The Future of IRAQ

[liberalpragmatist]

Frankly, I'm not at all optimistic of the country's future, whether Kerry or Bush wins. Of course, it will be a disaster of Bush is re*elected. If that occurs, expect him to keep propping up Allawi but without enough support. The rest of the world hates him. Expect him to divert troops to go to war against Iran, further inflaming extremists and causing Allawi's government to collapse to Sadrists.

If Kerry wins, I think he'll try sincerely to get other countries aboard, and he might have modest success. Kerry will have genuinely good intentions, and its possible that the country will pull together under him and work out reasonably well, if not perfectly. But I don't see that as likely. Most other countries will be sympathetic of Kerry's aims but won't want to commit troops to what they see as a quagmire. Kerry will have to end up endorsing one of two bad outcomes or a combination of both: 1) giving tons of money and weaponry to Allawi's forces and letting them do what they want as we withdraw, (2) allowing a partial break-up of Iraq into semi-independent regions with their own militias bound up in a loose economic and political alliance which might allow the kurdish and non-Sadrist Shiite militias to unite with former Baathists against Sadr. The end result under Kerry will not be, IMO, a fundamentalist Iraq, but either a divided or authoritarian Iraq. Perhaps a combination of both. Such a state will be stable and will be freer than Saddam, allowing for some political and social freedom ala Egypt. Either way, we face impossible choices and lose any lasting respect in the world - the joke will be that we exchanged Saddam for Saddam-lite, and at the cost of by then probably 2000 American soldiers and tens of thousands, if not over a hundred thousand Iraqi civilians.

Anyone else's thoughts?

[LibraLabSoldier]

1. We will succeed.

You are right. Requardless of who the president is next year, Iraq isnt going to go away. Our military is gonna be there for at least five, and more likely ten years. We are rebuilding, and the Iraqi people can tell the difference from who is blowing up the infrastructure(insurgents) and who is working to get the lights on, and the water running......


But the important thing we as Americans need to realize is that having true allies in the middle east is important. I dont consider the Saudis to be our allies, or even the Israelis. The Iraqis will be, once we are done rebuilding.


Just one soldiers opinion.

[DrWeird]

2. Yes. We must win in Iraq.

If we don't the entire middle east will fall to communism like dominos.

[Jacobin]

4. LOL

And, "there's light at the end of the tunnel"
;-)

[JudgeSmales]

12. I agree

Plus we may need to give them weapons again if Iran decides to start some trouble....

[Ms. Clio]

22. Oh, yeah, it'll be Iran starting the trouble

Not the invaders of Iraq, right next door to Iran. Not Israel.

Bah.

[Aidoneus]

13. The rebuilding process in pictures

But first, a question. What is your position in the military? If I were to guess, it'd be whatever title as the bureaucratic equivalent of Glass Half-Full Propaganda and Public Relations, but I don't like to guess about things...

ANYWAY, the feature presentation. I wanted to reinforce your words with graphic displays proving their truth. It will help to drive the point home.

Now in this picture, the Liberators are generously providing a source of light for the dark morning:


This group gathers together to get over their anti-Iraqi outlook to thank the Americans (obviously the real arbitor of what counts for "pro-Iraq" interests) for providing this much-needed light. Maybe one day they'll get the chance to thank you personally if you ever see them?


This building appears to be ... um.. only part of the way into the Rebuilding Process. A vital part of the "re"-building cycle is that something must first be destroyed.


Here, the Freedom Bringers are helping the locals remove apparnetly unwanted buildings, so as to make sure there is room for all of the great glorious Liberty-bringing structures to be constructed at a later date:


Now this is a brilliant method of providing the little extra OOMPH! in providing business to all of the new hospitals:


On the surface of things, it may APPEAR to the untrained eye that this girl is grieving the loss of her family members in a recent assault on Fallujah. We know this to be false, however:--she is just so overjoyed at being free, she cannot help but cry due to her savage upbringing.


This OBVIOUSLY BRAINWASHED YOUTH dares to resist the liberators in the current Preperation For Rebuilding Operation in Najaf.


Here, citizens of the occupiedliberated land are kept so that they may celebrate their freedom in the safety of isolation:


Inspired by all of the atrocitiesGood News coming from next door, these Iranian youths demonstrate their angereagerness to be invadedfreed next and condemncelebrate the DestructionRebuilding Campaign carried out by the occupyersliberators:


The Rebuilding Campaign has had a tremendous rippling effect, raising bumper crops of love for the US all over the world:


You get the idea.. I had far too much time to kill in making this, but now I must get going.

[Taxloss]

14. You, Sir,

are a very generous and talented man. More power to your elbow.

[Name removed]

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[Aidoneus]

19. So which is it?

it's a war/people die/etc etc, or is it a rebuilding process where all those mean nasty OTHER guys are the ones doing the badnessosity(TM)? For your friends to ever "finish rebuilding", magically making beloved allies of those they have widowed, they'll first have to stop destroying. At any rate, to me this is an absurd way of looking at it. Draping a frilly facade over the plainest obscenity is just dishonest to me.

It was not this thread that I enjoyed, but some of the other things I've written up lately. You can look them up, if you'd like, for I don't save my work for future reference (probably should, but I don't). But however much I liked releasing what I know, rather than just mocking the half-full victory brigade, those will mostly be ignored like usual.. I do have a malfunction, however.

Well, I happen to find the medics as decent, so I went light.

[LibraLabSoldier]

20. You are making us out to be babykilling thugs

We are trying our best to repair the decades of damage that Saddam caused. It is hard since the insurgents keep blowing up power grids, water mains, and other key infrastructure. Believe me, the Iraqis for the most part have no love for the insurgents. Most of them want a hardline theocracy, and are fighting at the behest of guys like AlSadr.....Every time an Iraqi police station gets blown up, five hundred guys are lined up the next day to sign up. They know that in order to be free, they have to take charge themselves. We are helping them do that.

[Aidoneus]

30. That is not me painting such a picture

The fact that your friends are zealously acting up the part does all of the heavy lifting there; btw, don't put words into my mouth. I go to great lengths to select exactly what I mean to say, I will not have strawman-cliches unceremoniously dumped upon them as a supposed reflection. I may be making them out to look poorly, but it is only a mirror that I hold up.

The basic "there to help" premise remains ridiculous on multiple levels.

I see we both have friends on the ground, except mine tell a different story. Vantage points mean a lot, I guess.

[LibraLabSoldier]

31. Yeah.

Most of mine are medical personell, and most of the wounds they have seen have been caused by car bombs and IEDs. Neither of which we happen to have in the arsenals of military weapons.

[Aidoneus]

35. the term was intended to be loosely read, as the force in general

the other units, I mean--operations, pilots of the AC-130 gunships and the strange flying machines bravely dropping bombs from miles up in the air, tank gunners, artillery engineers, etc.. and I usually intend myself to be taken literally!--a momentary slip on my part.

Actually, I have noticed reports of very, very few of the foreign occupation forces wounded or killed by the Carbomb Brigade (the one attack on the Italians as the exception); this leads me towards suspicion of these, but I digress. Those must be from RPGs instead--plenty of those in use.

[LibraLabSoldier]

40. Its hard to make casualties of our "allies"

considering total there are maybe 20,000 of them with the 140,000 US troops deployed. Simple math. But I am not going to really argue this. Urban warfare is what we have been pushed into. It is the most difficult and most costly of all land warfare. We seldom "drop bombs from miles up", although they are using the helicopter gunships more. However, I am not even trying to defend this war. I will say this. We are fighting to do more good than harm.

One of the surgeons at the hospital i work at has a strange picture on his desk. It is a member of the Republican Guard giving him a hug. The man was wounded by fire from his own people who panicked when the infantry was bearing down on them. One of the bullets entered the mans groin. This surgeon saved the mans life, and saved his manhood. He promised to name his next born son after the surgeon...considering the doctor is a korean american, it will probably be the first Iraqi child named Kim in history.

We give medical care to everyone, coalition, civilian, and wounded enemy POWs. Do our POWs get the same treatment? No. They get beheaded on video.

This story I told you will never be in the news anywhere. It will probably survive only in the doctors family, and in my memory.

Stop trying to make us out to be the bad guys. Most if not all servicemembers do not agree with this war. We are doing the best we can to solve these problems with as little unnecessary loss of life as possible.

[mitchtv]

48. I don't think anyone wants to make our troops the bad guys

The simple fact remains, that we are there as an invading occupying power, with colonial ambitions and an ally to Isreal's expansionist ambitions. I am so sick of Chimpies excellent foreign adventure, beingequated with a war on terror. Isreal could have peace, by withdrawing to the '67 boundries. land orpeace , either one, can't have both, and we can't help them. Hell, Bush promised to get Turkey into the EU, what a laugh that was.

[Zhade]

50. You wouldn't be dealing with wounded...

...if we hadn't illegally invaded a country that posed us no threat whatsoever.

Sure, sure, we got rid of Saddam (not why we went in, of course - WMD, anyone?), but we've replaced him with Saddam-Lite (Allawi), and Abu Ghraib - tortures assisted by some medics and doctors, to my sickened horror - sure has given the Iraqi people reasons to hate the occupiers.

I don't want troops to die, which is why I never wanted them to go into Iraq in the first place. Less of them might be killed if they'd stop raping and murdering innocent people.

Just a thought, and not a slam against all soldiers.

[DrWeird]

46. Very, very good.

Wish I'd thought of it.

Props.

[Name removed]

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[LibraLabSoldier]

27. So sue me....

I just get upset when someone calls me a liar. Sorry about the personal attack. But where i come from calling a man a liar is the worst kind of insult. But you know what? My military service protects your rights as much as anyone elses. So I appologize for the attack.

[Ms. Clio]

28. Oh, thank you so much

The Constitution protects my rights, not you.

[Name removed]

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[LibraLabSoldier]

33. I tell you what

as soon as you actually know what real service members experience, what our lives are like, why dont you stop trying to tell us how we are screwing the whole world up? Sit back, let us do the hard work....

[Name removed]

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[Ms. Clio]

39. What, is "no balls" supposed to be the ultimate insult???

Bwhahahahahahahahaha

[Name removed]

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[Ms. Clio]

44. I'll tell you what's really curious, "Dave"

And that would be all the "soldiers" who have suddenly shown up here and who all seem to spout curiously similar lies and talking points that many, if not most, long-term DUers know to be complete and total bullshit.

[Curious Dave]

45. I hope you don't think

that I agree with this guy, because I don't.

On the other hand we do have a certain accepted "orthodoxy" (if you will) in the DU and heaven help the sincere (but perhaps misguided) person who comes along and posts something that strays too far from it.

As for long-term DUers being able to spot complete and total bullshit... I've only been lurking here for about a year and only registered about 7 months ago or so. I guess my bullshit filter still isn't quite as finely tuned as other's.

[Ms. Clio]

47. I lurked for a while before registering, too

I lurked for most of the next several years, and just started posting a lot recently--no doubt some wish I would just shut up again!

I agree that there are certain orthodoxies, and it's quite easy for newbies to run afoul of them--I remember getting crossways with several people on a thread about that poor crazy woman who accused Bush of raping her (one of the few monstrous things I don't believe he is guilty of). It was disconcerting.

And to be fair,my filter is extremely sensitive when it comes to certain topics. Maybe I have just seen far, far too many posts by trolls and neocon disuptors posing as "misguided" but "sincere."

[mitchtv]

49. what a load of Crap !

there are lots of views here mostly civilly. One thing I don't like is soldiers saying they are in Iraq to protect my freedom. No siree ,they are endangering my life. I know its not their fault.

[Zhade]

51. Our rights are inherent. You do not grant them.

Nor are you protecting them for us in Iraq.

Tell me, just how are Iraqis threatening our freedom here, hmmm?

You need to get educated, and fast, or you're going to be assumed to be a b*sh supporter, and we don't allow followers of that traitor on this board. So my advice: read a lot of these threads, absorb some wisdom, and try not to keep insulting people.

Do these things with an open mind, and you will find your knowledge increased a thousandfold.

[The Crazy Canadian]

3. The Iraq war is already lost.

What we see today is just small potatoes. Once US troops pull out in a year or two, the country will break-up like former Yugoslavia.

I don't have a solution then just to say it's time to get the hell out of there ASAP.

[Taxloss]

5. 2000 American lives, I fear, is an optimistic estimate.

Things are going to get worse before they get better, and with American troops dying at the rate they are I fear the final toll will be closer to 7000-10,000. That's unless the US and Britain pull out. But pulling out might very well mean a civil war in Iraq, which can't be allowed. So we are left in the awful rock-and-hard-place situation that people predicted and protested against in record numbers before the war.

If you consider the fact that neither of the two front runners in your elections favour immediate withdrawal, we're left with the following scenario. And I'm afraid to say that it's an optimistic one. Casualties continue, and possibly even increase, as the occupiers become tired and the opposition realises the psychological battle it is winning. By Autumn 2005, 2500 US Soldiers and 400 Brits are dead and Western companies are refusing to work in Iraq because of the killing of hostages. This will be a huge problem for whoever is US President at the time, but Pres Bush would be hurt far more than Pres Kerry. The pressure to withdraw is colossal. Iraqi casualties are pushing 40,000.

So, thoughts turn to a quick fix. The occupying forces enter negotiations, and the final deal looks something like this (signed March 2006): Three separate states with full autonomy, governed internally as they wish, moderated by an oligarchic national council. Everyone gets a prize apart from the coalition, which looks awful. Iraq is not democratic, and the bloodshed is not over, except now the US and Brits are only involved by way of airstrikes from carriers in Qatar and the Gulf. Coffins stop piling up at Arlington and Northolt, but Iraq's agony goes on. The region remains a breeding ground for extremism and terrorism.

So, what do you think? Far from the mark?

[Tamyrlin79]

7. One additional speculation

I don't think it will descend into civil war after we withdraw, or not for long. Why? Because if we leave, Turkey will seriously consider invading to prevent the creation of an autonomous Kurdish state. Iran has the most to gain by invading, particularly the Shia South and might be able to take the central Sunnis in the process.

[Taxloss]

8. And that's not a civil war?

It's still a civil war, even if foreign powers are involved rooting for one of the sides. And, contrary to most people's expectation, the Kurdish north will be the quietest area in the event of a civil war.

But my scenario doesn't mean civil war; it means trading democracy for a low level guerrilla war instead.

[tlcandie]

6. They have a future? Afghanistan has a future?

It seems they are both now or in the process still of being blasted to ground zero and WAY BACK into pre-1900s.

Scarey to even think about the future in terms of these countries. It seems to me more like the lawless west. He who has the biggest gun and meanest temper wins!

No infrastructure; land is devastated; there is no money (pitiance); no schools; no governments or councils of any kind that are by the people and for the people.

Sorry, but it all just looks so bleak. :cry: I can't even begin to imagine how these people feel to have the roots of civilization destroyed and all that they know!

How do you start from scratch with nothing? All I see are illegal activities such as growing poppies supported once again by the US.

[Just Me]

9. I ask: Can "democracy" be violently/destructively imposed,...

,...upon anyone? Isn't the imposition of will upon a weaker/vulnerable person/nation,...an absolute contradiction of the concept of democracy (let alone a moral contradiction of the ideal associatated with human worth and equality, etc)?

[Taxloss]

10. Yes, it can.

But the forces invading Iraq didn't really want democracy. They wanted a client that would serve the West's interests, which they equate with the World's interests. That's the whole neocolonial agenda.

The Iraqis, I'm sure, want democracy - but they don't want a Western client state. They want a state that reflects their interests, and uses their strength and natural resources to their own ends. And why shouldn't they? But the US and Britain don't like that, and never intended that. They want, and forgive my indecorousness, an oil-whore and an unsinkable aircraft carrier. Anything else is unacceptable. And the idea of creating a democracy and then stating exactly how it should think is so flawed and ludicrous as to be unbelievable. But that's the situation we're in.

[Zhade]

11. The future of Iraq...

...won't start until we leave their country and the puppet government is overthrown.

History repeats itself. Wish more people would remember that.

[not fooled]

15. the REAL future of Iraq

1. US troops there indefinitely , or at least until the oil runs out ("there will be troops in Iraq on the day I die", to quote the estimable Bernie Ward*); as soon as the country is suitably subjugated, largely in garrisons;

2. economy run according to Bremer's 100 laws, i.e. a corporateer/freemarketeer wet dream of privatization, deregulation, and anti-unionization in which the well-being of the Iraqis is merely an afterthought and assets of Iraq serve as source of revenue for foreign corporations;

3. chaos and strife among political factions present at continuous baseline level; largely tolerated and ignored by the US overlords as long as the country is "stable" enough to keep the oil flowing and permit US interests to continue looting the country;

4. brutality and repression by the puppet gov't tolerated and tacitly encouraged by US masters to keep the lid on things;

5. no truly free elections or real democracy, ever, as long as any semblance of such threatens US interests.

check back in 10 years--would love to be proven wrong but unfortunately suspect not







(* streaming live and archived on www.kgo.com; highly recommended for the thinking person)

[Zhade]

52. Welcome to DU!

Glad to have an insightful poster like you aboard.

:toast:

[Disturbed]

18. It' s possible.

Firstly, the US Puppet Govt. would need to be disbanded and real elections would need to be held. If the Sunnis and Shi'ites united and agreed to share power with the Kurds, Iraq could be stable. Why would al Q keep attacking if the US and it's allies departed and Iraq became a Muslim state? Isn't that one of al Q.'s goals? If Iraq was set up similar to the UK model with a multi-party system and devided up Iraq into three states under a Natl. Govt. why would there need to be a civil war?

[iconoclastic cat]

16. Here's something from another blog:

I found it on dKos, but here's the original:

*****
War and Piece

August 20, 2004

Iran in Iraq. Here's what I'm hearing. Iran has called in all its trained guys who speak Arabic to go to southern Iraq. That they have and will continue to target state oil workers. That they have also sent operatives to northern Iraq to target the Israelis Hersh wrote about. That they have moved the senior Revolutionary Guard operative for Afghanistan to the Iranian embassy in Baghdad, a guy named Qudzi. That the Pentagon has ignored this intelligence until it is a bit late.
Posted by Laura at 07:45 PM
*******


Not good.

[Swede]

37. Civil war.

Shiites,Sunnis and Kurds go at it. Iran,Turkey and Pakistan may get drawn in. Then all bets are off.

[DU GrovelBot]

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[Moderator]

53. Locking.......

I would like to remind everyone that
personal attacks are rule violations.
Please remember that it is expected
that all conversations on this board
will be held in a civil manner.



Thank you for understanding.


DU Moderator