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

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (171551)	9/30/2005 5:21:29 PM
From: Geoff Altman	Respond to of 281500

Ed, first let me say thanks for your well thought out response. Second I'd like to make it clear that while I've been posting some articles that are obviously hawkish doesn't necessarily mean that agree with the all opinions of the author and will try to state my present opinion and not that of the author. I take all opinion pieces with a large dose of salt although some ring truer that others. On Afghanistan, I completely agree that the longer we stay the harder it will get. We have become quite proficient at entering countries and displacing adversaries. We've never been all that great at either knowing how to deal with the disparate tribes and teaching them how to act towards a common good or at when we've done what we can so it's time to leave. Buying and selling a stock might be a good analogy(selling being much harder in my book).<g> I had no doubt that removing the taliban and reducing their influence would be possible. At this point I have no illusions that things are or will be hunky dory once we leave. There's one instance I read about that I thought rather compelling. During the last Afghani election an old man that had travelled miles to get to a poling booth entered to vote and spent 10-15 minutes just looking at all the pictures of the candidates. When asked who he voted for it was apparent that he didn't even know any of the candidates or what they stood for. He was looking for the right face. When asked why he made the rather arduous journey? He smiled and said basically, "are you kidding me? This is the first time I've ever had a chance to have a say about who's in office!" A seed has been planted and I find that rather poignant. As for implication that the protestors are wrong, it's not the protest perse that I find disagreeable it's the indications that anti-war types seem willing to do anything including speaking out against the interests of their own country in order to reach their goal. A simple silent march without the rabid exhortations would have been much more effective to influence not only the gov't but the American people. oops, gtg, I'll get to Iraq later.

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (171551)	10/2/2005 5:41:31 PM
From: Geoff Altman	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

I'd say that how we got into the war in Iraq at this point is not worth dwelling upon. The pretext of WMDs was a plausible one at the time and we may never know if they were there or not or if indeed that was the real reason. I'm much more concerned with now and the future. First I'd like to start off, with what I'd almost consider and axiom by saying that anyone that reaches the level of the oval office has and willingly accepts a responsibility to the American people that supercedes all else when it comes to getting us into a war. To think and expend energy otherwise, to me at least and many other people (some of them in the Gov't) , would forever have us looking for evil conspiracies. I'd prefer to trust the president, (and notice I didn't say Bush), until given an adequate reason to doubt him, otherwise it's just an exercise substituting unknowns for fact and a waist of energy. The way he/she discharges that responsibility of office may not appear to be correct to many in sending us to war or keeping us out of a war for that matter, but the fact is, in the present, we never really know all the information that the president has access to, (this might only be known to historians years from now). To me, insulting the president equates to insulting the office, is deconstructive and not only something I'm at loath to do but that also makes me feel a certain degree of animosity/nonempathy towards people that would partake of same. Case in point, FDR pre US direct involvement in WW2. FDR knew that the right thing to do was join the allies but since WW1 the US had a rather strong isolationist attitude and he didn't want to fracture the country by ordering direct involvement. He worked around the rules and sent aide to Britain anyway, which the Joe American was in the dark about. Much of the prewar maneuvering has only been revealed in the last decade and a half. In the end I don't think anyone could argue that our sending aid before our direct involvement in WW2 was wrong. On to Iraq. Keep in mind that I'm just a humble electronics technician and admit to having no special academic training in middle east affairs. IMHO, in order to even start to understand Iraq you have to understand at least a little about the history of the arabs and persians. Since ancient days these people have been slaves of some sort of king dictator or tribal leader. The few early laws, which would be the foundations for later laws, were draconian to say the least, see the, "code of Hammurabi",The code is towards the bottom of the page: fordham.edu Much later crica 400-300 BC there are some interesting accounts from the ancient Greek general Xenophon, "The Persian Expedition", about Darius I (?) and the basic attitude Persian rulers had of their subjects. In battle, some Persian officers jobs were to ride behind their own forces literally whipping them into battle and to keep them engaged. Xenophons accounts of the expedition, while a bit aggrandizing, were quite amazing. He emphasized to his men that while the persians were many they were also slaves, whereas the greek was a free man worth 100 slaves. Oh, crap, I'm really digressing now <g>. The advent of Mohammed, did nothing to affect the subservience of the persians/arabs. In fact it enlarged it to include subservience to Islam as well as the ruling families. Subservience to Allah if they want to go to the nice place when they die and subservience to whatever ruler if they and their family want to keep on living. I put it to you that while the modern muslims have adopted technology the religion itself has not evolved with it enough. There are old laws in the bible that aren't exercised anymore, that would make you laugh if they weren't so awful, regarding dress, planting, marriage, heresy etc.ending up with either being burned, stoned or some basic part of your anatomy being removed but those aren't taught to lay people anymore. IMO part of Islam is still in the dark ages and hasn't evolved to fit modern times for the most part. There are parallels that you could draw from other religions. I have to pause here, even though I'm sure you're champing at the bit to argue my posts. I'm applying for a job at Intel and have been posting when I get tired of working on my resume and preparing for my interview. That coupled with my sons worrisome addiction to one of the online games <gg>. I'll try to finish tomorrow.