[Rhodes22-list] Question for Brad about Iraq Information(political)

[john Belanger]

germany after ww1 couldn't live up to agreements it signed to end the war either.  even wilson thought the terms were too harsh and would cause trouble later. he would have addressed it if he had lived. the allies would probably have reformed the terms if they had not been preoccupied with the russian revolution. they favored looking the other way when germany started to recover because they thought europe would need to face the soviets united against the eastern threat. miscalculations are always rampant in war...

Brad Haslett <flybrad at gmail.com> wrote:   John,

We'll get to religion in a minute. As you may recall about WW2, Patton was
criticized for keeping units of the Wehrmacht intact and putting former
Nazis in key positions of municipal leadership. One (of thousands) of the
events not anticipated in Iraq was that the Republican Guard wouldn't stand
and fight, but fade into the general population to fight another day. Not
putting former Baathists in leadership positions was another error.
Whatever the post-Saddam plan was, it was either seriously wrong, poorly
executed, or both. The shipment of higher grade explosives from Iran for
IED's wasn't anticipated or stopped. Sealing the borders should have been
priority one. I think if we've learned anything militarily from this
engagement it would be this: one hundred thousand of our troops can take on
anyone, anywhere. Winning a war is easy given our superiority, winning the
peace requires a massive amount of "boots on the ground". If you read
Petraeus's COIN manual (only 200+ pages, you can do it!) you recognize many
of our mistakes. Stable government follows stable living conditions. We
didn't meet that challenge for the first four years and the errors are so
numerous I'm not going to spend the time outlining them. The surge is
showing much progress but that isn't being reported. You have to go outside
the MSM using some of the sources I've already posted on the list to stay
abreast of current developments.

Let's talk politics briefly. The initial invasion of Iraq had bi-partisan
support in the Congress. In fact, the decision to take out Saddam was an
extension of the Clinton Administration "regime change" policy. If you read
Jeane Kirkpatrick's last book, published after she died early this year, she
makes the case for the legality of the invasion and why our European allies
didn't join the fight (financial self interests). Saddam never met the
agreements he signed to end hostilities at the end of the Gulf War. The WMD
argument was certainly the most effective selling point, but the failure to
comply with a dozen other UN resolutions made a good argument as well. BTW,
Kirkpatrick wasn't a supporter of the invasion. Someone on this thread
discussed 'national interests' (probably Dave, I'm too lazy to research
it). I personally questioned whether our national interests were at stake
in Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia-Hergegovina, and Kosovo during the 90's. But once
the decision was made by the Commander-in-Chief, I wanted our troops to be
successful in their mission. My personal dislike of the Commander is
immaterial. Such is not the case today with the war's detractors. If they
could stifle their BDS for one minute and look at the stakes, the situation
looks much different.

There is a reformation taking place in Islam worldwide and the bad guys are
winning at the moment. As someone mentioned earlier in the thread (probably
Dave again) the Saudi's started this by funding and exporting Wahhabism. All
fundamental religions prey on the misfortune and fears of their converts.
Not only does Iraq need to put radical Islam to bed, all of the Muslim world
needs to redefine their interpretation of the Koran to join the modern
world. If you study the rise of the muijahideen in Afghanastan (start with
"Charlie Wilson's War, soon to made in a movie) you can see why a retreat
from Iraq will only embolden al-Queada. Welcome to the 21st century of
religious wars, not unlike the 7th. We're not going to charm these people
to our way of reasoning. Surrendering Iraq to them just when we're seeing
improvement is certainly not the answer.

Brad

On 7/14/07, john Belanger wrote:
>
> brad
> one thought i think you should address, that i think may be having an
> effect on our willingness to subscribe to option 1. religious fear of
> armageddon. and additionally, why didn't we realize that by weakening any
> national leader we would be unleashing the extreme right wing of their
> political and military population to "rescue" their way of life from the
> brink of extinction by an outside power. every country, and, apparently
> every religion has their fair share of extremists. we have our skinheads,
> neonazis, etc. when we leave iraq, a strong centralized, representitive
> government must be in place or there will be a coup. and we will be back to
> square 1. in germany after hitlers death, admiral raeder was in command of
> the german government. i think i'm correct in that he signed the papers of
> surrender. that ended hostilities,and weapons were confiscated. religion
> didn't raise an objection. iraqis have to put religion to bed and serve the
> needs of their country.
>
> Brad Haslett wrote:
> Rummy,
>
> Wally is going to attack me for publishing another editorial instead of
> stating my beliefs in my own words, but this one summarizes what I've said
> over the years. There is little room for me to add or detract from this
> thought. As a man who has been abandoned by his party and his President,
> "I'm Free At Last!"
>
> Brad
>
> -------------------------
>
> July 10, 2007 The War About the War *By* *Herbert
> Meyer*
>
> The 9-11 attacks did more than start a war; they started a war *about* the
> war. No sooner had the World Trade towers collapsed and the Pentagon burst
> into flames than two perceptions of the threat began competing for the
> public's support:
>
> *Perception One: We're at War*
>
> *For the third time in history Islam - or, more precisely, its most
> radical
> element - has launched a war whose objective is the destruction of Western
> civilization. Our survival is at stake, and despite its imperfections we
> believe that Western civilization is worth defending to the death.
> Moreover,
> in the modern world - where a small number of people can so easily kill a
> large number of people - we cannot just play defense; sooner or later that
> strategy would bring another 9-11. This conflict really is a clash of
> civilizations whose root cause is Islam's incompatibility with the modern
> world. So we must fight with everything we've got against the terrorist
> groups and against those governments on whose support they rely. If the
> Cold
> War was "World War III," this is World War IV. We must win it, at whatever
> cost.*
>
> *Perception Two: We're Reaping What We've Sowed*
>
> *There are quite a few people in the world who just don't like the United
> States and some of our allies because of how we live and, more precisely,
> because of the policies we pursue in the Mideast and elsewhere in the
> world.
> Alas, a small percentage of these people express their opposition through
> acts of violence. While we sometimes share their opinion of our values and
> our policies, we cannot condone their methods. Our objective must be to
> bring the level of political violence down to an acceptable level. The
> only
> way to accomplish this will be to simultaneously adjust our values and our
> policies while protecting ourselves from these intermittent acts of
> violence; in doing so we must be careful never to allow the need for
> security to override our civil liberties.*
>
> There is no middle ground between these two perceptions. Of course, you
> can
> change a word here and there, or modify a phrase, but the result will be
> the
> same. Either we're at war, or we've entered a period of history in which
> the
> level of violence has risen to an unacceptable level. If we're at war,
> we're
> in a military conflict that will end with either our victory or our
> defeat.
> If we're in an era of unacceptable violence stemming from our values and
> our
> policies, we are faced with a difficult but manageable political problem.
>
> *Splitting the Difference*
>
> Since the 9-11 attacks, President Bush has been trying to split the
> difference. It's obvious that he, personally, subscribes to Perception
> One.
> Just read his formal speeches about the conflict, such as those he's given
> to Congress and at venues such as West Point. They are superb and often
> brilliant analyses of what he calls the War on Terror. Yet he hasn't done
> things that a president who truly believes that we're at war should have
> done. For instance, in the aftermath of 9-11 he didn't ask Congress for a
> declaration of war, didn't bring back the draft, and didn't put the US
> economy on a wartime footing. A president at war would have taken out
> Iran's
> government after overthrowing the Taliban in Afghanistan -- and then sent
> 500,000 troops into Iraq, rather than just enough troops to remove Saddam
> Hussein but not enough to stabilize that country. And a president at war
> would have long since disposed of Syria's murderous regime and helped the
> Israelis wipe out Hezbollah.
>
> Study history, and you quickly learn that oftentimes events and the
> responses they generate look different a hundred years after they happen
> than they look at the time. It may be that history will judge that
> President
> Bush performed heroically, doing the very best that anyone could do given
> the two incompatible perceptions about the conflict that have divided
> public
> opinion and raised the level of partisanship in Washington to such a
> poisonous level. Or, it may be that history will judge the President to
> have
> been a failure because he responded to 9-11 as a politician rather than as
> a
> leader.
>
> Either way, it is the ongoing war about the war that accounts for where we
> are today, nearly six years after the 9-11 attacks: We haven't lost, but
> we
> aren't winning; fewer of us have been killed by terrorists than we had
> feared would be killed, but we aren't safe.
>
> While experts disagree about how "the war" is going, there isn't much
> disagreement over how the war *about *the war is going: those who
> subscribe
> to Perception Two are pulling ahead.
>
> Here in the US, virtually every poll shows that a majority of Americans
> want
> us "out of Iraq" sooner rather than later, and regardless of what's
> actually
> happening on the ground in that country. Support for taking on Iran - that
> is, for separating the Mullahs from the nukes through either a military
> strike or by helping Iranians to overthrow them from within - is too low
> even to measure. There isn't one candidate for president in either party
> who's campaigning on a theme of "let's fight harder and win this thing
> whatever it takes." Indeed, the most hawkish position is merely to stay
> the
> course a while longer to give the current "surge" in Iraq a fair chance.
> Moreover, just chat with friends and neighbors - at barbeques, at the
> barbershop, over a cup of coffee - and you'll be hard-pressed to find a
> solid minority, let alone a majority, in favor of fighting-to-win.
>
> However it's phrased, just about everyone is looking for a way out short
> of
> victory.
>
> Overseas, public opinion is moving in the same direction. For example, in
> Great Britain Tony Blair has stepped aside for Gordon Brown, who in the
> midst of the recent terrorist attacks in London and Glasgow has ordered
> his
> government to ban the phrase "war on terror" and to avoid publicly linking
> the recent, mercifully failed attacks in London and Glasgow to any aspect
> of
> Islam. The current leaders of Germany and France are less anti-American
> than
> their predecessors, but no more willing to help us fight. Down under in
> Australia John Howard - blessed be his name - is holding firm, but for a
> combination of reasons may be approaching the end of his long tenure; none
> of his likely replacements are nearly so robust. And the Israelis - who
> are
> facing the triple-threat of Hamas, Hezbollah, and before too long a
> nuclear-armed Iran - are going through one of their periodic bouts of
> political paralysis.
>
> *A Second Attack*
>
> It's possible that something horrific will happen in the immediate future
> to
> shift public support here in the US, and throughout the West, from the
> second perception to the first. When asked by a young reporter what he
> thought would have the greatest impact on his government's fate, British
> Prime Minister Harold Macmillan responded cheerfully: "Events, dear boy,
> events." One more 9-11-type attack - biological, chemical, or nuclear -
> that
> takes out Houston, Berlin, Vancouver or Paris, and the leader of that
> country will be overwhelmed by the furious public's demands to "turn the
> creeps who did this, and the countries that helped them, into molten glass
> and don't let's worry about collateral damage." (This will sound even
> better
> in French or German.) Should the next big attack come here in the US, some
> among us will blame the President but most won't. The public mood will be
> not merely ferocious, but ugly; you won't want to walk down the street
> wearing an "I gave to the ACLU" pin in your lapel.
>
> Absent such an event in the near future, it's likely that over the next
> few
> years the war will settle into a phase that proponents of Perception Two
> will approve. Simply put, we will shift from offense to defense. The
> Department of Homeland Security will become our government's lead agency,
> and the Pentagon's role will be diminished. (Nothing will change at the
> State Department - but then, nothing ever does.) Most people in the US,
> and
> elsewhere in the West, will be relieved that "the war" is finally over.
>
> To preserve the peace we will have to be more than willing to make the
> occasional accommodation to Moslems. If they ask us to put more pressure
> on
> the Israelis - well, we can easily do that. If Moslem checkout clerks at
> our
> supermarkets don't want to touch pork - by all means let's have separate
> checkout counters for customers who've bought those products. And now that
> we think about it, "Happy Winter" will be as good a greeting, if not a
> better one, than "Merry Christmas." Won't it?
>
> Of course, there will be the occasional terrorist attack. Some, like the
> recent ones in London and Glasgow, will fail. Others will succeed, but
> guided by the mainstream media we will view them with the same detachment
> as
> we would view a meteor shower that brought flaming rocks crashing randomly
> into the Earth. Most will land harmlessly in fields, some will land on
> houses and kill those few residents unlucky enough to be home at the time.
> Once in a while, one will crash into a crowded shopping mall or, sadly,
> into
> a school packed with children. These things happen - alas - and while it's
> riveting to watch the latest disaster unfold on television there really
> isn't much one can do about it. Life goes on.
>
> In the long run, history always sorts things out.
>
> If it turns out that Perception Two of the threat is valid, then over time
> we will become accustomed to the level of casualties caused by the
> terrorists. After all, more than 40,000 Americans are killed each year in
> traffic accidents and we don't make a big political issue out of that, do
> we? Our attitude toward death-by-terrorist-attack will be the same as our
> attitude toward deaths on the highway: a tragedy for the victim and
> members
> of the family, but nothing really to fuss over. And if Perception Two is
> valid, it's even possible that the terrorist threat eventually will ease.
> Can you even remember the last time anyone got bombed by the IRA?
>
> But if those of us who subscribe to Perception One are correct, then it's
> only a matter of time before something ghastly happens that will swing
> public opinion throughout the West our way - and hard. Whether this will
> happen in two years, or five, or in 15 years, is impossible to predict.
> All
> we can know for certain is that if Western civilization really is under
> attack from Islam, or from elements within Islam, then they will not give
> up
> or be appeased. At some point they're going to go for the knockout punch.
>
> *Fighting, Finally, to Win*
>
> The pessimists among us will argue that by this time we'll be too far gone
> to save; that years of merely playing defense and of making concessions to
> the sensitivities of our enemy will have eroded our military power, and
> sapped our will, to the point where *de facto* surrender will be the only
> option.
>
> We optimists see things differently: For better or worse, it's part of the
> American character to wait until the last possible moment - even to wait a
> bit beyond the last possible moment - before kicking into high gear and
> getting the job done. It's in our genes; just think of how many times
> you've
> ground enamel off your teeth watching your own kid waste an entire
> weekend,
> only to start writing a book report at 10:30 Sunday night that, when you
> find it on the breakfast table Monday morning is by some miracle a minor
> masterpiece.
>
> However horrific it may be, the knockout punch won't knock us out.
> Instead,
> it will shift us from playing defense back to offense - and this time we
> won't hold back. The president will ask Congress for a declaration of war
> and he, or she, will get it. We'll bring back the draft, send our troops
> into battle without one hand tied behind their backs by lawyers, and we
> won't waste time and energy pussyfooting with the United Nations. And if
> we've closed GITMO by this time - we'll reopen it and even double its size
> because we're going to pack it. All of this will take longer to organize,
> and cost more, than if we'd done it right in the aftermath of 9-11. That's
> unfortunate, but that's the way we Americans tend to do things. And when
> we
> do finally start fighting for real -- we'll win.
> Herbert E. Meyer served during the Reagan Administration as Special
> Assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence and Vice Chairman of the
> CIA's National Intelligence Council.
>
>
> On 7/10/07, R22RumRunner at aol.com wrote:
> >
> > Herb,
> > I believe that the Democratic candidate at least had a brain.
> > Your president
> > is a joke. The only thing that isn't funny is the number of years it
> will
> > take to clean up the mess he will leave behind when he finally is
> > relieved of
> > his duties....and the sooner the better as far as I'm concerned.
> >
> > Rummy
> >
> >
> >
> > ************************************** See what's free at
> > http://www.aol.com.
> > __________________________________________________
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> >
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