Shot in the Dark

The Why We War

Amir Taheri on the stakes in Iraq:

Those familiar with al Qaeda’s literature in the past four years know that all jihadi groups regard new Iraq as the principal battlefield between Osama bin Laden’s version of Islam and modernity.The new Iraq also has determined enemies within:

* The Shiite sectarians, often linked to the Khomeinist regime in Tehran, have done all in their power to destabilize the country and undermine the democratically elected institutions.

* Sunni sectarians, often supported by governments or groups in Arab states, have pursued similar objectives.

* The Saddamite regime’s remnants, especially the 200,000 or so members of the Ba’athist Republican Guard, provide the backbone of rival Shiite and Sunni insurgent groups and death squads.

And then, the chase – emphasis mine:

The struggle for Iraq is so bloody and bitter because the stakes are extremely high. The success of the democratic forces and their allies, notably America, in preserving the above achievements could have as dramatic an impact in the Middle East as the Soviet Union’s fall had in Europe.

Preserving the victory achieved in Iraq means delivering a deathblow to all the Middle East’s demons: the pan-Arab chauvinists, the Khomeinists, al Qaeda and other jihadis, Shiite and Sunni sectarians, and reactionary autocrats.

To the left:  Terrorists flock to Iraq because we’re the great satan and they hate us.

To the right:  Terrorists flock to Iraq because they realize that this is Terrorism’s Stalingrad.

(Via Jeff Kouba at TvM)

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Mitch Berg

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19 responses to “The Why We War”

  1. RickDFL Avatar
    RickDFL

    First – Mr. Taheri incorrectly labels Iran a “one-party state”. While certainly repressive , Iran has a variety of competing political parties that contest elections. Second, foreign terrorists flock to Iraq because they are Sunni extremists who want to prevent the growth of Shia power. If Saddam had died suddenly, Iraq fell into civil war, and the U.S. had never come, they would still go to fight the Shia. Finally, if Iraq=Stalingrad, then we should retreat. If our strategic situation resembles that battle at all, our position more closely resembles the German position. Our initial invasion failed to destroy all resistance, we continued to ‘stay the course’, grinding our army down, overcommitting our strategic reserve, and leaving ourselves in a precarious position.

    We can not win the war, but we can save the Army.

  2. Terry Avatar
    Terry

    General RickDFL has reported for duty!

  3. Kermit Avatar
    Kermit

    “Mr. Truman, we have no choice but to surrender! There have been to many casulties. Americans will learn to adapt to chopsticks.”

  4. billhedrick Avatar
    billhedrick

    Rick, your credentials for such analysis are what exactly?

  5. RickDFL Avatar
    RickDFL

    My credentials are nothing special but I am not asking anyone to accept my analysis based on my credentials. If I have made a factual assertion you think is wrong, be a man and say so. If my inferences from those facts are wrong be a man and say so.

  6. billhedrick Avatar
    billhedrick

    Rick my man, I am using the “chickenhawk” maneuver, you know how that works.

  7. RickDFL Avatar
    RickDFL

    Bill:

    The “chickenhawk” maneuver works where you ask someone else to make a sacrifice you are unwilling to make. I am not asking that you or anyone else fight in Iraq. I will take your lame response as a concession to my analysis.

  8. Kermit Avatar
    Kermit

    Mmmm. Chickenhawk. Lovely in a garlic & wine sauce. Distasteful in a debate.

  9. Mitch Avatar
    Mitch

    The “chickenhawk” maneuver works where you ask someone else to make a sacrifice you are unwilling to make.

    An intellectually-sluggardly maneuver based on facts that are never really in evidence.

    Unwilling? What, you’re clairvoyant? You don’t know what’s in the hearts of others. But you have no problem filling in the blanks to complete a trite alogical word game!

    Not only alogical, but fascist. What, only people in the military have the right to speak?

    On 9/11, I was a 38 year old single parent with two bad knees. The military really didn’t want me. Yes, I checked.

    I am not asking that you or anyone else fight in Iraq. I will take your lame response as a concession to my analysis.

    Well, na na na boo boo to you too.

    Keep this tucked in the back of your mind, Rick: not even in the throes of a catastrophic stroke would I concede to any of your analysis.

    Just set that as our baseline, and we’ll avoid unfortunate little lines like the above.

  10. RickDFL Avatar
    RickDFL

    “not even in the throes of a catastrophic stroke would I concede to any of your analysis”

    If you do not show up for the game, the umpire does not ask if you want to concede, you have conceded. By not disputing the facts or inferences of the analysis, you have conceded the analysis. If you think the analysis is wrong be a man and say why.

    I suspect our Army in Iraq contains a fairly large contingent of single parents with medical conditions for more serious than two bad knees. Would you support a restriction on funding for the Iraq war to prevent the Army from deploying troops like this guy?

    Check out: http://www.noiraqescalation.org/press?id=0054

    “This is not right,” said Master Sgt. Ronald Jenkins, who has been ordered to Iraq even though he has a spine problem that doctors say would be damaged further by heavy Army protective gear. “This whole thing is about taking care of soldiers,” he said angrily. “If you are fit to fight you are fit to fight. If you are not fit to fight, then you are not fit to fight.”

    As the military scrambles to pour more soldiers into Iraq, a unit of the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division at Fort Benning, Ga., is deploying troops with serious injuries and other medical problems, including GIs who doctors have said are medically unfit for battle. Some are too injured to wear their body armor, according to medical records.””

    If your problems are enough to excuse you from the fight, will you allow them the same protection?

  11. Doug Avatar
    Doug

    I love how bill brings up the chickenhawk crap, Rick only respond to it and MitchCo knocks it down.

    Paul Cebar has a great song for just such occasions. It’s called “Hook, Line and Sinker” and Rick, you just got caught.

    I guess that would be a strawfish.

  12. RickDFL Avatar
    RickDFL

    Doug:

    This thread reminds me of “The Sounds of Silence”.

  13. Doug Avatar
    Doug

    It is interesting Rick. I have a brother-in-law who reminds me of the SITD crowd. Huge Bush supporter, huge Iraq war supporter – you name it. Before the war started, we carried on very heated e-mail discussions. The thing I kept saying to him was that if we did actually start a war in Iraq, we would have foreign insurgents flooding Iraq to fight a guerrilla against US troops that would last years. According to Joe, I was being a typical, hysterical, emotional liberal and that the war would only last a matter of weeks if not days.

    On the second anniversary I sent one of his e-mails back to him and said “I guess I was wrong and you were right… It’s only lasted 104 weeks – 730 days”.

    The next day my wife got a call from her sister who was crying and asked that I stop sending e-mails to Joe because it had pissed him off so much he was threatening to stop having anything to do with my wife and me.

    Before all of this happened, they came here a three or four times a year and we went to visit them everytime we went to the cabin. Since it happened, we see each other at Christmas and that’s about it. When we do see them the silence is deafening.

  14. Paul Avatar
    Paul

    First – Mr. Taheri incorrectly labels Iran a “one-party state”. While certainly repressive , Iran has a variety of competing political parties that contest elections.

    Really?

    In the last Iranian election, there were ten candidates, but all held the same idealogy that has ruled the country since the overthrow of the Shah–so much so, that there was a record low turnout this time. Besides, the elected officials are mere figureheads, the mullahs run the show.

    You can have any flavor you want, as long as it’s vanilla!

    Second, foreign terrorists flock to Iraq because they are Sunni extremists who want to prevent the growth of Shia power. If Saddam had died suddenly, Iraq fell into civil war, and the U.S. had never come, they would still go to fight the Shia.

    If you actually believe this, I’ve got swampland in Florida to sell you. I also have the Brooklyn Bridge!

    Foriegn terrorists flock to Iraq because the last thing they want to see is a functioning democracy right on their doorstep, since that would cause unrest among those they oppress.

    And since you brought it up, what if we hadn’t gone in Iraq? I guess you can sleep at night while men are being fed into wood chippers, their wives and daughters tortured in rape rooms. Funny how no one on the left brings that up; the only ones on the Left that did so was Amesty International (they screamed about this for years) until after 9/11.

    Finally, if Iraq=Stalingrad, then we should retreat. If our strategic situation resembles that battle at all, our position more closely resembles the German position. Our initial invasion failed to destroy all resistance, we continued to ’stay the course’, grinding our army down, overcommitting our strategic reserve, and leaving ourselves in a precarious position.

    Rick, we beat their asses so bad that they had to resort to guerrilla-hide-amongst-the-civillians-and-use-them-as-human-shields just to survive. There are some pockets of resistance because we aren’t following the Geneva Convention (you know, since they do not wear the uniform of enemy combatants, they are lined up and shot as spies) to the letter.

    As for the ‘our initial invasion failed to destroy all resistance’ you yourself said that ‘foreign terrorists flock to Iraq.’ How do you suggest we ‘destroy all resistance’ when it is the ‘foreign terrorists’ doing the flocking? Should we have attacked the entire Middle East to stop the ‘flocking’?

    Lastly, Rick, there’s ‘if Iraq=Stalingrad, then we should retreat.’ Go rent The Killing Fields to get a glimpse as to what the John Murtha strategy would create. I suppose you can sleep at night over that, too.

    Oh, and Rick? You’re wrong.

  15. Paul Avatar
    Paul

    Doug said:

    The next day my wife got a call from her sister who was crying and asked that I stop sending e-mails to Joe because it had pissed him off so much he was threatening to stop having anything to do with my wife and me.

    Doug, if you treat him like you do us here, I’m surprised he didn’t beat you on the deck of your cabin until there was nothing left but blood.

  16. RickDFL Avatar
    RickDFL

    Paul:
    “Foriegn terrorists flock to Iraq because the last thing they want to see is a functioning democracy right on their doorstep, since that would cause unrest among those they oppress”

    The foreigner terrorists coming to Iraq are mostly Sunnis. They oppose ‘democracy’ in Iraq, not because the have an idealogical objection to democracy, but because in Iraq Shias will win any democratic election. In their home countries these same Sunni extremists are probably quite eager for democratic elections because it would increase their power. Free elections in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, and Pakistan would almost certainly bring Sunni extremists to power.

    “I guess you can sleep at night while men are being fed into wood chippers, their wives and daughters tortured in rape rooms.”
    Yep. It is a big bad world out there. If you can not handle that, find some hippies for a round of “Kumbaya”.

    “There are some pockets of resistance”.
    Well that is the understatement of the year. Road travel has become so dangerous, U.S. forces increasingly rely on helicopters. Now helicopters are so endangered the Army has restricted areas and hours of operation.

    “because we aren’t following the Geneva Convention (you know, since they do not wear the uniform of enemy combatants, they are lined up and shot as spies) to the letter.”
    Even if we were to shot everyone we wanted to it would not do any good. As a foreign occupier with almost no Iraqi political constituency we have no reliable intelligence. Which group of Iraqis can we rely on to tell us who to shoot? Then the minute we started wholesale killings the Iraqis would cut our supply lines so fast it would make your head spin. We can stay in Iraq, just as long as Iran and the Iraqi Shia say we can.

    “Go rent The Killing Fields to get a glimpse as to what the John Murtha strategy would create”
    If I thought our continued presence would change things I would be for staying, but we are not doing any good. There will be a disaster and a human catastrophe, but the best people to sort it out are the Iraqis, not the U.S. Blame for this disaster rests squarely with you and the Republican administration that created the disaster.

  17. RickDFL Avatar
    RickDFL

    Paul:

    Go easy on your brother-in-law. He and those like him will have a hard time accepting responsibility for the greatest strategic blunder in U.S. history.

  18. RickDFL Avatar
    RickDFL

    sorry that last one was meant for Doug

  19. Doug Avatar
    Doug

    Rick said,

    “He and those like him will have a hard time accepting responsibility for the greatest strategic blunder in U.S. history.”

    To be fair, you can’t hold people like Mitch or my brother in law responsible for this. You can however point out that they seem constitutionally incapable of admitting they were wrong.

    The irony is that they do acknowledge that mistakes were made which just happened to result in the same things that people like you and I were saying would happen.

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