An Inconvenient Truth about Iraq
Things are getting better there. So much better that even the NY Times and Newsweek have to admit it. Grudgingly, but still. That’s got to hurt.
The quagmire seems to be drying up. It’s still too early to be sure this trend will progress. But the Iraqi forces have become more effective in dealing with problems. The factions that were supposed to be engaged in a civil war, according to the left, are uniting to fight Al Qaeda.
The Iraqis are tired of war, just as the Germans were at the end of WWII. They had the same kind of insurgent problems when the war ended there, but they got sorted out.
In the end, most people want to live in peace. The idea that Middle Easterners want to live in a state of perpetual war and conflict is a racist notion. The problems in the region have more to do with tribalism than anything. Competing versions of Islam and radicals trying to seize power are several other major factors. This happens when a power vacuum happens, as in the fall of Saddam. Iraq has hug oil reserves. Naturally, different factions would like to own that.
But when those factions got the message that we’re not leaving despite what the pres and lefties want, they realized their insurgency was a failure. And Iraqis got tired of seeing friends and family dying or being maimed by the insurgent’s bombs.
The US made several mistakes when they went into Iraq. They’ve had to learn this the hard way. But the actual level of casualties on the US side is at record lows. Further, another terrorist sponsor state was taken out of the picture. Now there are only two left. If you include Libya, that more than 60% out of the picture. All in a relatively short amount of time.
Afghanistan and Iraq are still not entirely stable. There is also the fear of Pakistan falling apart. But we’re a long way from where we were six years ago. I’d say that’s a positive accomplishment.
UPDATE: Now this is really painful if you’re on the left. If the Bush Doctrine is a big success, which just might happen, a lot of people are going to look really, really stupid. No wonder they’re so pissed off.
“The Iraqis are tired of war, just as the Germans were at the end of WWII. They had the same kind of insurgent problems when the war ended there, but they got sorted out.”
Posted by on 11/19 at 04:12 PMWell, if not it was because WWII was not waged in a manner anywhere near as ethical as this war.
Posted by on 11/19 at 04:16 PMSome were predicting victory in Iraq in 2008, as far back as May 2006.
So what will the fifth-column do now?
Posted by on 11/19 at 04:22 PMWerewolf turned into a wet squib because (a) in the Soviet occupied territory the Soviets shot whole families and shipped their friends off to Siberia when someone committed a terrorist act; that sort of thing became very unpopular very quickly, and (b) on the other side of the line the Germans were petrified that the Americans would leave and let the Soviets march in.
What’s taken the Iraqis 4 years to figure out, the Germans glommed onto almost immediately. If you have a choice of being occupied by Americans or anyone else, you pick the Americans. They treat you a whole lot better and they’re not afraid to spend money to fill in the bomb craters.
Posted by on 11/19 at 04:26 PMThere werewolves weren’t nearly as effective for several reasons, including what Orion said. They also didn’t have any funding or fresh troops like the Iraqi insurgency. So yes, they were not as effective at all. But they did cause some problems for years.
One of the things we did back then that we don’t do now, is execute any ones we caught. Now we live in an age where e have to provide personal doctors and dietitians for each prisoner.
The bottom line is, progress has been made despite claims that it was impossible. It could all fall apart tomorrow. But it’s not trending that way.
A lot of predictions of the anti-war crowd have turned out to be utterly false. Their only claim to fame is no WMDs.
Posted by on 11/19 at 04:43 PM“Their only claim to fame is no WMDs.”
So far.
Posted by on 11/19 at 04:50 PMPlus, Germany was defeated after six years of war and crippling casualty rates versus three weeks of war and negligible casualties in Iraq.
Nevertheless, when Werwolves (not werewolves) would kill a GI, a field artillery piece would be set up and the offending town shelled through the night. Such reprisals against civilians were not covered by the Geneva Convention until 1949.
We’ve come a long way, and the payoff in terms of world peace will be huge.
Posted by on 11/19 at 04:52 PMAbsolutely. It’s a tragedy that so many innocents died in Iraq, but most theme were not our fault. It’s despicable how some have tried to lay all the blame on us.
We go out of our way to avoid civilian casualties, often putting our own people at risk. And we spent billions of our money to try to repair a country devastated by years of Saddam not giving a damn about th people and letting the infrastructure fall apart.
In time, I think you will see more gratitude expressed from over there when it settles down.
Posted by on 11/19 at 05:06 PMAfter things cool down and the WMD’s are produced as expected, what will the American people do about the members of Congress who turned their collective backs on the military? Could any one of them reasonably expect to be ‘Commander in Chief’, after that abandonment?
Posted by on 11/19 at 05:28 PMSure there were WMDs. Even the Democrats said so.
http://www.glennbeck.com/news/01302004.shtml
Aside from the nerve gas shells we’ve found all over the damn place since the occupation, the UN themselves admits that Iraq had over six tons of anthrax, most of it already loaded onto rockets, right up until the beginning of the war (the CDC took this into account in designing their disaster preparedness programs). The current location of this stockpile and a large tularemia stockpile is unknown, although there is some evidence it was actually destroyed rather than shipped to Syria (we can only hope).
I’m always amazed at the libs who claim Iraq never had WMDs. The Iraqis themselves said they did. The UN inspectors confirmed this, and even took pictures of some. The Democrats agreed. The Republicans agreed. Companies all over the world admitted selling them the necessary equipment. The materials themselves, the labs and construction facilities, and the delivery devices have all been located on numerous occasions since the occupation. Finally, the Iraqis actually used them on the Iranians and the Kurds. And those Kurds didn’t keel over and die because Bush asked them to.
It’s mind-boggling that there is still any discussion about this.Posted by on 11/19 at 05:37 PM?\“Their only claim to fame is no WMDs.”
No Saddam Al Qaeda connection.
The war will pay for itself.
They will greet us with flowers.
Posted by on 11/19 at 05:56 PMTom_Dubya. They did greet us with flowers. Read Chris Hitchens about that. We found more connections, not less, between Saddam and Islamic terrorism in general, including AQ.
On the pay for itself part, you’ve got a point.
The comment illustrates what will happen when the left has its predictions fall apart, because it is what always happens: they won’t notice. We expect that the emergence of facts will shame people into rethinking their positions, because that’s what we do. But leftist views are held for social and emotional reasons, and aren’t much affected by facts.
Posted by Assistant Village Idiot on 11/19 at 06:18 PMThey will greet us with flowers.
This tired meme implies that each and every Iraqi was greeting us with bullets. That’s hardly the case.
Posted by on 11/19 at 06:49 PM“The idea that Middle Easterners want to live in a state of perpetual war and conflict is a racist notion.”
Precisely. The libs talk about race and equality but, their only real interest is power. They’re not at all interested in the freedom and well-being of a bunch of filthy wogs who can’t vote.
Posted by on 11/19 at 07:00 PMI suppose we could have firebombed Tikrit and Baghdad and killed millions of civilians so the rest would be afraid, and cut off all supplies until the population was near starvation.
Plus, we could have had the Soviets seize half of Iraq and brutalize it so horribly Iraqis started fleeing into our part of the country and they had to build a wall to keep them in.
Posted by TallDave on 11/19 at 07:36 PMAmerica always ends up paying for other people’s messes and mistakes. We rebuilt Germany and Japan after the war. We also lent billions to many other Europeans countries, and none of them repaid us. We even lent millions to the Soviets before WWII and helped them build factories that they turned into war factories after we left.
If it wasn’t for the US a lot of places would still be a mess instead of flourishing.
We may never get back the money we spent on Iraq, but if the region finally sees peace and the terrorists are basically snuffed out, the dividends should well than make up for it.
Posted by on 11/19 at 07:41 PMI disagree that the Left was correct about Iraq not having an WMD. When did anyone on the Left object to the war on that basis? Even Ted Kennedy (DUI-MA) stated the WMD existed. EVERYONE thought they were there.
To say otherwise is revisionist history.
When the war is over and we’ve succeeded the Left will just keep on walking. Remember their warnings that Reagan was going to antagonize the Soviets and start WWIII? I remember John Kerry backing a plan to subsidize the USSR…to placate them. Any recognition that they were wrong about the Cold War? No way. They are now trying to credit Gorbachev. These are not intellectual, let alone, intellectually honest people.
Posted by on 11/20 at 04:02 AMDon’t get me wrong. I think there were WMDs of some kind. But they haven’t been found after years of looking, so they were either moved or destroyed.
Saddam broke every treaty he ever signed. He was too addicted to power to allow himself to be neutered by the US. He would have hid his weapons, because he thought of himself as a conquerer and he needed them.
They’re still finding functioning munitions in France from WWI and WWII buried in farmer’s fields. So if the WMDs exist, they will probably surface someday. But so far, that’s the only thing the left can really claim they were “right” about.
Until they turn out to be wrong about that too.
Posted by on 11/20 at 08:18 AM
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