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Politics : GOPwinger Lies/Distortions/Omissions/Perversions of Truth -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Land Shark who wrote (66964)	5/24/2006 2:27:47 PM
From: Orcastraiter	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 173976

I read that in April in Iraq, that an average of 70 executions take place everyday. This is the result of sectarian violence that pits Shia against Sunni. When one sees what happens in Iraq in the absence of authority, one gets a new perspective of the issues that Saddam faced in keeping strife down in Iraq. Saddam's methods were abhorred by all, including the Iraqi people, especially the Shia. Perhaps some of the executions are in retribution for deeds in the past. The memories of atrocities stretch across generations. Pragmatically speaking, alternatives to the invasion and occupation of Iraq should have considered the political fabric of the nation. Apparently it was ignored almost completely. One understands that unlike Germany or Japan, where the population was homogenetic and no underlying tensions existed for civil war and power struggle, Iraq is a boiling pot of ethnic tensions. To surmise that you could control the populace with the same or fewer troops than it took in Germany or Japan is quite simply erroneous. Comparisons of WWII occupations to the occupation of Iraq is about as useful as comparing apples to watermelons. To supplant a Saddam, you must be ready to re-apply an equal amount of pressure on the people that Saddam did. He kept the lid on the boiling pot. He did so in brutal terms. That brutality made for efficiencies in the number of loyal Fedahyeen troops needed to carry out control. To rise above that level of brutality, the number of loyal soldiers must increase multifold. The situation in Iraq will not improve, until someone exerts authority. Right now rival ethnics are trying to take power by extinguishing their neighbors. The definition of civil war. Until this authority is established, there will be chaos in Iraq. This is what we have wrought by an invasion and occupation in a country where warnings of what lay ahead were ignored by those in authority in the US. The situation on the ground was woefully underestimated. The Saddam-like force has not been applied and the result is societal collapse. It's the same thing as removing the calculated shoring from a mine shaft, and hoping that it won't collapse. Take out Saddam...you need to re-apply that same force...otherwise collapse may be imminent. Orca