Iraq - surely not again!!

[FLYBOYJ]

I dont think people in the west can get their heads around some facts of the middle east.
Religion and politics are frequently the same.
The countries involved were created by outside powers (mainly UK and France).
Being Sunni or Shia is much more important than your nationality.
Your religious leader is your leader voting in a national election is therefore a nonsense.
By the time the west has found out what is happening and decided to act the situation has changed so a screw up is guaranteed.

I think you hit the nail on the head.

 

[s1chris]

It's a tricky one but the causes and reasons aside, do we stand by and tolerate the end result of whatever drives this current war? Innocent people being killed. We (the UK) didn't stand by when it happened in ww1 or 2 so what's changed now?

There are two approaches, go in to purely to serve as a means of stoping the fighting that is going on or go in and try and resolve the issues that caused it.

As a peace keeping role I think we should offer support, as a mediator to solve the underlying issues? No leave that to the people of the country to democratically decide.

If the effects of the conflicts and uprising really impact upon the UK's security then let's wade in. I just don't buy the media's spin on the current situation being a risk to the UK other than fuel prices as usual.

 

[michaelmaltby]

"....what's changed now"

WW1 and WW2 were not religious wars .... this is ... and it will have to be settled and accounted for by those whose religion is at war.

 

[vikingBerserker]

I think trying to force 3 groups of people together that do not want to be together is idiotic. If the citizens of Iraq want it broken into 3 new countries, I do not see an issue, This is like throwing 3 roosters into a ring and acting surprised that they don't get along and start fighting.

 

[s1chris]

"....what's changed now"

WW1 and WW2 were not religious wars .... this is ... and it will have to be settled and accounted for by those whose religion is at war.

But the result is the same, inoccent people being killed.

I'd also state that ideologies (Nazi) and religious beliefs are pretty much like for like in that you can broadly just term them as beliefs.

 

[mikewint]

Once again Viking hits the nail squarely on the head. The present national boundaries are Western (Churchill) creations. And the US needs to learn (much like the British eventually did) you cannot make every country into a similacrum of America (which is also not a democracy it's a REPUBLIC).
My thoughts are somewhat Isolationist: "Your Rights End Where My Nose Begins." I personally don't give a Tinker's Damn what Iraq/Iran/Afgan do WITHIN their own borders. I/we/us get involved when/if they attempt to export their system beyond their borders. The Arabic states learned long ago what happens when/if they mess with the Israelis.
Yea, I know, it's a simplist view and other Nation-states are going to get involved on one side or the other magnifying the conflict

 

[pbehn]

But the result is the same, inoccent people being killed.

I'd also state that ideologies (Nazi) and religious beliefs are pretty much like for like in that you can broadly just term them as beliefs.

The Nazi belief wasnt entrenched for thousands of years in the minds of the populace before Adolf showed up.

The religions of the book namely Judaism Christianity and Islam have roots going back much further than just the birth of Christ or even a supposed creation 10,000 yrs ago. As I see it the middle east is at a stage similar to that in Europe about the time of the 30 years war, until they completely devastate each other they will never put religion on the back (and private) burner but seek to "win". Problem with that is weapons now are not muskets and swords.The countries of the middle east were manufactured. As I understand Iraq the Kurds Sunnis and Shias have been forced together by no longer existant colonial powers. What for us would be a democratic process is for them ceding vital interests to an alien belief. The oldest people in the middle east even now were born in lands with different names beliefs and structures. If I re draw the border with Texas and Mexico will Texans happily take part in a vote for the Mexican president.

(That is for illustration I had 6 great months in Veracruz I have no axe to grind with Mexico)

 

[pbehn]

I have seen the west help Iraq against Iran help Afghanistan against the Soviets help Kuwait and Saudi against Iraq Invade Iraq, Invade Afghanistan threaten Iran with "Asymetric response" and now we are treated to the west and Iran combining against the new ogre of ISIS. I am a Brit the decisions may have been in the White House but were fully supported by UK so I say "west" not "USA". I cant tell the USA what to do but the west hasnt done well so far in the middle east (and that goes back to British involvement there for close to 2 centuries)

 

[bobbysocks]

what scares me most about this situation is the large number of "converts" from western countries who have made the pilgrimage to the ME ( syria and now iraq ) to fight alongside their ME brothers. these jabroonies have clean histories and passports. there is no way to track thier activities and movements. they are being trained by expert extremists in tactics and construction of IEDS and VBIEDS and the deployment of them. once the conflict is over they will clean up and come back to the US, Canada, UK...etc....but bring with them all that training and indroctrination. the multitute will not be on anyone's watch list. when the west does something that stirs their ire they will have the anonymity and resources to strike directly at the heart of the enemy for the cause. sooner or later the $#!T over there is going to spill over the borders of every country and that will be the saddest of times....

 

[nuuumannn]

The present national boundaries are Western (Churchill) creations. And the US needs to learn (much like the British eventually did) you cannot make every country into a similacrum of America (which is also not a democracy it's a REPUBLIC).

Yep, I agree, but again, not Churchill's doing; the division of the borders and responsibility over each region was done with the Sykes Picot Treaty before Churchill's intervention. Interestingly enough, ISIS are using the treaty as a basis of national dispute.

The problem is that we are talking about nations here; the Arabic people have never thought in terms of nationhood to the same degree was we do until the West imposed its borders upon the map. before that was done, these 'countries' existed as principalities with rather fluid borders and in most cases none at all, under the governorship of the Ottoman Empire. This is partially why T.E. Lawrence failed in establishing his vision of an Arabian homeland; he was trying to establish several disparate tribes together who did not have the same interests and beliefs and attempted to get them to make a 'nation'. Before the West imposed its governance on the region, the people did not care for national borders, they were nomadic tribespeople whose source of income was trade with other tribes, even travelling as far afield as modern day Romania and Vienna. They didn't know national borders and, like I said earlier, these were established initially by the Sykes Picot Agreement of 1916, which cemented the national borders and boundaries we know today.

Religious belief guides every facet of life when you are a muslim. Nations that do become muslim republics are governed by the Koran and its teachings and values, which surprisingly to those who don't know much about Islam are just like those in Christianity and just like Christianity, individuals have twisted and chosen to interpret the Koran for their own needs and wants. Most muslims reject the kind of hard line fundamentalism that many of these people adopt, purely because they don't represent the true value of the teachings of the Prophet Mohammed, which is about "good ole family values" (take it away, Peter Griffin) and tolerance and peace, not death and destruction.

Now, of course, for the last nearly 100 years, we have imposed a system upon the ME that was not their own to begin with and yet we are still surprised when they don't want to be governed by our way of doing things? We can't expect the different factions to migrate into different physical boundaries, why should they? Its their nation - their concept of 'nationhood' being very different to ours, it's up to them how they redefine their borders, not the US government. How could we expect them to get 'democracy' to work in countries with idealogical practices so fundamentally different to ours? Our democratic system has taken years to get up and running and it is full of flaws, so to impose it upon people who have no concept of individual choice of government and responsibility to society to the same degree as what our political system expects is folly.

Like Joe said, we need to stay the fXck away this time, even if it was us who made the mess in the first instance. Do we really want more bodies returning home from the Middle East draped in flags? Chris's idea of humanitarian aid and assistance will be of benefit and should be investigated, we owe it to them at the very least.

 

[swampyankee]

A number of years ago -- I think it was during the Clinton Administration -- a number of people (not liberals) railed against going into Haiti, as the US shouldn't go into a country just because some people don't like the ahole in charge. A few years later, an overlapping group railed in favor of going into Iraq on the exact same grounds they had declared unacceptable a few years earlier.

Was Saddam a nasty dictator? Sure. Was he notably worse than dictators who were not overthrown by a US invasion? While one can argue about that, I think the answer is "probably not." It's not like the US hasn't acquiesced to or even actively supported some quite nasty dictators in the past.

 

[parsifal]

This argument about hussein has gotten me more than a little flabbergasted. If we had done nothing about him, he at the very least would be in control of about 25% of the worlds oil reserves and enslaved a staunch ally of the west (kuwait). For years the western press bayed for blood over his murder of his own people. We find evidence that the man had a WMD program and finally decide to do something. i dont buy the argument that the Bush Administration were fully sucked in by the faulty intell argument. i think they were just sick of his games and wanted to go back and deal with him. Sure, it was about oil. Sure, it was about making sure the Germans, the French or the Rusians did not get control of Iraqi Oil. i get all that, and you know what, I could care less about their whining and complaining. I could care even less about the morals of going to war. We made a decision to go to war, we did it, it was necessary, our people did a great job. Our intersts were looked after, and as far as im concerned thats all that matters, and really, the only thing that we had any control over.

now, the people of iraq were handed their freedom, and a lot of help to get on their feet and control their own destiny. They chose the form of govt that they have, and the inequalities they wanted to institutionalise. that had not much to do with getting rid of hussein. this mob of cutthroaats also emerged in Syria, and similar nut jobs exist in egypt, Libya Algeria, nigeria. And other places. These nutters were always there, hussein or no hussein would make not a bit of difference as to their existence.

 

[GrauGeist]

A number of years ago -- I think it was during the Clinton Administration -- a number of people (not liberals) railed against going into Haiti, as the US shouldn't go into a country just because some people don't like the ahole in charge.

France wasn't happy that the U.S. was involved in that, just like this recent humanitarian effort in Haiti, after the quake, developed a little friction between the French and U.S.

 

[nuuumannn]

We find evidence that the man had a WMD program and finally decide to do something. i dont buy the argument that the Bush Administration were fully sucked in by the faulty intell argument.

Before Desert Storm maybe. Parsifal, either you have little knowledge of the situation in Iraq immediately prior to the 2003 invasion, the criticism post invasion, which included the distinct lack of WMD or you are deliberately choosing to ignore the facts.

A quote from a CIA report published in 1999 called Iraqi Military Capabilities through 2003:

"Four more years of UN sanctions andalong with damage inflicted by US operations, have significantly degraded Iraq's military capabilities. Erosion of Iraqi Air Force capabilities has been most pronounced, reflected on continuous decline of operational aircraft, sortie generation rates, and pilot ability. Air defense capabilities have suffered more recently, primarily from destruction by Coalition air forces. Since Desert Storm, naval forces have been more active; however, naval forces remain incapable of defending naval-based operations. Ground forces have fared comparatively better than other services, but even they are less well prepared for major combat operations"

Full document here, although the text is muddy and full of gaps: IRAQI MILITARY CAPABILITIES THROUGH 2003 - CIA document

Scott Ritter, a rather controversial outspoken critic of the US government's stance on its hostile intent over Iraq before the invasion and former UN Weapons Inspector in Iraq wrote in 2002:

"There's no doubt Iraq hasn't fully complied with its disarmament obligations as set forth by the Security Council in its resolution. But on the other hand, since 1998 Iraq has been fundamentally disarmed: 90-95% of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capacity has been verifiably eliminated ... We have to remember that this missing 5-10% doesn't necessarily constitute a threat ... It constitutes bits and pieces of a weapons program which in its totality doesn't amount to much, but which is still prohibited ... We can't give Iraq a clean bill of health, therefore we can't close the book on their weapons of mass destruction. But simultaneously, we can't reasonably talk about Iraqi non-compliance as representing a de-facto retention of a prohibited capacity worthy of war."

"We eliminated the nuclear program, and for Iraq to have reconstituted it would require undertaking activities that would have been eminently detectable by intelligence services."

"As of December 1998 we had no evidence Iraq had retained biological weapons, nor that they were working on any. In fact, we had a lot of evidence to suggest Iraq was in compliance."

UN Weapons Inspector and former head of the International Atomic Energy Commission, Hans Blix claimed in a BBC interview in 2004 that the American government deliberately falsified evidence to make an excuse to go to war.

Info on Blix: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Blix

Colin Powell figures largely in the whole mess, contradicting himself on many occasions, before being brought to task a couple of years after the war. In an article that appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald it was claimed that in 2001 Powell and National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice were of the impression that "Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had been disarmed and was no threat." On 24 February 2001, Powell stated: "[Hussein] has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbours."

Article here: Pilger claims White House knew Saddam was no threat - www.smh.com.au

Yet on 5 February 2003 he spoke in favour of an attack on Iraq to the UN Security Council, despite initially being opposed to a forceble overthrow of the Hussein regime not long after his instatement as Secretary of State. Two years later however, in an ABC News article published on 8 September 2005 Powell states that the his involvement in attempting to convince the Security Council of the validity of an invasion tarnished his reputation: "Of course it will. It's a blot. I'm the one who presented it on behalf of the United States to the world, and [it] will always be a part of my record. It was painful. It's painful now."

The article: Colin Powell on Iraq, Race, and Hurricane Relief - ABC News

Much information here on Iraq's WMD: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction#Legal_justification

In 2004 Head of the UN Khofi Annan made a very public claim that the war was illegal: ""From our point of view and the UN Charter point of view, it [the war] was illegal."

From here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legality_of_the_Iraq_War

 

[N4521U]

Something to be said about having indoor hobbies!

 

[pbehn]

Its all very well blaming what happens on events of 100 years ago. Why isnt Poland similarly in anarchy and chaos? The middle east population are masters of the pyrrhic victory. Just a few more popular uprisings and they will be back in the stone age.

 

[swampyankee]

we were in a mess of trouble if we had to rely on someone like Saddam to give us regional security in this part of the world. My opinion....he was a problem that needed to be dealt with. We should have finished the job in 91 but didnt. But we did go back and get rid of him in 03. So that allowed sectarian violence to erupt, but in my opinion Iraq was broken already and if Husseins removal means an eruption of violence, then so be it.

There was nothing good about that bastard, except that he died. unnaturally.....

Right now, we're seeing the result of many years of sectarianism and minority rule. While Iraq was unlikely to have been home to terrorists -- Saddam may have supported them with money (the Saudis probably did; the Pakistani intelligence services almost certainly do, Iran does) but he was not their "friend," and didn't want his people to get the idea of attacking governments -- it was run for many years for the benefit of the minority Sunnis, mostly at the expense of the majority Shiites. Britain, and later the US, preferred dealing with the Sunnis for G-d alone knows what reasons, and, like engineering the Shah's coup in Iran, the chickens, as it were, came home to roost. Right now, I think it's likely that Iraq will go the way of Yugoslavia, possibly in an even messier fashion.

The US has relied on similar flawed "leaders" for regional security in other places, like Egypt. It's usually ended up biting us in the ass.