Hey Ed,

Nice blog, covers a lot of disparat...

2007-03-09T08:16:00.000+01:00

Hey Ed,

Nice blog, covers a lot of disparate ground, really quite interesting.

So far as Murtha, I admire him, but not unduly. The entire debate about Iraq seems to suffer from severe reality-dislocation. Murtha says, paraphrasing, "We accomplished what we set out to do--deposed Saddam, captured or killed his cohorts. Job well done, job finished."

Oh, really? I am not aware that our "job" in Iraq was ever well-defined. Even now we bandy words around like "success."

One is tempted to give up on all the standard and very hazy ideas about success in Iraq--that we will, for instance, help them constitute a stable democracy, and then, at last, graciously, stand aside.

In the face of the relentless sectarian violence, one is tempted to wonder, "How in the world did Saddam ever make it work?"

The answer to that is not palatable to us. He used the Iron Fist.

So we are in quite a moral dilemma. We have unleashed the demon of sectarian violence. Are we willing to resort to Saddam's methods to quell that sectarian violence? If so, if we are willing to use the Iron Fist, if we say to ourselves, "Well, our ideals are really good--democracy, and all that--but the reality is that by hook or by crook we now aim *only* at reducing the number of daily casualties from the current '100 per day' to the '1 per day' Iraq enjoyed under Saddam," well, then it's time for military governorships in every province in Iraq, and it may well be time to reconstitute the Sunnis as the one and only governmental force in Iraq. They may be the only ones ready to bring the Iron Fist down hard enough and long enough to quell the violence.

In other words, Saddam was right. He told the world, "If you want to stop the violence, put me back in power." But we not only allowed, we encouraged, the Shiites to execute him.

The blood lust is upon them. If we leave now, pull out our troops, Iraq will soon dissolve into provinces governed by ruthless warlords. Other countries, like Iran and Saudi Arabia, will forward their conflicting interests, supporting this or that warlord. It will be the Iron Fist all over again, but the bloodletting will not soon stop. Saddam's Iron Fist will seem like a velvet glove by comparison.

Were Shiite pilgrims ever attacked by suicide bombers, under Saddam? Were renowned Shiite mosques ever blown to smithereens, under Saddam?

No. No.

Did he kill thousands of his own people? Yes.

Did he use a secret police to torture and imprison hundreds, or thousands, of people? Yes.

Are Americans prepared to use the methods of Saddam to put the demon of sectarian violence back into its bottle?

No. We unleashed the demon, but we will not do what it takes to bring it under control.

So we are in an insoluble dilemma of our own making.

Is there nothing we can do, then?

One can't help but think there is a shred of a chance for our so-called "surge" to succeed. But what, exactly, is success?

Naturally, the realists mumble something about lowering our expectations.

But let's spell it out. I say, a Shiite-ruled Iraq is a recipe for ongoing disaster.

We will have to insist upon a government which enfranchises the Sunnis, and the Kurds, giving each group some meaningful autonomy and oil revenues. We will in effect guide Iraq into a condition which will resemble my conjectured future, above, of its dissolution into warlord-led nation-statelets. I cannot imagine any international force whatsover which will be able to assume the burden of keeping the peace between these factions. The factions will inevitably ally themselves with other nations, such as Saudi Arabia (the Sunnis) and Iran (the Shiites).

This too is a disaster. Hmm. I can't say I've hit upon a viable "solution." In fact, no matter which scenario I imagine, in each and every one, we will look back, and Iraqis will look back, on Saddam, and say, "Those were the good old days."

So how is Murtha so admirable, for, after all, he too seems in the Washington lock-step of imagining we did the Iraqis some giant favor, by deposing Saddam?

The Democrats are as bad or worse than the Republicans. At least the Republicans speak their misguided minds. The Democrats won't dare utter a word until they check the polls. If they ever do speak their mind, they rush to apologize. Obama said the lives of our 3,000+ killed in Iraq were "wasted." Which is what he himself believed; or there was at least a locus of honesty in his statement. But, his eyes on the polls, he was quick to retract the politically-dangerous statement.

No, the Democrats lined up like sheep to sign on to the resolution approving Bush's invasion of Iraq. The scope of their idiocy is so great that they cannot even see it. They are poll-mongering sheep who flock beneath the banner of the politically correct.

So. just a few remarks. Great blog, though.

Russell Towle

Comments on VentureMind: Sometimes it Takes a Hawk

Hey Ed,Nice blog, covers a lot of disparat...

Hey Ed,

Nice blog, covers a lot of disparat...