I apologize KLP. I shouldn't have suggested you were so one sided that you were "stupid." I don't think of you as stupid, never have.
Second, I used some pretty strong words to introduce the article because I wanted some of you to read it. It's a long 4 post article and something I thought well worth the time. I'm the kind of person that can't resist a strong challenge so I gave one and, apparently, it worked. That doesn't mean I'm not hotheaded but this time I threw in the hot words to get a reaction.
Thirdly, you write: ---This statement from the article in italics is VERY true, IMO...and anyone who thinks in two years we can not only win a war, and try to win the peace, AND as well, TRAIN their soldiers like ours are trained, PLUS make sure their basic energy, water, sewer, telephone, oil pipelines, schools, food, housing and built from the ground up, ETC ETC ETC, can be done in two years either believes in miracles, or has absolutely no patience nor ability to see the problems that exist, now and in the Saddam tenure.
No one could disagree with that statement but it proves too much, or too little depending on how you use the phrase. What's important is not how much we've gotten done but rather what we've learned while we've tried to get things done. Unless you are a magical thinker that believes that remarkable changes in entire cultures and societies can occur in a few days, months, years or decades, we've learned that the watershed events we hoped would "turn things around" have disappointed. We should also have learned that the experts that said "this would happen" in Iraq and were ignored or, worse, fired, were right and are right.
It's not a good policy to keep sending lives and hundreds of billions down the same toilette that swallowed them. I believe someone once famously wrote that the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again, failing and thinking that this time it would be different. Since the men sending men to die aren't going themselves, aren't sending their own families and probably won't, I'm not too impressed with continuing the wastefulness. Especially since it's costing us a lot more in terms of our ability to lead the rest of the world and increased risks of danger to us from terrorists.
Fourthly, I'm a little sensitive about comments that indicate I want us to fail. I was against the invasion and occupation of Iraq from the beginning. I thought, and said, that it would cost us in terms of world leadership, would draw moderates into radicalism which would translate into increased risks of terrorism to us, and that our lofty "generational changes" goals were not doable. I thought that everyday Iraqis would come to hate us and ankle bite us with a death of a thousand cuts and the ones paying the price would be our sons and daughters in Iraq. I was accused of being UnAmerican, hating America, hoping we would lose and a lot of other things. We can now discuss those issues more civilly but two years ago that wasn't the case. If I overread your comments then I apologize again.
Finally, you ask; "Perhaps you would care to comment what you would do if you were a General, and various Officers down the line about the training of the Iraqi's in Iraq.
It's not the training of the Iraqi Pro-US goals forces that's the problem. We could easily train them up. I know, and you know also, that it's not hard to work an AK47 or an M-16, not hard to operate a machine gun, throw a grenade, launch a mortar, learn unit tactics or any of the other things that face to face fighting requires. The Iraqis aren't stupid and the guys fighting us seem to do a fairly effective job fighting against our much more sophisticated technology. No, it's not training they need, its a cause worth dying for.
Many Iraqis from the same culture that includes those that drops their weapons or switch over to the other side at the first sign of danger, and yes many of those "cowards" are Shia also, are willing to walk into the gates of hell if their clerics ask it of them. So why are they willing to attack armoured vehicles with crude weapons or trucks and die trying to inflict harm but not usually prepared to fight against the insurgents or for their government. And they aren't.
They didn't seem to be willing to fight and die for the Allawi government and although there are glimmers, they don't seem prepared to sacrifice their lives for this "new" government. In addition it appears that so far large numbers of them certainly aren't willing to die for something we call "democracy." But many of them WILL die fighting against Americans, some spontaneously picking up discarded weapons and attacking. And THOSE men were, and evidently still are, tough. No matter how you view their politics they've fought to the death in some hellish circumstances and died bravely.
So if I was the general in charge of training I'd send word to Washington that I couldn't push a string and that it was time for new plan that didn't involve wishful thinking and wasn't wasting the precious lives of my men. I'd suggest leaving them to solve their own problems, but then I'd have recommended that from the start.
But this Administration won't do that. They won't do that for the same reason they wouldn't listen to the first President Bush or most of the real experts on the middle east. They won't do that because they don't understand little people, they've never been to war, and they think you can herd populations with intimidation, the same way you herd sheep, or fool them with doubletalk.
They're wrong. All of us have inborn tribal instincts that do not allow the men of the tribe to tolerate strange men who come to rule. It is that way in small groups and it's that way in large ones. If you don't believe me then think about how you'd feel if the situation was reversed and foreign men with guns had power over you, your woman, your property, your movements, your freedom and your life. Do you feel the heat? Ed |
