Author
|
Topic: Bin Laden's stunning victories - Part II Iraq (Read 2094 times) |
|
Hermit
Archon
Posts: 4287
Reputation: 8.94
Rate Hermit
Prime example of a practically perfect person
 
|
 |
Bin Laden's stunning victories - Part II Iraq
« on: 2005-11-10 06:36:04 » |
 |
Iraq
Do I need to tell Virians that according to that to a presumably "acceptably American main stream journal", NewsWeek, ex Secretary of State Colin Powell is privately confiding to friends that the Iraqi insurgents are winning the war in recent weeks? Daniel Benjamin director for counterterrorism at the National Security Council from 1994 to 1999 has reached a stark conclusion about the war on terrorism: not only is the United States losing, we are creating a new haven for terrorists. Michael O'Hanlon of the Brookings Institution of Washington has performed an analysis (below) which leads him to assert, "All the trend lines we can identify are all in the wrong direction." His conclusion, "we are not winning, and the security trend lines could almost lead you to believe that we are losing."
The trends seem clear:
[COMBAT FATALITIES] U.S. military fatalities from hostile acts have risen from an average of about 17 per month just after President George W. Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1, 2003, to an average of 82 per month.
[COMBAT WOUNDED] The average number of U.S. soldiers wounded by hostile acts per month has spiraled from 142 to 808 during the same period. Iraqi civilians have suffered even more deaths and injuries, although reliable statistics aren't available.
[INSURGENT ATTACKS] Attacks on the U.S.-led coalition since November 2003, when statistics were first available, rose from 735 a month to 2,400 in October. Air Force Brig. Gen. Erv Lessel, deputy operations director of the multinational forces, said Friday that attacks were currently running at 75 a day, about 2,300 a month, well below a spike in November during the assault on Fallujah but nearly as high as October's total.
[BOMBINGS] The average number of mass-casualty bombings has grown from zero in the first few months of the U.S.-led occupation to an average of 13 per month.
[ELECTRICITY PRODUCTION] Electricity production has been below prewar levels since October, largely because of sabotage by insurgents, with just 6.7 hours of power daily in Baghdad in early January, according to the State Department.
[OIL] Iraq is pumping about 500,000 barrels of oil a day fewer than its prewar peak of 2.5 million barrels per day as a result of attacks, according to the State Department.
[INSURGENTS] At the close of 2003, U.S. commanders put the number of insurgents at 5,000. Earlier this month, Gen. Mohammed Abdullah Shahwani, the director of the Iraqi intelligence service, said there are 200,000 insurgents, including at least 40,000 hard-core fighters. The rest, he said, are part-time fighters and supporters who provide food, shelter, money and intelligence.
O'Hanlon still has more ifs on the table than I, but then, I probably have more COINOP experience than he does. Also, while he and I agree that the US has emptied Fallujah of its so called "insurgents", I know that the US did so by depopulating it of civilians too. Allegedly (and I think that this latest horror story is accurate) through the US borrowing a technique deployed by the Russians in Chechnya, that is, deploying mass artillery bombardments using phosphorus shells and combinations of HE and inciendiaries ( to establish a killing zone for unprotected civilians with munitions which are supposedly approved for use for "battlefield illumination". Perhaps we now know why the US would not ratify the codicile to the International treaty on Chemical Weapons banning Inciendiary weapons). What was that Nietsche said about the abyss?
If this is accurate, and the photographs of the dead and also these albums (just click successive (next) to churn your tummy) suggests that it is, then in my opinion, we have another My Lai on our hands. What that will bring is hard to say. Hopefully not too much more in the way of apologetics and attempted equivocation. How does the litany go? Saddam Hussein is a nasty nasty man who used torture and chemical weapons to kill about 1/10 of the Iraqi we have killed to free Iraq of his rule and their oil. We deliberately targetted and killed Iraq's children (sorry Jake, but that charge is undoubtedly true, refer e.g. http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0401c.asp AND http://www.scn.org/ccpi/HarpersJoyGordonNov02.html the latter creates an entirely different perspective to the popular projections) out of our love for them and our wish to free Iraq's boys and girls from having to attend secular schools in what was the most educated, equal and industrialized Arabic nation. And, oh yes, we used torture, chemical weapons and random attacks on civilians to achieve our aims. Why don't the Iraqi love us now?
Well, they turned out in droves for the election which we gave them, goes the NeoConArtists, and their NoddiesTM all beat time with their noses. "Look at the turnout. The Iraqis really want democracy". One minor issue. I'm not sure any of this is true. In fact, nobody really knows what the full story is. Parts of it I know are false. Here are some facts (courtesy of Mark Manning).
- United Nations observers never left the Green Zone during the elections.
- Observers were stationed at only five of Iraq’s 90-plus polling places.
- Al Jazeera, the Arab news organization, was kicked out.
- Iraqis were told that if they wanted food rations, they had to vote.
- Everybody in Iraq is dependent on food rations.
- And the food ration guys were at the polling places to make sure people voted.
- CNN showed a long line of people in Falluja "waiting to vote", but it wasn’t a voting line. It was the checkpoint line, people waiting to get into the city.
Now I'm sure as sure can be that our resident spinmeister can paste 5000 or even 10,000 articles culled from the hundreds of NeoConArtist sites around the Internet to drown these indicative numbers in spin. And perhaps claim that the USA wouldn't use chemical weapons (only they have acknowledged delivery of both Phosphorous shells and M77 incendiary munitions – although denying that either had been used illegally (i.e. to target civilians). Unfortunately, and contra the cons, by and large, the numbers emanate from the US DOD and can only be sniped at, not rejected in totality. And if the numbers are even close to accurate, then I doubt that they can be interpreted differently from the way that the reader is invited to do for herself. While the pictures, like the denied for the longest time My Lai images, tell a story all on their own. Also tricky to deny. Unless, of course, the reader has let go of reality. In which case, the reader might even translate these numbers into a "victory". I've seen worse happen.
What does bin Laden have to do with Iraq you may wonder. Nothing. Well, nothing much. Actually, nothing at all before the US trapped themselves in Iraq and the NeoConArtists, their apologists, pandits and choirboys when their weapons of mass delusion had evaporated, spent their time repeatedly asserting that we had had to go into Iraq to defeat bin Laden (whose hostility, in reality, to Saddam Hussein may have exceeded GWBs, but no self-abusing, err respecting, NeoConArtist ever let a fact get in the way of a good myth).
At that point a mere handful of guerillas prepared to fight for Bin Laden and affiliated organizations could transform every action taken against US forces, and even mistakes made by US forces, into "Another victory for the glorious martyrs against the evil infidels." Now too, when we leave, or worse, as we stay and bleed the death of a million cuts, bin Laden surely wins. How on earth could anybody be stupid enough to invest into a self-defeating strategy like this is difficult to figure out. Or maybe not. Examine (Harp Chorus) "Our Dear Leader" - and his followers - and I'm sure something will suggest itself to you.
At any rate, Bin Laden's victory in Iraq is "stunning" only because he did not fight in Iraq, and certainly did not win in Iraq, indeed, as far as I know, he wasn't even in Iraq. Unfortunately, the Americans who did fight there, and claimed to have won every battle they have engaged in, have still lost, so comprehensively, thoroughly, self-destructively and completely as to have given Bin Laden a victory he did not deserve and could not, under any conceivable circumstances, have earned.
Perhaps worth noting that an identical accuse, isolate, sanction, attack progression has long been a hallmark of Israeli tactics, and the Americans appear to be following a similar course against a number of their less than favorite states. The weakness of this approach is that if your opponent is sufficiently nimble, the sheer predictability of your approach can be played in his favor.
Sources: (for all articles on this thread)
Colin Powell Believes U.S. is Losing Iraq war
U.S. in danger of losing the war
Tiger Force Atrocities in Vietnam
Google Reference Search for US intent to cause civilian casualtis in Iraq
US Genocide plans
US vs Iraq
Afghanistan: An Outright Humanitarian Disaster
Did the US military use chemical weapons in Iraq?
Rai News 24 Slideshow of Death (Just click " successiva" (next))
Rai News 24 Video
US Military confirms Phosphorus & Inciendiary Use in Fallujah
Diving Into falluja Mark Manning
NSA Archives - Iraq
Bush critics conclude US losing war on terrorism
US forces 'used chemical weapons' during assault on city of Fallujah
Advice to responders. Keep comments and responses dealing with the subject of this post, Iraq, on this thread. Cite sources. Write arguments. Do not engage in cut and paste marathons. Don't make blanket assertions. Remember to have fun.
|
With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion. - Steven Weinberg, 1999
|
|
|
Blunderov
Archon
Gender: 
Posts: 3160
Reputation: 8.91
Rate Blunderov
"We think in generalities, we live in details"
|
|
Re:Bin Laden's stunning victories - Part II Iraq
« Reply #1 on: 2005-11-11 08:07:10 » |
|
[Blunderov] " War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing worth a war, is worse. A war to protect other human beings against tyrannical injustice; a war to give victory to their own ideas of right and good, and which is their own war carried on for an honest purpose by their own free choice - is often the means of their regeneration."(John Stuart Mill:The Contest in America)
This is why the deception, fraud and perjury at the Whitehouse is no transient scandal. Persisting as they do in insisting that the war was righteous in this Millsian sense, they cannot justify their furtive manipulations without doing violence to the necessary conditions of 'honest purpose' and 'free choice'. Clearly this is a bad war.
IMV the only thing to do with a bad war is to stop it as soon as possible. The best possible outcome that I can think of would be if the rest of the world pragmatically decides to intervene with a multinational peacekeeping force under UN auspices and America, including Halliburton and ALL the other cronies, completely withdraws. No bases. Contracts anulled. No McDonalds. No embassies. No nothing.
This would require massive forces and resources, not to mention sacrifice and loss of face. I do not see this happening. Alternatively, the US could bite the bullet and place sufficient boots on the ground to overwhelm the insurgency. This too would require massive force and resource, perhaps even the draft. I do not see this happening either so the prognosis seems grim - "I think I am in rat's alley/where dead men drag their bones."
Whatever the case, no beginning can be made until honesty of purpose is regained. Bush must go. Right now.
Best Regards.
|
|
|
|
|
Hermit
Archon
Posts: 4287
Reputation: 8.94
Rate Hermit
Prime example of a practically perfect person
|
|
Re:Bin Laden's stunning victories - Part II Iraq
« Reply #2 on: 2005-11-11 13:18:47 » |
|
My reading is that at this time there is no way that the US can achieve anything effective in Iraq, even if every single potential draftee could be put into a uniform and placed there. It would only make it worse - in every way. More targets, more unhappiness, more terrorism, more money, etc.
Most of the choices we have at this time are bad and worse. Unless we have the balls to preempt the process, I think we have to accept the fact that Iraq will become an Islamic state (strongly contributing to the export of anti-west terrorism) and beset by civil war until it explodes messily into at least three nations, at least one of which will become an Islamic republic allied with Iran (and that the people who end up in that group will come off badly irrespective of what we do). This would inevitably lead to massive instability in Turkey - which is why Turkey's condition to entering the war was an agreement by the US not to establish a separate Kurdish enclave. It would also pose a serious risk of Kuwait ending up in a losing fight with Iran. The only sensible course, in my opinion, is to break the country up while we have the power to do it relatively cleanly. The question is how we get from here to there, while doing as little additional harm as possible.
The following might be a good starting base for negotiation. It accomplishes a number of parallel goals (long term structural goals indicated with an *) and is much lighter on the US than we deserve. Nevertheless, it is probably largely attainable if sold correctly.
Even so, I doubt that this or anything approaching it is on the cards. It is as sensible, just and fair a solution as I have been able to think of. And those attributes are not components of either International law or how the US considers the world to function. A useful mind exercise none the less.
[1] Impeach Cheney (This is important. Cheney is far more dangerous than Bush. This may be what has protected Bush from serious consideration of impeachment to date).
[2] Impeach Bush
[3] Charge the individuals in the Bush Administration's line of command from POTUS down with war crimes and crimes against humanity in Rome. The good news for Bush and Cheney being that they won't be hanged or decapitated - or even stoned (all three having been proposed for Saddam Hussein). The bad news for them is that their personal fortunes should (deservedly) be at stake. If found guilty, they should be stripped of assets to prevent them from doing further harm - and to set an example to others.
[4] Pre-acknowledge that the US is at fault for having engaged in an illegal war and grossly abused the process of the UN - an institution which we should not forget was started by the US which established the processes which we have, so very effectively suborned.
[5*] Abolish the security council veto powers.
[6*] Give the UN effective power. Perhaps 1/10 of current military budgets. (From memory, that suggests 40 billion a year from the US, 8 billion from Russia, 4 billion from China - enough to make a serious difference to the world). Ultimate goal is for the UN to take control of all major projective forces and space.
[7] Given that the US is likely to lose a class action suite for wrongful deaths against in excess of at least 150 000 Iraqi (it should be ten times that) in any equitable forum the US agrees to pay 1.5 Trillion (Only $10,000 per head, a real bargain) over some reasonable period in exchange for an agreement that no further cases can be brought against the US or its citizens, so long as the US assists in prosecuting other countries (e.g. the UK) who assisted in the illegal war. Other nations are given the option of making a similar deal or being sued/sanctioned. Notice that this would get rid of the crushing debt load from the Iran-Iraq war. Some of the money is paid up front to the UN to manage the transformation. This makes a lot of things possible (including get Iraqi oil flowing again).
[8] Cancel all contracts made by the US for work in Iraq. Cancel all transfers of Iraqi assets to third parties.
[9] So far as possible recover money paid to companies for work in Iraq (poisoned fruits principle).
[10] Establish a management board for Iraq under UN auspices.
[11] Establish a Truth and Reconciliation Group in Iraq including some eminent international legal experts.
[12] Invite Saddam Hussein and the current illegitimate government to act as advisers to the UN management group. In Saddam Hussein's case, after he gives a complete accounting of his previous activities to a reconciliation body in exchange for dropping all charges against him.
[13] Place the US troops currently in Iraq under the control of the UN, but to be demobilized ASAP. Replace the US troops with troops who are trained in balanced responses and who don't see Arabs as inferior or "the enemy."
[14] Negotiate to divvy up Iraq - possibly including a Federal element, but also discovering if the Iraqi and their neighbors are interested in getting together. It may be worthwhile trying to get Turkey to work to create a Kurdistan, and Kuwait to join with the Sunni. Iran has long coveted the Shiite territory so would take little persuasion. The trouble would be defending Kuwait from being eaten up by a combined Iran unless Kuwait and Sunni Iraq joined up.
[15] Attempt to establish freedom and democracy based on free and fair elections in the US as well as in Iraq <wicked grin>.
The following is the currently established US line of presidential succession (from Wikipedia):
- President
- Vice President
- Speaker of the House of Representatives
- President Pro Tempore of the Senate
- Secretary of State
- Secretary of the Treasury
- Secretary of Defense
- Attorney General
- Secretary of the Interior
- Secretary of Agriculture
- Secretary of Commerce
- Secretary of Labor
- Secretary of Health and Human Services
- Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
- Secretary of Transportation
- Secretary of Energy
- Secretary of Education
- Secretary of Veterans Affairs
The Secretary of Homeland Security, as of 2005, is not officially part of the line of succession.
To date no one other than a Vice President has acted as President.
|
With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion. - Steven Weinberg, 1999
|
|
|
|
Logged
