burner - perhaps because they know it can’t be won now that we have so few allies. It’s hard to argue that the War on Terrorism is priority #1 for the USA anymore. It should be.

Here’s what should have happened: Our good will after 9/11 should have been further leveraged to create a more powerful and long-lasting international coalition, perhaps 90% manned by our own military but with the strong economic, political, and popular support of a broad international base. This movement would continue to conduct operations like the one in Afghanistan, but we’d extend it to other places like Indonesia, the Phillipenes, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Jordan. We would STRONGLY support (i.e., send troops and guns) governments who seek to root out terrorists in their own countries. Intelligence gathering by coalition nations would be highly connected and coordinated. Cargo ships around the world would be regularly subjected to inspection by coaltion navies. Instead of promoting the civil-rights travesty of the PATRIOT act as our first and best line of defense, we could pass a domestic terror bill that is in keeping with our traditions of civil liberties and be confident that our international efforts are actually making a difference.

It would be a hell of a lot easier for us to do such a thing if an American-led international coalition against terrorism existed. But it does not exist because we destroyed it by our unilateral invasion of Iraq.

-Cf

I wrote:
> This movement would continue to conduct
> operations like the one in Afghanistan, but
> we’d extend it to other places like Indonesia,
> the Phillipenes, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi
> Arabia, Jordan.

Before I get flamed… The above isn’t meant to suggest that we outright invade these places like we did to Taliban-led Afghanistan. But it could mean that we help those governments root out their own internal terrorists, and it could mean that we send in missiles or troops with or without their permission (as Clinton did to Al Quaeda bases in Afghanistan). With a broad international level of support and with good intelligence, there’s an awful lot we could be doing.

-Cf

“The War Against Terrorism and the War in Iraq. They are two different things. Please stop perpetuating the myth that they are connected.”

Did you read my post? I very specifically cleave the two and directly address most of the issues you raise. What is up with that?

As for who believes terrorism should be fought reactively, Chirac, Schroeder and most of their respective governments. Dean and Kerry both claim to want to be proactive, but yolk their hopes to enlisting the help of Germany and France which are committed to being reactive.

“Our good will after 9/11 should have been further leveraged to create a more powerful and long-lasting international coalition, perhaps 90% manned by our own military but with the strong economic, political, and popular support of a broad international base.” Complete fantasy-land stuff if you mean to include France and Germany. The only bit of reality in that statement is the 90% manned by the US. The UN has repeatedly expressed an interest in NOT making change in the Middle East. And if you think that the Middle East terrorism threat will be dealt with without making serious changes in the Middle East, you are wrong AND you are back to the reactive argument that you claim not to embrace.

“It would be a hell of a lot easier for us to do such a thing if an American-led international coalition against terrorism existed. But it does not exist because we destroyed it by our unilateral invasion of Iraq.”

The first sentence is correct. The second sentence completes ignores the fact that the ‘coalition’ was ridiculously fractured by January or Febuary of 2002. Look at the pathetic commitment of the French and UN in Afghanistan at that time. Not much money, almost no troops—pathetic. That would be months before the UN debate about Iraq for those with a timeline. Lots of things would be easier with a broad coalition. But our putative allies weren’t interested—even before Iraq. Look at their lack of action. Don’t be so easily fooled by their nice sounding words.

> > “The War Against Terrorism and the War
> > in Iraq. They are two different things.
> Please stop perpetuating the myth that
> they are connected.”

> Did you read my post? I very specifically
> cleave the two…

I stand corrected, but still: you use the term “the war”, a rhetorical device that, no matter how you qualify it, suggests that there is only one war - as if the invasion of Iraq was a subset of that war. To avoid unintentional conflation, I would prefer everyone referring to the two concepts to consistently use two different terms, as I have: “The War Against Terrorism” and the “War in Iraq.”

You go on to argue that many nations, in particular France and Germany, weren’t much help to us during the War on Terrorism. Even if you are 100% right about that, it doesn’t mean that we don’t need their help now! Let’s face facts: France and Germany - and most other countries around the world - are considerably less helpful to us now than they ever were before. We need all the help we can get, don’t we?

> The UN has repeatedly expressed an interest
> in NOT making change in the Middle East.

I deliberately never even mentioned the United Nations. Coalitions can be made outside of the UN, as Clinton showed in Kosovo — indeed, I’m not even sure our actions in Afghanistan had any UN imprimatur, either.

But not only coalitions: there are bilateral relationships that were damaged by our War in Iraq - the leadership of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt, whose cooperation we desperately need in fighting the war on terrorism, are *less* inclined to help us now. And the people of those nations are now downright hostile to us.

Our ability to form any kind of meaningful coalition - UN, regional, ad hoc, or even simple bilateral - is now sadly crippled.

Let’s say we had some good evidence that there was an Al Quaeda training facility, complete with a pile of WMDs, camped out in Pakistan. Assuming anyone believed our evidence (think chicken little), can you imagine how hard it would be to form a coalition to attack the camp? And can you imagine the dangers of us sending US troops into the Pakistani tinderbox without any Islamic allies at all? Can you even imagine Musharraf agreeing to it?

I’m just trying to make the point that allies, even weak ones and fair weather ones, are better than no allies at all.

> … the ‘coalition’ was ridiculously fractured
> by January or Febuary of 2002… Look at the
> pathetic commitment of the French and UN in
> Afghanistan at that time.

I’m not sure I would agree with that entirely. First of all, the military action in Afghanistan was cooling down by this point: Karzai had been sworn in, etc.

Also, remember that January 2002 is just about the time Bush unveiled the “axis of evil” phrase in the State of the Union, a hamfisted phrase which, rightly or wrongly, had the predictable effect of alienating nations (admittedly some with less backbone than us) who could have helped us in the War on Terrorism. And contrary to what you’ve said, the Bush administration *was* already making noises about taking pre-emptive action against Iraq, even in February of 2002. By the summer of 2002, only a half a year after 9/11, the Bush administration had made it abundently clear to the world that they intended to take “the War” to Iraq.

If by the above statement you meant to point out the speed and efficiency with which the Bush administration demolished our potential for international assistance and cooperation on the War on Terrorism, you’ve done a very good job of that.

-Cf

I find it difficult to argue with you when you fail to distinguish between diplomatic facades and real positions. Diplomatic facades are mere words. Positions end up being backed by action and money. Bush did not demolish our potential for international assistance. He revealed as empty, words pretending to be willing to give assistance. His rudeness was in calling France and Germany on their diplomatic lies. If they really believed that the War against terrorism was important for them to fight, and if they really thought Afghanistan was an important component of that then they would have put their money and troops where their mouths were.

They did not.

Bush pointed that out.

That is revealing a lack of willingness to give assistance. That most certainly is not creating a lack of willingness.

For further though on that theme see North Korea and Bush ‘creating’ a crisis by removing the payments for NK not engaging in the creation of nuclear weapons when they continued in the creation of nuclear weapons. Common leftist tropes include Bush creating that crisis. On the contrary, Bush exposed the crisis which North Korea created.

“I find it difficult to argue with you when you fail to distinguish between diplomatic facades and real positions.”

Sebastian, please try to address the message, not attack the messenger.

You believe that statements A, B, and C were true and D, E, and F were diplomatic doublespeak. We on the left believe that D, E, and F were the truth and A, B, and C were the lies. It doesn’t help anything to treat those who disagree with you as living in a fantasy.

Also, after 9/11, the rest of NATO involked the common defense clause and offered support, but the Bush Administration declined the offers. Bush chose to go it alone and use only minor support from our allies. We shouldn’t use Bush’s refusal to accept help as proof that help could not be given.

Context sensitivity is a big problem in trying to create consistent theories of action. What may be mutually exclusive and contradictory in ideological theory may turn out to be reconciled easier in practice.

The true complexity of the world and the actual range of environments and societies that exist can be obscured from our notice by our assumptions, our ignorance, and our preconceptions of the world. It is an chronic, persistent problem of global human society. Nobody is immune. Some though, have placed themselves at greater risk.

We will always live, in part, inside our heads, inside our imaginations. Our hopes, our fears, our opinions can and do form vital parts of our mental anatomy, and perform vital functions for people in interacting with our society. But because of them, we have a talent as human beings that other creatures don’t: we can let our imaginations run away with us.

Wars are a good example of this.

Being a child of the 80’s and 90’s, I was born into the post-Vietnam era. Before the Gulf War, I recall a great deal of comparison to the War in Vietnam, before the battles took place.

But Iraq turned out different, because the reality of the Vietnam War was shaped by a different context than that in Iraq. Enemies were clearer, more traditional. Technology had advanced, and so had tactics. Terrain, objectives, and command structure all contributed to the nature of how the War would have to be fought, and the question of whether it should have been fought at all.

So too, would the choices differ between Afghanistan and Gulf War II. I recall both wars weathering comparisons to Vietnam. Such fears most likely contributed to our nation’s decision not to invade Afghanistan with masses of our soldiers and heavy equipment. So, instead, we provided aerial support to the Northern Alliance, letting them push out the Taliban and engage Al Quaeda directly.

That decision may have cost us a final victory in that conflict. To the victor goes the spoils, the saying goes, and another saying says, if you want it done right, do it yourself. By letting the Northern Alliance do the bulk of the fighting, we put them back in control of large amounts of territory. We also ensured that we were not in control of the bulk of the ground forces engaging the enemy. We ensured that local politics would play a bigger role than it otherwise might have.

If Osama escaped, he did so by taking advantage of those things.

In Iraq, diplomatic problems cost us dearly. From Turkey, to Saudi Arabia to the major economic and military powers of Europe, we were deprived of the complex web of supply routes, directions of attack, and troop numbers that would have greatly sped up the war, and enabled us to quickly and effectively end the war. Instead of thirty days of major combat, it could have been couple of weeks.

The Bush Foreign Policy has been so problematic because theory is more important to his administration than practice. He didn’t want to get involved in nation building in Afghanistan, for ideological reasons.

Result? Afghanistan doesn’t much resemble a nation right now. Without centralized authority, it has been much easier for the Taliban and Al Quaeda remnants to regroup, and gather forces once again. It has also been easy for the drug trade to flourish again, in the absence of the Taliban’s extreme but effective opposition to the growth of Opium poppies.

In Iraq, Neo-Con guesswork and theory as to the results and justification of an invasion was allowed to dominate and even monopolize the foreign policy and military decisions relating to the war. The result? When events ran counter to their expectations, Iraq went from a quick and easy victory and regime change to being an extraordinarily difficult military and provincial problem.

The restraints that Bush and the Neo-Cons imposed on our intelligence and diplomatic apparatus crippled our ability to determine the truth ahead of time, instead of discovering it inch by humiliating inch. It crippled our ability to seek alternative strategies of containment and control.

But worst of all, the Neo-Con restraints on the operations of those agencies and agents involved has drawn them away from a frank and open-minded pursuit of information on the real problems abroad, and possible solutions and strategies to be employed in facing them.

In essence, Bush is shaping the architecture of our foreign policy to reflect the structure of his approach to policy in general: Ideology and theory above pragmatism and observation. reduced further, one can put it thusly: Bush is not inclined to let the outside world erode his own faith and confidence in what believes to be the case in the world. He is not prepared to give up, in good time, on ideas that many others would have long since abandoned as discredited. While that attitude can be interpreted to be a certain kind of heroism, it also can be seen as a kind of hubris, a tragic flaw that can undo the good that person tries to do.

With Iraq the warnings were there for many of how much damage this could do to us. From the pre-emptive nature of the war, to the questions about the presence of unconventional weapons, to the question about the propriety and the effectiveness (or countereffectiveness) of what this would do for the War on Terror. There were questions about the intelligence… The list goes on and on. If nothing else is consistent about what people find problematic in this chapter of the War on Terror, it is the willful disregard of this Administration for issues whose worries and warnings events would later vindicate.

Plainly put, Bush and his people failed to take advantage of the expertise, evidence and experience that lay behind the objections of many of the legislators, diplomats agents and analysts. They were too wrapped in the confidence they had concerning their actions and their agenda to spot the disparities of what they imagined, and what was truly the case.

Whatever successes have been achieved in the war, there is a sense among many that our current success in Iraq is more the result of our good luck rather than Bush and Co.’s good planning. We would much prefer that our victories in battle and our security at home not depend so much on the vagaries of good fortune and happy coincidences.

“You believe that statements A, B, and C were true and D, E, and F were diplomatic doublespeak. We on the left believe that D, E, and F were the truth and A, B, and C were the lies. It doesn’t help anything to treat those who disagree with you as living in a fantasy.”

Of course it doesn’t. Which I was I would like you to examine the actions of France, Germany and Russia vis-a-vis Afghanistan. None of them provided or now provide many troops. None of them provided or now provide much money. None of them provided or now provide much support. That leads to some pretty strong conclusions about which pronouncements were diplomatic doublespeak.

Stephen, are you joking when you say this: “In Iraq, diplomatic problems cost us dearly. From Turkey, to Saudi Arabia to the major economic and military powers of Europe, we were deprived of the complex web of supply routes, directions of attack, and troop numbers that would have greatly sped up the war, and enabled us to quickly and effectively end the war. Instead of thirty days of major combat, it could have been couple of weeks.” The first clause is defensible, but the idea that the war could have prosecuted any more quickly is astonishing. As it was we had taken Baghdad about 2 full months before most people thought was possible. I won’t deny that diplomatic concerns have hurt us in the War in Iraq, but if include the idea that we were likely to have been able to finish the war in less than three weeks as one of the problems, you are vastly overestimating the damage done to our tactical abilities.

All of which is quite beside the point on this post. My post shows that our allies were unwilling to engage deeply in the War on Terrorism even in the supposedly slam-dunk case of Afghanistan. When NATO Article V was invoked, our allies wanted target by target veto power for bombing, as in Kosovo. That is why their ‘help’ was rejected. It would have crippled our ability to defeat the Taliban. Remember all of those stories about soldiers calling in bombs with response in 20-30 minutes? That would have been impossible under the target vetoing structure desired by France and Germany. We would have been lucky to get a 2-3 day turn around like in Kosovo. During the rebuilding phase, Germany has been slightly more helpful, and France and Russia have not. This suggests either that these countries don’t take the War on Terrorism very seriously, or that they don’t believe that Afghanistan is very important to it. Neither position is particularly helpful.

Our Allies wanted to be involved and to help us, but they didn’t want to be there as just extra troops under American command with no input to the prosecution of the war. Is that so unreasonable? Can you imagine the outrage if we were to provide troops to assist defending an ally without input into how our troops are managed and how targets are chosen? It didn’t matter how seriously the allies took the War on Terrorism - because they wanted to be treated with the respect allies deserve, Bush decided to go without them. Expediency and pride trumped alliance, support, and legitimacy.

Of course, none of this has actually created a good justification for the war. One problem I have with the initial post is that it assumes that the onus falls equally on those who support the war and those who don’t. Since this was an unnecessary war against a foe that had been contained and had no important connections to the attack we received, the onus to justify positions should fall much more on those who want war.

The initial post claimed three justifications for the war and said they weren’t contradictory. However, one (“Saddam wanted to acquire WMD”) was not the actual justification given, and the other two don’t hold under examination (containment was holding, and Bush would be going for Uzbekistan, Zimbabwe, Myanmar, etc. if humanitarianism were actually a goal). So, they do not contradict each other, but each fall apart on their own.

> If they really believed that the War against
> terrorism was important for them to fight, and
> if they really thought Afghanistan was an
> important component of that then they would
> have put their money and troops where their
> mouths were.
>
> They did not.

Sebastian, your assertion that France did not help the Coalition in Afghanistan does not stand up to even the simplest scrutiny:

http://www.centcom.mil/operations/Coalition/Coalition_pages/france.htm

According to the Centcom site there are 15,000 troops in Afghanistan right now, and 4,200 of them are French. That’s almost a third. Now, these numbers may well be false - perhaps the US military presence is much larger - but this is pretty much all we have to go on.

The misperceptions Americans have about the roles other nations play in world affairs are staggering. I wonder if, again, you are conflating the War in Iraq with the War on Terrorism. You are letting France’s recalcitrance regarding our invasion of Iraq (and maybe France’s recalcitrance in general to kowtow to American hegemony) to cloud your memory of France’s clearly active role in the War on Terrorism.

I remember after the first Persian Gulf War, there was a parade down Broadway here in NYC. The American troops were roundly applauded for their hard work. But when the British, Canadian, and other coalition parters’ troops marched by, they were consitently greeted with boos and hisses. Were you one of those booing?

-Cf

Thank you for that link CF. It is greatly appreciated and something that I myself was not aware of.

Sebastian, I’m not sure how or why France, Germany and Russia were supposed to provide troops, money and support if we were refusing their help in the first place. As for targeting input, I imagine that with a little bit of Diplomatic finagling, we could have easily turned that into a rubber stamp. But you know something? Bush doesn’t want to share his toys, even if it is in name only.

He has an obvious anti-UN bias. Powell had to browbeat him into going through the UN, and even then he couldn’t get his boss or his colleagues not to raise a stink. I recall some jaw-droppingly insulting comments coming from Rumsfeld, Cheney, and the rest.

And, no, I wasn’t joking. How much quicker would this war have been, had we been able to open up and supply a northern front? Even just overflight rights for Turkey could have been a major strategical victory. We had a whole chunk of the Army held up from entering the war on time because we couldn’t send them through Turkish airspace to Northern Iraq.

The effect of starting the war without that huge chunk of the Army in play should not be underestimated. It should not be overestimated, either, how much of a victory we really had. We took Baghdad fairly quickly, granted, but it might have been even quicker had the Iraqi’s been forced to defend themselves from both the north and the south.

Additional troops to our own could have helped us stem the lawlessness before it became the overwhelming problem that it did, a problem that persists to this day. Additional money to our own could have alleviate the deficit-busting cost we’ve had to handle for this war Additionally supply lines and guards for those supply lines could have alleviated the strain that slowed down our momentum in the middle weeks of the war.

Kosovo was over after an air campaign of only 54 days. We pounded an entrenched government into submission. Also, as I recall it, Our involvement with Afghanistan during that time was mostly an air campaign.

Alternatively, with NATO help, we could have done the job ourselves on fighting the ground battles, instead of using the Northern Alliance to fight for us by proxy.

Bush seems to think that going it on our own is preferable. I would disagree. We need to conserve our power in the War on Terror, not overextend it wastefully. We need people on our side, making things easier, not more difficult for us. The allies were taking the War on Terror seriously, I’ll wager. But what Bush did was he said, don’t be concerned, don’t butt into our business, don’t count on getting any compromises. It is Bush, not the allies who made things more difficult for us, as he is wont to do. It is Bush who is either unwilling or unable to yield any control.

Without him being willing to compromise, our options are limited, and often unsatisfactory.

“Our Allies wanted to be involved and to help us, but they didn’t want to be there as just extra troops under American command with no input to the prosecution of the war.”

No they didn’t want command of just their troops, they wanted veto power over all troop targets. ALL. And they wanted it for a pittance in support. And that absolutely is ridiculous.

You also aren’t tracking my argument. It is that you can’t believe both of the following arguments: that Iraq distracted from Afghanistan in any major way, and that our ‘allies’ have been particularly helpful in Afghanistan. Since our Afghanistan allies had almost nothing to do with Iraq, they couldn’t have had their militaries distracted by it. So either they aren’t much help (i.e. the US was distracted so everything falls apart) or the distraction doesn’t really matter. You can have either, but you can’t have both. Technically you could also have my position: the allies haven’t been much help, but it didn’t matter anyway because we weren’t as distracted as people say.

You fail to notice that the 4,200 French troops includes an entire carrier battle group which is certainly not operating in Afghanistan. How many thousands of men is that? I’m not sure, but it certainly can’t leave many for Afghanistan.

“Additional troops to our own could have helped us stem the lawlessness before it became the overwhelming problem that it did, a problem that persists to this day. Additional money to our own could have alleviate the deficit-busting cost we’ve had to handle for this war”

Absolutely. But you are talking about troops in the 50,000 to 100,000 range. But the available troops from France and Germany might have been in the 3-6,000 range. Not nearly enough. And we would have had to provide all the logistic support. And if you think France was going to pony up money while they are in one of their deepest financial crises, you are dreaming.

OK, I’ll try again. Sorry I’ve missed what you’ve said.

Position 2 as originally stated refers to the “real war”. Now, it is stated as referring only to Afghanistan. I think that people espousing Position 2 see beyond Afghanistan when making that argument, and complain about Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, domestic safety, etc. There are many ways to battle terrorism throughout the world that do not directly involve the military.

“So either they aren’t much help (i.e. the US was distracted so everything falls apart) or the distraction doesn’t really matter”

Or, support of the allies can’t be weighed because in both theaters the US refused help except for onerous terms.

So, you’re saying (I think) that allied militaries aren’t being used in Iraq, so they could be used in Afghanistan for the real war. This argument relys on the military as the only means to solve problems, and as the only potential bottleneck.

When war opponents say that “The invasion of Iraq has forced … to neglect the real War”, they aren’t referring only to the military (as the ellipses did). We refer also to the time wasted in Washington, in the White House, the CIA, the State Department, and the Pentagon. We could have focused on other ways of combating terror, but thousands of hours (maybe millions) have been wasted in diplomacy, information gathering, executive meetings, financial tracking, translations, etc. on a war in Iraq that didn’t respond to those who attacked us in the first place.

So you’re right, our military is stretched much thinner than it should be, and there is some potential military capacity in our alliances to cover what we can’t because of Iraq. But we lose sympathy for that argument in how we treat our allies when they want to help us, and we have wasted time and energy in other parts of government than the military.

Sebastian, how could it not distract? Case in point, did you know that the anti-insurgency efforts in Iraq are distracting from the WMD search? Resources and people are being drawn away from it towards dealing with all the violence. Afghanistan, last known address of a serious terrorist threat is currently not our top priority. We have the bulk of our forces in Iraq, the bulk of our spending there, and the bulk our public policy debates about that place. Afghanistan, as incomplete as it is, is not top priority anymore.

I would consider that a major distraction, especially from a president who promise to catch Osama Bin Laden dead or alive.

As for support from other nations, I’m sure anybody else but Bush would have been willing to treat the French and Germans as equals, and to see that Veto Power provision as the start of a negotiation rather than the end of it. That’s what Bush and his people don’t get: often diplomats will hand you an extreme condition on something, just to start the haggling. Also, if France is suffering financial problems, it has good reason to be careful about its spending. I would hope other world leaders would learn that lesson and curb their excesses.

About troop numbers, there’s an old saying: Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Five or Ten thousand soldiers could have freed up our people to go out and kick the butts of some of the looters out there. Instead, we have to stick around twiddling our thumbs while people are literally stripping the insulation from the walls around us, and burning important papers. Bush’s problem is that he’s got a very narrow definition of who our friends are.

What makes things worse is that America and the European powers managed to elect hard-headed twerps going in precisely opposite directions to one another, resulting in good old fashioned ideological gridlock. However, it takes two to tango, and Bush was all too willing to be a partner in that dance. Clinton would have smoothed over the differences with a few veiled threats, and some nice honeyed deals, and we would have had international support. But no, we get Bush, who seems intent on burning bridges with any governments in this world that actually resemble ours.

A good interesting piece Sebastian. And while I feel the logic flows nicely through it, I don’t believe that it settles the argument.

Sorry about the length of my post, I felt your article deserved some consideration, and it grew a little lengthy as a result.

You have framed the argument in a very unique and subjective way, so excuse me if I misconstrue some of what you’ve said.

Position 1 probably does sum up the view of a lot of the critics of the war in Iraq, so not much needs to be said about it.

Position 2 is a consequence of a poorly chosen course of action. It is not the main problem with the invasion of Iraq. It is merely one of a number of reasons why it was a poor decision.

Position 2 is, as you’ve stated, a contradiction of position 1, but I think with a slight qualification. The resources of the media and the world community are finite and both are needed in a war on terrorism. It is very well, in theory, cleanly dividing resources into military and police, but I don’t think that’s how it works in reality. The war in Iraq has clearly diverted attention from Osama, where is he? Does anyone care anymore? He wasn’t mentioned in the State of the Union so I guess he’s not the priority that he once was. But this is only a minor point I make, the most important thing is that I feel the contradiction you highlight is not decisive enough because there were more significant reasons for not invading Iraq. One of these reasons you deal with in position 3.

Position 3 is your most contentious and indeed the weakest of the three. Firstly it was not just the military support that the UN would have provided it was also the respect for an international consensus and legitimacy that it would have bestowed. Important things in maintaining the moral high ground, alliances and reputation abroad.

Secondly France and Germany did supply troops/planes/expertise in Afghanistan. You initially state they did not and then suggest that this was not enough to be considered an honest contribution. I am not sure what the critical threshold is for such things, so you could be right on this.

But didn’t Canada object to the war in Iraq? Yet their contribution in Afghanistan was considered sufficient enough for them to be put back on the list of countries eligible to bid for Iraqi contracts. I say this in order to counter the idea that countries who objected to Iraq cannot be considered true allies because they “also refused” to help in the “legitimate” war in Afghanistan. This is not the case.

You then logically tie in position 1 and 3 which is fair enough. But it seems such a narrow aspect of the anti war argument that it doesn’t advance your position much further.

If containment was falling apart why was Saddam singularly unable to defend himself or his country and where are the WMD? It seems to me that he was well contained. Though still no less deserving of being deposed.

And the humanitarian benefit from the war is/will be wonderful, and yet this was used quite cynically as justification. This was not the major consideration. I seem to remember you (Sebastian) saying that American interests mean that Iraq/Middle East will always be the priority that, for example, Africa will not. There are plenty of places in Africa run by corrupt regimes and in need of humanitarian help. Yet nothing will be done about these. This is not to say that if you can’t help them all you shouldn’t help anybody, but at the same time the lack of consistency means that we know that humanitarian concerns were not high on the Administrations list of priorities. Iraq was invaded for precisely the reason you have stated before, it was in American interests do so, the only reason humanitarianism is mentioned is because it is a useful rhetorical device.

I feel another position you need to address is the fact that, despite humanitarian concerns and containment, the war was sold on WMD and yet when the UN inspectors wanted more time to look for them this was denied to them. It could be cynically said that the reasons for this are now obvious, they would never find any. It could also be argued that the Administration acted honestly but based on poor intelligence. Yet Cheney’s linking Iraq to 9/11 and the British Govts. bungled attempt to embellish the threat from Iraq (Uranium from Africa, the 45 minute claim) would strongly suggest otherwise. It seems, to me at least, that there was a lot of dishonesty involved in order to initially justify the war. Sebastian, does this bother you? Or do you believe it was a case of faulty intelligence? Which is worse to fight a war because of bad intelligence or to sell a war on a lie?

“Position 2 as originally stated refers to the “real war”. Now, it is stated as referring only to Afghanistan. I think that people espousing Position 2 see beyond Afghanistan when making that argument, and complain about Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, domestic safety, etc. There are many ways to battle terrorism throughout the world that do not directly involve the military.”

I’m sorry if I haven’t made it clear, but I agree that the War on Terrorism is much broader than the invasion of Afghanistan. I focus on Afghanistan because rhetorically all of our allies agreed that Afghanistan was important to it. I focus on Afghanistan because it illustrates that even when the allies all supposedly agree, many of the larger countries are still dramatically unhelpful. And that is after the invasion of Afghanistan. That is after much of the most dangerous work was done. That suggests that either that the allies are not particularly committed to the war against terrorism, or that they don’t have much to contribute, or both. I’m not going to argue about which it is, because they are unhelpful in any of the three instances.

I don’t know how to respond to the ‘legitimacy’ claim. Almost all important diplomatic and military events in the past twenty years have happened outside the UN. Very few people worried about UN importance in Kosovo, where our interest in being involved was far less. The UN has a horrible track record of places where it gets to be deeply involved in local government. Cyprus and the Palestinian Authority are the two that leap to my mind. But we did, foolishly, try to deal with the UN. That is why the focus was on WMD. WMD was the only thing important to the UN. You may have noticed that the UN doesn’t get involved in stopping genocide. China would veto to avoid a precedent which could ever be used against its Tibet policy.

Even if the containment regime had been effective in the past, it was being dismantled in 2003 by France, Germany and Russia. It was also based on economic sanctions which had fallen out of favor as being unhumanitarian. Which leaves us with no containment regime. Is that a problem?

“That suggests that either that the allies are not particularly committed to the war against terrorism, or that they don’t have much to contribute, or both.”

Or they would have been more helpful if the Bush administration had asked for help and accepted help when offered. This is a valid option that your thesis rejects. You’ve stated why you reject it, but I disagree. Oh well.

Does anyone know how many American troops are in Afghanistan? Anyone? It’s never spoken of. This thread has inspired me to do some cursory research into this question and into my perception that perhaps the War in Iraq is a distraction from the War on Terrorism.

The Centcom site says that there are 16,000 troops operating in the Afghanistan “Operation Enduring Freedom” theater. 15,000 of them are non-Afghan. It says that there are 8,000 from non-US countries. Which leaves about 7,000 from the USA.

http://www.centcom.mil/operations/Coalition/joint.htm

France is about 1/4 the size of the US, and their armed forces are even smaller proportionally. Yet they appear to have only 1/2 as many troops as we have in the region. France has committed 25% of their entire navy to Operation Enduring Freedom.

Here’s what I conclude from the Centcom numbers: The USA is simply NOT participating in the War on Terrorism enough, not even to a degree proportional to that of even the dastardly French.

-Cf

Ah, but I count Iraq as part of the war on terror. I only talked about it separately so we could focus on areas where there was general agreement.

Me:
> …The War Against Terrorism and the War in
> Iraq. They are two different things. Please
> stop perpetuating the myth that they are
> connected.

Sebastian:
> Did you read my post? I very specifically
> cleave the two and directly address most of
> the issues you raise. What is up with that?

Sebastian:
> I count Iraq as part of the war on terror.

Me:
You are too clever for me! I give up!

-Cf

Before you go removing the dust out of the UN’s eyes, perhaps you should take care of that log stuck in ours. When have we helped prevent Genocide, besides during Kosovo? We let Cambodia go. We’ve allowed mass slaughters in Central and South America. People have been killing each other for ages in Africa, without us lifting a finger. The list goes on and on. As much as I’d like to believe that we would crack down on genocide worldwide, I’m not going to argue that we are better suited for the job than the UN given our track record.

We’re likely constrained by the same problems the UN is. One, not just any slaughter can be called genocide. Millions during the rule of the Khmer Rouge, but was it genocide? No, it was political. Same goes for Stalin’s purges.

One of the complicating factors in this is that such political slaughters often occur in the midst of civil war or political unrest. We have a bad track record of getting involved in such civil wars. Somalia was one. Vietnam could be said to be another. As for political unrest, many of the governments we allied with during the Cold War were some of the most murderous tyrants of the 20th century. It doesn’t look like we’re doing much better of a job now, considering who the members of this coalition of the willing are.

The UN, at the very least can act with the appearance of impartiality, especially if it’s decisions are not always going our way. If we don’t at least nominally allow the UN it’s own path, it won’t be that useful to America when it does side with us.

As for the NATO powers, invoking that section of the treaty obligated them, and they knew that going in there. Seeing as how a third of the troops in Afghanistan are French, I don’t see how you can say the french were just being a bunch of Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys.

As for Iraq being a distraction, I don’t know how else you can define it at this point. No substantial pre-existing Al-Quaeda presence was found, much less evidence for the stockpiles of unconventional weapons that Saddam Hussein was supposed to have. In short, we had no real reason to go into this war. At this point Iraq can be considered a distraction just on the basis of the nonexistence of what we went to war to oppose in the first place.

It can also be considered a distraction in terms of the resources that are being devoted to take care of it, that are unavailable to use in Afghanistan Troops, funding, vehicles and equipment are being used in Iraq, where there was no real reason to be there, rather than in Afghanistan, where we still have reason to be there. That, Sebastian, counts as a pretty big distraction in the War on Terror, if you ask me.

Christopher. Your original complaint was that I make no distinction between Afghanistan and Iraq when discussing the War on Terror, which didn’t seem fair to countries like France who didn’t think Iraq was a part of the war. In my post I specifically cleave the two so that we can analyze what other countries are doing in the country which they ‘agree’ is part of it . The US thinks that Iraq is part of the war on terror so it makes sense to include its efforts in Iraq as part of its understanding of the war on terror. France does not agree, for purposes of the discussion I limited myself to Afghanistan. You then want to suggest that the US isn’t taking the war on terrorism seriously because it doesn’t have the commitment to Afghanistan that you seem to want. Since other countries are not engaged elsewhere, it seems reasonable for them to deal with the tiny areas of the war that they agree to. Furthermore you insist on talking about percentages. But if Iraq was a distraction you imply that not enough is being done in Afghanistan. If that is true, and if France and Germany really think it is important, why in the world don’t they send large numbers of troops and lots more money? They were perfectly willing to send massive amounts of money straight into Saddam’s pocket in the misleadingly named ‘Oil for Food’ program. If Afghanistan is important, and if it is being neglected, and if the US isn’t the only important country in terms of nation-building, then why aren’t other nations stepping up?

Vis-a-vis stopping all genocides, the US combines the issue with its own interests—appropriate for a country. The UN claims it as part of its authority in general. Furthermore you may notice that the UN is completely incapable of dealing with genocide apart from the US military, while the reverse is not true. Furthermore talk to leftists about why the US was strongly discouraged from getting involved in the slaughter in Cambodia. It has to do with glorious revolutions of the Communist variety.

“The UN, at the very least can act with the appearance of impartiality, especially if it’s decisions are not always going our way.” Which UN are we talking about here? The UN as impartial anything is a complete myth. I don’t even know where to begin with that. It treats despots as equal to elected Presidents in terms of both moral and practical consequences. It has a preoccupation with Israel which is odd considering slavery in the Sudan, actual genocide in Rwanda, and studied refusal to choose between genocidal maniacs and their victims in Kosovo.

Once again distraction of what? Of police manpower? No. So is the war on terror mainly policing or largely military? Once again distraction for whom? The US or France and Germany? Distraction from what? The narrow goal of eliminating a single terrorist group, or the project of changing the Arab world so that it won’t lend itself to these ideologies? Distraction has to be distraction from something. A huge problem with liberal rhetoric on this issue is that in order to critique this properly you really need to have a plan or at least talk about concrete goals. Alliances exist to do things. What should our theoretical alliances do? Distractions distract from things. What should the US military have been doing? Alliances also have to be with willing parties. Who is willing, and to do what? One of the major parts of this article is that most countries wanted to limit themselves to the narrow question of Afghanistan. Fine. But if you have such a limited focus, why can’t you do a lot? 8,000 troops from all the other countries combined is practically nothing from countries that aren’t even getting involved in bigger projects like Iraq. They talk big, but their actions can barely be heard.

I read that one-quarter of France’s navy is dedicated to Operation Enduring Freedom. What more do you want from them?

-Cf

Sebastian, your whole system of thought concerning this relies on the counterfactual claims of the administration.

No stockpiles of WMDs have been found. Stockpiles were what we were going after, not penny-ante little violations. We were supposed to be facing an apocalyptic threat requiring immediate action. There was supposed to be no room for negotiation, no time to look into matters further. No solid intelligence indicates that in pre-Gulf War II Iraq Al Quaeda had any significant presence in Iraq, much less that any of those terrorists got a chemical or biological weapon. As for nuclear weapons, Al Quaeda will have to look elsewhere. No evidence of credible nuclear program has been found. With the technical difficulties and time periods required to refine uranium to weapons-grade, that means that the likelihood of Iraq supplying Osama the Nuke was somewhere near zero.

If that was the case, two things are true. Saddam was no threat, and we were better off focusing our strength elsewhere.

Had a war broken out elsewhere requiring our attention, we would have been forced to draft people into the army to face that threat. The expense would have been considerable. We can glory about our power all we want to, but even we have to rely on limited resources.

Our enemies will certainly win if our economy craters under such burdens, especially if they are able to employ their methods rather cheaply. Our only way of facing this appropriately is to be very particular about how we fight this war. We should only take on expenses when we can gain dramatically by them. Otherwise, we should fight them at their level. For every person they infiltrate into our societies, we should infiltrate one of ours.

We should gather our clues by criminal investigation, because such clues need no revelation of national secrets, we can use them with greater flexibility. We can cheaply roll up networks, get convictions so the progress is public and notable, and by that more implacable. A nation that is constantly at war drains itself. One that uses it’s police power to fight back can keep up the battle for quite some time.

We are best served by a policy that values hard evidence over suspicion, because suspicions can mutate and multiply where truths can only be as they are. Chasing reports of WMDs, suspicions of cooperation with terrorism will only exhaust us. That would be a victory for the terrorists.

“I read that one-quarter of France’s navy is dedicated to Operation Enduring Freedom. What more do you want from them?”

Please look at a map of Afghanistan and tell me the relative worth of Navy support to Army support for a completely land-locked country.

Stephen,
I’ve been over these arguments before. My answers are in the archives. They start here , and follow here and here .

I shouldn’t try to summarize, because something worth 3 essays doesn’t distill very easily. But basically fundamentalist Islamist terrorism and Ba’athism spring from the same underlying Arab and Near-Eastern cultural problems. Dealing with Al Qaeda as you seem to suggest is like treating an opportunistic AIDS infection with anti-biotics. You may kill the immediate threat, but the danger is far from over. Like HIV we probably have not yet developed the proper cure. For the reasons I outline in the links I cite, I think the war is much broader than many are willing to admit.

But once again, most of this is irrelevant to my post. My post highlights the fact that our alleged allies can’t even help in cases which they rhetorically claim are clearly in the war on terror. Therefore it is no surprise at all that they choose not to help in the wider war. You seem uninterested in engaging this point, even though it is absolutely crucial to your suggestions about how the war ought to be fought.

As for “We should gather our clues by criminal investigation, because such clues need no revelation of national secrets, we can use them with greater flexibility. We can cheaply roll up networks, get convictions so the progress is public and notable, and by that more implacable. A nation that is constantly at war drains itself. One that uses it’s police power to fight back can keep up the battle for quite some time.”

Criminal investigation tends to be about assigning blame after the fact of a crime. Only rarely can it stop things in advance. That is not an acceptable way of dealing with terrorism.

A criminal investigation pre-empts not by following suspicion of an act, but following the acts to those who committed them, and those who associate with them. If you know who those people are, you can put surveillance on them, and be in a better position to pre-empt them by non-prosecutory means. In the meantime, you’re not relying on iffy information, because criminal investigations can put together forensic cases that are more damning and often more precise in their leads.

Your justifications seem to be as follows: The Arab civilization has turned against us, Saddam was being a slimy snake and becoming a rallying point for the Arabs, and the containment policies were failing, allowing them to gain traction in the Middle east in terms of power, which you deemed more dangerous in the light of September the 11th.

That sounds to me more like an imperial smackdown than a truly defensive war, as it was sold to the American people. If that’s Bush and the Neo-Con’s true motivation, then it’s worse than I thought.

This war was not justified in terms of solidifying America’s imperial reach. It was justified as a war of pre-emptive defense, which is bad enough if you don’t have hard evidence backing you. We ended up, indeed, not having it. I opposed Bush on the premise that we need another pre-emptive war based on lousy evidence like we need another collective hole in our heads.

But your justifications? I oppose them on principle. We will never succeed in calming the anger and frustration of the Arab world by repeating the performances of the colonial powers who they identify as having put them in their current situation in the first place. We will bankrupt ourselves, our reputation, and weaken our defensives abilities if we persist in the course the Neo-Cons have laid out.

9/11 should not be the turning point after which our foreign policy sinks into arrogance and paranoia. It should be our opportunity by showing America’s strength by it’s ability to act with dignity and wisdom. It should be our opportunity to show them that cannot inspire the worst in us, and that get them, even though we haven’t sunk to their ends justify the means level.

You should understand, the more we act like arrogant imperialists, the more the terrorists win. The more toes we step on, the more bridges we burn, the happier these people are. They want us to fulfill our role as the bad guy, to do their work for them, in convincing the world of our unsympathetic character as a nation and civilization.

Bush, I fear, is the worst kind of president we could have elected in a time like this. He is a man who seems unable to avoid rising to the bait, or responding to an insult. He is self-righteous, manichean, and immune, it seems, to suggestions that the course he takes could be wrong. His unswerving confidence in his actions feeds the perception that this is a man who must be checked and opposed, because he won’t do it himself. He won’t stop himself.

I guess the question is, in the end, who do we leave the rest of the world fearing more: Us, or the terrorists. As long as they fear us more than the terrorists, we will not get the kind of help we need. We must convince the rest of the world, that their common enemy is not us. And going on a campaign of either ill-advised pre-emptive wars, or of imperial intervention is the worst possible approach to that.

> > “I read that one-quarter of France’s navy is
> > dedicated to Operation Enduring Freedom.
> > What more do you want from them?”

> Please look at a map of Afghanistan and tell
> me the relative worth of Navy support to Army
> support for a completely land-locked country.

As a hawkish sort of fellow, you should know that the Navy is primarily used these days for the delivery and support of airborne weaponry. France has sent its *only* carrier fleet to fight in this war. If they needed their carrier fleet elsewhere (for example to rescue American citizens like they did last year in Liberia) this could be a problem.

In fact, a good deal of the United States’ military participation in Operation Iraqi Freedom is Navy-based. What do you mean to suggest about our own military strategy?

Even if, as you seem to suggest, we live in a crazy mixed up world where the French (and the US) is run by insane people who send warships to fight enemies in the desert, it still looks to me like the French are showing a serious committment to the War on Terrorism. Why do you insist on trying to portray the French as uncommitted to the war when the numbers so clearly tell otherwise?

-Cf

I can’t agree that 9-11 was caused by or a cause for ‘imperial reach’. In terms of the US I’m not even sure what the term would mean. Applying the word empire to what the US is or what the US does seems like a huge stretch on the word. You’ll have to explain what you mean by the phrase or I can’t really respond.

Chris, I don’t understand what you are saying about airborne weaponary. We aren’t in the phase of Afghanistan where airborne weaponry is a major concern. If that is the purpose of the carrier, it can’t be much help. The carrier group is symbolic, just like every other facet of French support in this area—useless but designed to look and feel important. It doesn’t show serious commitment. And from a country the size of France and with the shrill noises France makes, the ‘commitment’ to Afghanistan of less than 5,000 troops—most of them in a marginally effective carrier group—is a minimal commitment. There really isn’t any other way to see it without admitting that Afghanistan isn’t that important to station troops in at this point. If you want to say that, at least there would be no contradiction.

Yes, I think Sebastian’s whole argument rests on the idea that an international consensus and support with regard to Iraq was not needed because the opinion/backing of countries like Germany and France was worthless because
A) They’re “supportive” policies of Saddam meant they were predisposed to being anti-invasion.
B)They didn’t “help” in Afghanistan which was a legitmate battle in the war on terrorism.

I think Sebastian’s arguments have some merit, but Iam not sure the weight of evidence or opinion backs him up.

The fact is, it wasn’t just France/Russia/Germany who opposed the war, the bulk of world opinion was decisively against the invasion, and for some perfectly valid reasons.

But I suppose as Dubya would say, when Iraq has “the materials to produce as much as 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent” and “continues to posses and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised” well then “America doesn’t need a permission slip to
defend itself”. He would know…and as Rummy might have said and who cares what the rest of the world thinks, or knows, or thinks it knows about the unknown knows.

Iam yet to be convinced either way, but I don’t think one would be stretching the meaning of imperialism too much in relation to the US if….

“Imperialism can also refer more generally to a country’s efforts to have a lot of power and influence over other countries, esp. in political and economic matters”
Source: Cambridge International Dictionary of English

“- any instance of aggressive extension of authority
- a policy of extending your rule over foreign countries”
Source: www.hyperdictionary.com/dictionary/imperialism

Is it possible for a country to maintain a position whereby it can consume more than 25% of the world’s resources while having only 6% of world’s population, without having imperialistic tendencies? I would have thought that it would be a necessity.

When the United States gets to determine arbitrarily what leaders rule what countries, we are effectively treating these nations as if they are provinces of our political union. Therefore, it is imperialism.

The Neo-Cons want that kind of imperialism. They want us going in and dictating terms with the business end of a cruise missile. They think if we lay control to enough of the countries in the Middle east, we can ensure our security. But consider the following: Al Quaeda’s presence in Iraq has dramatically increased since we took the country. It’s become a magnet for terrorism. Bush may be able to chirp “bring them on”, but creating a stable government with a constant chaotic presence like that in the region has generally been acknowledge by the experts and the public alike to be a long term problem.

To counter this problem successfully, definitively, we would have to take the gloves off more or less. Not a terribly good idea, because that is exactly what terrorists like to see, especially terrorists who like to follow the example of what the Algerians did to the French.

Bush has put us in a no-win situation. We can crackdown, and become the bad guy, the empire builders, or we can let things slip into chaos. Or, the third option is, get the UN into the game, and make it difficult for Iraq’s neighbors to get into a territory grabbing frenzy.

Which do you think is better.

“When the United States gets to determine arbitrarily what leaders rule what countries, we are effectively treating these nations as if they are provinces of our political union. Therefore, it is imperialism.”

I would agree with you if we had some sort of general policy to that effect. But that is a dramatic overgeneralization. So far as I know we haven’t made an effort to have Chirac, Putin or Schroeder replaced. (Which by the way is more than we can say for them with their tariffs aimed intentionally aimed at key swing states). We replaced the Taliban (a direct threat) and Saddam (an indirect threat). We are encouraging change in Iran and Syria, both very nasty regimes. We would like change in North Korea. I don’t think you have to be an imperialist to want change in those particularly nasty regimes. (And that is particularly nasty in a very brutish world.)

“Al Quaeda’s presence in Iraq has dramatically increased since we took the country. It’s become a magnet for terrorism. Bush may be able to chirp “bring them on”, but creating a stable government with a constant chaotic presence like that in the region has generally been acknowledge by the experts and the public alike to be a long term problem.”

I believe you may be confusing ‘presence’ with ‘number of bombs going off’. Al Qaeda can be present in countries that it likes without bombing them. I suspect that Al Qaeda’s presence has not dramatically increased in Iraq, it merely is no longer a friendly presence.

> I believe you may be confusing ‘presence’
> with ‘number of bombs going off’.

Sebastian has a point here, insofar as we have NO IDEA WHATSOEVER who exactly it is attacking our troops in Iraq right now.

The news - and the administration - thinks it’s enough to point out that these attacks are occurring in the “pro-Saddam Sunni Triangle”, as if to suggest (with no evidence) that these folks are Saddam supporters.

Where I get confused is this: where the hell did the Baathists (if it is them) get such a huge bumper crop of *suicide bombers*!? From what I understand about suicide bombers, it takes two ingredients: (1) a religious cult and a broader culture openly friendly to suicide and martyrdom and (2) months or even years of brainwashing to transform weak and angry youths into human bombs. This kind of “technology” exists only in a few places: among certain Palestinian terrorist groups, Al Quaeda of course, the Tamil Tigers. Before the invasion, Iraq was an aggressor nation-state geared towards conventional and possibly even guerilla warfare - not an oppressed desperate people with a strong nihilistic cult at its core.

Or was it? I did once see a video on Frontline (that anti-Bush Saddamist mouthpeice!) last year that showed a screaming mob of Republican Guard trainees chanting “We will die for Saddam” and then proceeding to tear a live dog to peices and eat its raw flesh. So maybe before the war Saddam trained/brainwashed them to become suicide bombers, even in the event that their leadership hierarchy gets completely dissolved.

Or maybe a couple hundred Al Quaeda specialists moved in. That’s all it would take to acheive the result we see today, really. This, in fact, is what scares me: that Iraq will never acheive peace and stability as long as a handful of anti-American radicals (whoever they are) are able to kill a couple of Americans every couple of days. What a mess we are in.

But then again, who knows? The media and the administration don’t seem to care enough to tell us a damn thing about who is killing our soldiers or why they are dying.

-Cf

Sebastian, I heard not so long ago that a house was raided in Iraq and a whole bunch of Al Quaeda propaganda material, including videos was found there. That seems to indicate that at the very least they’re recruiting.

Just saw a couple news items circulating this morning indicating the Administration believes most of the attacks in Iraq are being committed by Al-Queda infiltrators.

Nothing like fixing your massive army in one location and saying “Bring Em’ On”. Like hanging a bullseye on our troops. Way to go there Bush, you should have stuck around on duty in the National Guard and learned something about military operations. We might have avoided all this had our President learned anything at all from Viet Nam about having an exit strategy before going in. Oh, well, spilt blood, now. And its dripping from Bush’s hands.

Suicide Bombers? Most of the bombs going off in Iraq are of the non-suicide type. I’m aware of 3 suicide bombers. I may have missed one I suppose, but that hardly counts as a bumper crop. You may remember we had 19 in the United States years before we invaded Iraq. And even if the rumors are true about them not all knowing that it was a suicide mission beforehand, that still leaves at the very least 4 in 2001 in the US.

Al-Qaeda is recruiting now? How is that relevant? They were recruiting in the following years that I’m aware of: 2002, 2001, 2000, 1999, 1998, 1997, 1996, 1995, 1994, 1993 and probably many years before that. You might note that Bush wasn’t even president during most of those years.

David, do you believe that these Al-Qaeda operatives would be doing nothing if they weren’t attacking our troops in Iraq? I strongly suspect they would be engaging in other terrorist activity. Don’t you think that is at all likely?

Sebastian, yes, I think that is true. And the point is that had we not invaded Iraq, we could have made Al-Queda our targets with surgical surprise attacks around the globe with full international cooperation and the resources to get the job done, instead of making us the targets for them.

We could have put Saddam on Notice in front of the whole world that if we or any nation finds a single Al-Queda member coming out of Iraq, we and the U.N. will take him out. That would have been a much easier sell to the U.N. which had full sympathy with us on going after Al-Queda. Being the cowardly survivor he is, Saddam would have killed any and every Al-Queda coming into his country.

That would have been so superior a strategy to the one now now making targets of our own G.I.’s.

“And the point is that had we not invaded Iraq, we could have made Al-Queda our targets with surgical surprise attacks around the globe with full international cooperation and the resources to get the job done, instead of making us the targets for them.”

This is the police version of the war on terror, and I at least am not convinced that it can work. It isn’t easy (especially with the appararently poor state of our intelligence community) to track down these underground cells when they aren’t doing anything. Waiting until they do something, when they have as much planning time as they want, leads to investigations after-the-fact subsequent to atrocities like 9-11. So in effect you are putting all US citizens in the very danger that you worry about with military members. Knowing that the UN never really does anything (after all Saddam won against the UN on inspections.) I see no reason to believe this: “Being the cowardly survivor he is, Saddam would have killed any and every Al-Queda coming into his country.” That kind of logic would suggest that Saddam was ok with weapons inspectors in 1999. But the facts differ with this kind of account.

I don’t believe the likelihood of your UN hypothetical. We would have gotten a 1441 like ‘threat’ and after the first Al Qaeda member was found we would discover that the French didn’t mean to ‘automatically’ escalate to war. Their would be discussions of the definition of ‘Al Qaeda’ which would likely exclude the person caught. There would be hand-wringing about how important the terrorist was. There would be an inappropriate focus on the name ‘Al Qaeda’ which would allow name changes to foil the UN.

> Suicide Bombers? Most of the bombs going
> off in Iraq are of the non-suicide type.
> I’m aware of 3 suicide bombers. I may have
> missed one I suppose, but that hardly
> counts as a bumper crop.

Maybe you missed one, or maybe you missed twenty. This list below took me about 20 minutes to compile. I left off incidents where it was unsure if the bombing was a suicide bombing or just a planted car bombing. And in some instances it was unclear how many bombers there were, what with them being blown to bits and all. So maybe I might have missed one.

January 28:
1 suicide bomber: 3 killed, 17 injured

January 25:
1 suicide bomber: 3 Americans killed, 6
wounded; 8 Iraqis killed

January 19:
1 suicide bomber: 20+ killed, 60+ injured

December 27:
1 suicide bomber: 12 killed

December 24:
1 suicide bomber: 4 Americans, 6 Iraqis
killed

December 14:
1 suicide bomber: 17 Iraqis killed, 33
injured

December 9:
2 different suicide bombers: 43 Americans
& 6 Iraqis injured

November 22:
1 suicide bomber: 16 killed

November 11:
2 different suicide bombers: 25+ killed,
many more injured

October 27:
5 different suicide bombers: 35 killed,
224 injured, including 12 killed at the
Red Cross HQ (one bomber is captured &
thwarted)

October 14:
1 suicide bomber: kills self, injures
many others

October 12:
1 suicide bomber: 6 Iraqis killed, 30+
injured

October 9:
1 suicide bomber: 8+ Iraqis killed, 45+
injured

September 22:
1 suicide bomber: 2 killed at UN HQ

September 9:
1 suicide bomber: 3 Iraqis killed, 41
injured

September 2:
1 suicide bomber: kills self, injures
others

August 29:
1 suicide bomber: 100+ Iraqis killed

August 19:
1 suicide bomber: 20+ dead, 100+ injured,
almost all UN employees

Maybe you were only counting the suicide bombers that have killed *American soldiers*, but just because a bomber kills Iraqis or other foreigners doesn’t mean that they’re not bona fide suicide bombers.

Your point that most attacks have been planted bombs is, of course, quite true. These are more likely to be your run of the mill militants operating at the behest of an aspiring Iraqi warlord, but the suicide bombers are clearly a phenomenon exhibiting another level of devotion entirely.

> You may remember we had 19 in the United
> States years before we invaded Iraq. And
> even if the rumors are true about them not
> all knowing that it was a suicide mission
> beforehand, that still leaves at the very
> least 4 in 2001 in the US.

I don’t understand the point of this statement. The 9/11 hijackers were recruited and trained for their missions BY AL QUAEDA! My whole point is that, according to conventional wisdom, it takes a group precisely like Al Quaeda to create suicide bombers. It would be news to most of us to learn that Saddam had the psychological and cultural technology to create suicide bombers, especially given the way his forces so quickly surrendered in both Iraq wars. My point was that it seems more likely that the suicide bombers were trained by someone besides Saddam, but that the Administration and the news media are not doing their job and trying to find out who exactly did train them.

Are they or are they not Al Quaeda? Who knows?

-Cf

Yes, and is your contention that if we did not invade Iraq that these suicide bombers would have found no other target?

No. Although I suppose it’s pretty unlikely that nearly two dozen suicide bombers (outside of Israel or Sri Lanka) would have killed and injured a thousand people in half a year.

My point was what exactly what I plainly said it was: that we (the public, at least) don’t know who these suicide bombers are.

Did we not see that Saddam had massive sucide bomber training programs?
Did we overlook or not forsee Al Quaeda members or other terrorist groups streaming into Iraq?
Is it easier than we ever thought to breed suicide bombers?
Or is it, as Bush pathetically suggested a few months ago, all part of a genius plan to lure terrorists into Iraq where our troops can get them?

-Cf

The Bush Administration’s logic that they’re using Iraq to sweep up terrorist networks is problematic in that for a trap to be successful, in military terms, surprise must be on the side of those setting the snare. If surprise were on our side in the beginning we would not be having this conversation. This isn’t any organized effort to trap terrorists, this is a quagmire trying to advertise itself as a trap. This is administration with a war where we have lost the initiative. This a war that has emboldened the terrorists, and Bush refuses to believe that he’s made a mistake in the way he waged this war.

In March, May, and August of 2001 in speeches to the CIA, National Defense Univerity, and the American Legion resctively (Bush 2001), President Bush addressed the issue of terrorism and rogue regimes in possesion of weapons of mass destruction without uniting the two concepts as if the posed a unique threat to Americans’ pyhsical safety. After the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center his method of presentation changed; in his speeches he began to follow references to AL Qaeda and terrorism with a short paragraph about Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass destruction as if a relationship exsisted between Saddam and Osama Bin Laden. President Bush made these inferences in the face of CIA assurances that no such relationships exsisted.
Bush’s status as an expert (POTUS with a high favorabitity rating) allowed him to influence what the American people would percieve. The public was swayed by use of priming (simple regular repition until what is recalled by the listeners becomes fact due to primacy of recalled memories) and spin (e.g. the phrases weapons of mass destruction and homeland security).
As one of the many individuals who do not believe that G. W. Bush is intellectual enough to develop and practice such a strategy on his own, I was not conned (convinced) by his ploy. In other words; I was skeptical because I did not see him as an expert at that time. On the other hand he appears to have learned rapidly.

BOTTOM LINE

The War on Terror was the best course of action. They kill one of us so we kill a hundred of them.

The United States is a football team, the army is our are linemen,Colin Powel is our quarter back, and George Bush is the coach. If you dont like the team, get the hell out ofthe stadium.

God Bless america