A disgusting vat of filth that no self-respecting intelligent person would wade into.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
I'm pretty worried about North Korea still.

Point being, we've been worried about the middle east for years, and will continue to be as long as it a) has oil b) countries there seek any kind of offensive long-range weapons. But those long-term issues go well beyond the issues now in Iraq and the war there.

The long term issues there are such that mistakes made from Truman to Kennedy in Iran still plague us daily, and mistakes made in Iraq could end up plaguing us as severely as those (though I hope not). Indeed, policies put in place by the British in the teens remain major issues.

Regardless, I believe it is likely in our interest to maintain a presence in both Iraq (or whatever the area becomes) and Afghanistan for the foreseeable future.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
The long term issues there are such that mistakes made from Truman to Kennedy in Iran still plague us daily,

Fair enough, but I don't think any R has sought to run on a platform that includes a "Truman lied, people died" strategy in quite some time.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
!.a. Yes
1.b. Yes, but failure to plan for that very known unknown is inexcusable

2.a. No
2.b. Yes

So it is not how evil their government is or was, it is just what they did to us.

Don't you think the world, Afghanistan and the United States are all better off without the Taliban in power there (even if they were not supporting Al Queda?)? You don't think the price was worth it (against assuming they had no connections do Al Queda)?

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter

1.b. Yes, but failure to plan for that very known unknown is inexcusable

BTW: "very known unknown?" you seem to be channeling Rumsfield here. It is kind of disturbing. You need to purge his speeches from your mind. I suggest Martinis, but that is only a suggestion.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
I'm pretty worried about North Korea still.

Point being, we've been worried about the middle east for years, and will continue to be as long as it a) has oil b) countries there seek any kind of offensive long-range weapons. But those long-term issues go well beyond the issues now in Iraq and the war there.

I know I am sounding like I am channeling Friedman when I say this (please try and forgive me) but as technology advances isn't the whole world's problems becoming more and more our problems also.

It may take a village but the whole world is becoming one village.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Fair enough, but I don't think any R has sought to run on a platform that includes a "Truman lied, people died" strategy in quite some time.

Indeed, there were only a few references to Carter's failed hostage rescue during the last election. But, the 1990 Iraq war was vigorously discussed.

The passions may not run so high, and the discussion may be more among the policy wonks than the folks who spin the evening news, but it's hard to image Iraq, and all the policies that have gotten us here through many administrations, being part of the American political landscape for some time.

And, at some point when another war breaks out, we will be once again debating whether the Powell doctrine or some other newfangled half-assed approach should apply.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
A good place to start might be learning a little bit about the countries as they are, rather than focusing on hypothetical countries.

Have you always been this much of a jerk, or did it just happen to you in Law School? What makes you think you have any idea how much I know about those two countries?

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Spanky
Have you always been this much of a jerk, or did it just happen to you in Law School? What makes you think you have any idea how much I know about those two countries?

Just going on what you've written here, I'd imagine.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Spanky
A question for the anti-iraq war posters.

1) If it had turned out that Saddam Hussein had financed 9-11 and that the Taliban had nothing to do with it,

(a) would an invasion of Iraq to remove Saddam Hussein been warranted?

(b) Should we have invaded and removed Saddam Hussein even though we knew there was a strong possiblity of a civil war?

2) If Bush suspected that Afghanistan had WMDs but had nothing to do with 9-11, and it was clear the Taliban had tried to kill a prior president:

a) Would that have been enough reason to invade Afghanistan?

b) If it turned out there were no WMDs after we invaded, does that mean the invasion would have been a mistake (otherwise being OK if there were WMDs)?

Not sure if I qualify as "anti-Iraq war" because I gave qualfied support pre-invasion, but I'll try to answer:

1(a) Hell Yes.
1(b) Yes, but we should have then had a decent plan in place with sufficient forces to maintain order and have a chance to keep it from happening (at least while we're there).

2(a) I'd say yes because of the known intimate association between the Taliban and al Qaeda. You can't assume that away.

(b) Not necessarily, and the consequences of a screw-up in Afghanistan, while serious, are far less severe for us than the potential consequences of a screw-up in Iraq.


S_A_M

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
But those long-term issues go well beyond the issues now in Iraq and the war there.

I hadn't focused on this particular statement before, but just saw it in Spanky's quote.

The problem is that the long-term issues in the Middle East are very difficult to separate; if you just look at the Kurdish issue, for example, you quickly discover that Turkey is scared shitless of a Kurdish state for obvious reasons, but then also discover that part of their fear is that other ethnic groups will be empowered, like the Armenians. The Russians also get scared shitless about this, since it could further destablize the Caucasus region, though the Kazahks and Uzbeks could see advantages there. The whole area from India and China over to Greece and North Africa and down to Tanzania has interlocking issues, and Iraq is right smack in the middle of all of them. Even Indonesia could get destabilized if there is a problem in Saudi Arabia.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Spanky
Have you always been this much of a jerk, or did it just happen to you in Law School? What makes you think you have any idea how much I know about those two countries?

Please, feel free to prove my assessment wrong.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
Just going on what you've written here, I'd imagine.

And what have I written that shows that I lack knowledge on either Afghanistan or Iraq? GGG, being his typical arrogant and ignorant self, is implying that if I knew more about Iraq and Afghanistan I would understand better why one would support the war in one and not the war in the other.

Am I missing something here? Has GGG spent a lot of time in either country? Is he fluent in Pashto, Hazari, Dari, Arabic or Kurdish? As he spent a lot of time getting to know a good cross section of the natives of both countries that would give him a special insight on how the people in both countries would react to an invasion by the United States?

My suspicion is that in order to understand GGG's position on Iraq (or any subject for that matter) better I would have to lower my IQ by about twenty points, purge myself of any tendency towards logical or linear thought, and increase my emotional and knee jerk responses to issues. I think those changes would give me a much better insight in to why GGG reaches the conclusions that he does.

[SlaveNoMore]

Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
And, of course, whether now, three years ago, or two years hence, it is the Bush Administration that brought us the Civil War in Iraq.

A better argument is that the 7th century schism in Islam succession that led to separate Shia and Sunni tribes brought us the "Civil War"

That is, if there actually was a civil war going on.

From Powerline

This is, I think, a judgment call on which opinions can differ, but my own view is that the situation in Iraq, while violent, is not what has ordinarily been considered to be a civil war in the past. I say this for several reasons.

First, a civil war is a species of "war." There are many kinds of violence--murder, riots, gang violence, terrorism, etc. But "war" has traditionally contemplated armies in the field. Iraq has militias, to be sure, but they do not, in my judgment, rise to the level of armies that have traditionally been viewed as conducting warfare. The militias generally don't fight each other, as armies do; they are more like terrorist groups or gangs that prey on civilians.

Second, the level of violence in Iraq does not rise to the level that has been associated with civil war in the past. I wrote about this here, in August. I compared death rates in Iraq as they were then being reported with death rates in two civil wars: the American and Spanish. I concluded that the death rates in Iraq were only around one-quarter of what was seen in those paradigmatic civil wars. One could do this analysis with other civil wars; the Russian comes to mind, but don't even think about it: it was one of the bloodiest events in world history. One might say: of course those wars were bloodier; they involved major battles like Antietam and Gettysburg. Which is another way of putting my first point about what constitutes a "war."

The death rate is slightly higher today than it was in August, but not enough to have any material impact on this conclusion.

Third, the really high level of violence in Iraq is confined to Baghdad and perhaps one or two other areas. If you take all of Iraq outside of Baghdad (around 77% of the country's population), the rate of violent death is only a little higher than what we see in American cities like Washington, DC and Baltimore. Remarkably, I think, the current murder rate in Iraq outside of Baghdad (but including Anbar province, Basra, etc.) is slightly lower than the murder rate in New Orleans prior to Hurricane Katrina.

I don't think that traditionally, a country would be said to be in a state of civil war if, outside of a single city, the level of violence could fairly be characterized as a high crime rate.

So, for those reasons, I would not call what is going on in Iraq a civil war. It seems pretty clear, though, that the present controversy is not the result of any good-faith effort to apply historical norms to the conflict in Iraq, but rather is part of the effort to stampede this country into defeat for partisan political purposes.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
I hadn't focused on this particular statement before, but just saw it in Spanky's quote.

The problem is that the long-term issues in the Middle East are very difficult to separate; if you just look at the Kurdish issue, for example, you quickly discover that Turkey is scared shitless of a Kurdish state for obvious reasons, but then also discover that part of their fear is that other ethnic groups will be empowered, like the Armenians. The Russians also get scared shitless about this, since it could further destablize the Caucasus region, though the Kazahks and Uzbeks could see advantages there. The whole area from India and China over to Greece and North Africa and down to Tanzania has interlocking issues, and Iraq is right smack in the middle of all of them. Even Indonesia could get destabilized if there is a problem in Saudi Arabia.

Do you really think that any party will be successful advancing a middle east "solution" by continuing to yammer about the Bush admin's mistaken strategy after 2008?

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Do you really think that any party will be successful advancing a middle east "solution" by continuing to yammer about the Bush admin's mistaken strategy after 2008?

I'm hoping it won't be a bumper sticker issue anymore.