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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (129894)	4/23/2004 3:34:46 PM
From: cnyndwllr	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Nacine, re: "There is no choice now but to put down the insurgencies." The fact is that I cannot think of a single modern instance where a foreign nation has been able to "put down" an insurgency when there exists at least a minimum of popular support for the insurgents. The things that must be done, including broad measures to locate, target and kill insurgents and to take punitive action against those that support them, have the unintended consequences of actually fueling the insurgency. The final outcome is not totally, and in fact probably not even primarily, under our control. The KEY is whether or not the local population is supportive enough of the insurgency to allow it to exist. In the triangle we already KNOW that the population is sufficiently pro-insurgency or anti-occupation to support an active insurgency. Rumsfeld's way of admitting this is to say that we need "better intelligence" regarding the identities, plans and locations of the insurgents. What he means is that we are not getting the help of the locals. In the north the Kurds are strongly in our camp. They, of course, have no reason not to be. In the Shi'a areas the clerics control the population. If you think the radical clerics can cause problems, wait until Sistani growls. The whole south of the country would become inhospitable to American presence if that happened. So it's not really about "putting down insurgency," it's more about helping the Iraqis find their own form of governance and then hoping that they don't choose a form that results in a bloodbath, a haven for terrorists and an unfriendly government to America. These problems were very evident before we invaded. They aren't going away now. Throwing more billions and more lives into the meat grinder that Iraq has become, and will continue to be, will not change reality. We need to understand that so we don't have to ask "why" more soldiers died in 10-20 years and then shake our heads because we don't have a good answer. When we bet the farm on invading and remaking Iraq into a western style democracy we made a sucker bet. We don't need to compound the problem by throwing our car keys into the pot. We need to do that thing the Bush camp seems so incapable of; we need to negotiate a way out that salvages something, we need to continue to "help" as long as our help advances our needs, and then we need to let that country find it's own path. After all, inevitably it will find it's own way, just as Vietnam did.