Second Chances

[Griff]

[neo]All we need do is bomb Iran. That will fix those nondemocracies.[/con]

[DanaC]

lol.

[glatt]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

The Democrats have no, repeat no, strategy to win this. They never had one

This much of your post is true. The rest is false.

When I say the Democrats want to stop losing, what I mean is that the war is already lost, and pulling out now (or at least setting a timetable to pull out) is simply having the guts to admit what is plain for all to see. It's over, and we lost. It's time to stop investing in a losing proposition. Cut our losses. Let bygones be bygones.

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by yesman065

"The official reported that on a couple of occasions in Baqubah, al Qaeda invited to lunch families they wanted to convert to their way of thinking. In each instance, the family had a boy, he said, who was about 11 years old. As LT David Wallach interpreted the man’s words, I saw Wallach go blank and silent. He stopped interpreting for a moment. I asked Wallach, “What did he say?” Wallach said that at these luncheons, the families were sat down to eat. And then their boy was brought in with his mouth stuffed. The boy had been baked. Al Qaeda served the boy to his family."

I just can't believe it. It's such an outlandish claim and to me it makes no logical sense - it's literally overkill.

If you want to brutalise and terrify people then I can understand kidnapping, maiming, torturing their children. Well, not understand it, but I can see that it would take away people's humanity and replace it with mindless fear and total obedience. But how much more loyalty do you get by cooking them?

Also, I'm interested in how this was done, precisely - if "the luncheon" dish included the stuffed head (for identification purposes) does this mean the whole torso was also cooked? In which case I assume the offal was removed as well as the arms and legs. Quite a lot of work involved as opposed to standing the kid in front of his parents and shooting him in the head.

What did they do with families they wanted to convert to their way of thinking that didn't have eleven year old boys? Or was that the reason they were interested in the first place? I would assume that if al Qaeda sent out buffet invites at any point after the first incident, that people would just drop everything and run anyway. After all if the story has made it this far round the world you'd think people in the same reason would have heard it pretty quickly.

I suppose I could be being hopelessly naive, but I don't feel it. I do believe there are inventive, sadistic and ruthless people out there. I'm aware of reports of torture and killing backed up by evidence from Amnesty International. This just doesn't ring true to me though.

[yesman065]

Sundae - I don't think they were trying to recruit anyone - it was done out of pure evil. To make these people become subservient to Al Qaeda. I do not see how we can just withdraw from this. This war cannot be lost - there is just too much at stake. I don't like many things about how this has gone or why or whatever, but the more I read about what we are trying to prevent there, the more resolve I gain. Withdrawl is not an option to me - for many reasons.

[yesman065]

Originally Posted by glatt

When I say the Democrats want to stop losing, what I mean is that the war is already lost, and pulling out now (or at least setting a timetable to pull out) is simply having the guts to admit what is plain for all to see. It's over, and we lost. It's time to stop investing in a losing proposition. Cut our losses. Let bygones be bygones.

It al depends on who you get your information from - It is not plain to me at all that this is lost - Gen. Patreus is neither dillusional nor a fool and I'll take his opinion over anyone elses at this point. Maybe we should have a vote in Iraq - a real one - and if they really want us to leave, then so be it. The infighting and dissention here is certainly not helping things abroad.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by yesman065

It al depends on who you get your information from - It is not plain to me at all that this is lost - Gen. Patreus is neither dillusional nor a fool and I'll take his oipinion over anyone elses at this point. Maybe we should have a vote in Iran - a real one - and if they really want us to leave, then so be it. The infighting and dissention here is certainly not helping things abroad.

Attention to detail is important, yesman065. Do you really think we'll be leaving Iran? Ever?

Tell ya something else. Dissent is patriotic.

[glatt]

Originally Posted by yesman065

The infighting and dissention here is certainly not helping things abroad.

On the contrary, it is helping a lot.

The more infighting and dissent, the faster the troops will come home. Bush had been on autopilot with this war for 3-4 years before the dissent and infighting made him pay attention. If we had this infighting and dissent earlier, maybe Bush would have tried his surge after two years of a stalemate rather than waiting for four years of stalemate. If we had this infighting and dissent before the war began, maybe we could have avoided the whole mess in the first place.

[piercehawkeye45]

I think the reasons why they baked the kids have already been mentioned. They want to be the badass kid on the block and are just getting a reputation. The are not looking for loyalty, but respect (in a “don’t mess with us” type of way).

For UG, the problem is that by the way we are fighting the war on terror we are just making more terrorists. Just randomly bombing innocent people does not make them appreciate us any more. Besides that, declaring a war on an ideology is something that can not be won except by using that same ideology. I supported a war in Afghanistan like we did in 2001-2002 since that was very effective because we specified we wanted to take down a specific group in a specific region and the local population more or less supported us. But to say we are going to rid the entire world of terror by bombing and "collateral damage" is about as unrealistic as declaring a war on an inanimate object.

[xoxoxoBruce]

We are not the ones doing random bombing, never have.

[yesman065]

Originally Posted by BigV

Attention to detail is important, yesman065. Do you really think we'll be leaving Iran? Ever?

Tell ya something else. Dissent is patriotic.

Yes, I think we will leave when things settle down, obviously not 100% though. I still think we should try and find out what the majority of Iraqis want - believe me - if they don't want us there then I'm all for every single American to begin leaving right now - period. Also, I'm aware that dissent CAN BE patriotic, but is not always.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by glatt

It's time to stop investing in a losing proposition. Cut our losses. Let bygones be bygones.

How do you suppose these would be bygones, though? I do not suppose our foes would do so, and can't imagine why you'd suppose it. Getting this war expeditiously lost would mean what, ten years down the road, or twenty? World War One set up World War Two, you know. These wars have been posited as a continent-wide European civil war in two phases, at bottom.

We're after stability enough to permit economic development there, in a place kept from economic development by states unconcerned with it, and in especial Iraq. We don't get that, we're in big and chronic trouble. So why do something to set up a greater and more ruinous war later on? Isn't it just plain stupid to seek a substitute for victory? Successful American foreign policy, especially dealing with countries so little connected with the wealth-producing powers of the global economy as the ones we're currently engaged in, calls for victory, particularly in the making of future grand alliances. If we don't get the victory now, we'll have to get one later -- and for those wringing their hands over the cost, what is the cost later?

I'm unimpressed with the "patriotism" of the dissent also. It is almost entirely based on the gut feeling that "America must lose, especially to non-democracies, because we're democratic and America. Whatever we do, we mustn't ever try and win a fight with a dictatorship, a band of thugs, or really anybody." As you know, I regard this sort of thinking as idiotic in a democrat, and superbly in one's overall interest if one is a fascist.

I also don't buy the idea that one can only use an identical ideology to defeat an ideology, nor that one is in danger of adopting a similar ideology to the one being fought against. Cases in point: the Cold War, World War Two, and the American Civil War, as well as the American Revolution, where George III's Britain failed to see it was engaged in an ideological struggle (not having fought one since about 1649) and never caught up.

How come nobody here but me is spelling "delusional" correctly? It has no connection etymologically with illusions.

[glatt]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

Getting this war expeditiously lost would mean what, ten years down the road, or twenty? World War One set up World War Two, you know.

I don't have a crystal ball, but my best guess is that if we left Iraq, it would end up being very similar to the situation in Somalia. Lots of warlord type people fighting for dominance. Without the common enemy of the US military, they will turn on each other even more. There will be a resulting refugee crisis, and we must be prepared to help with that. It will be a bad situation, but not significantly worse than it is now. It's already bad today.

[yesman065]

Originally Posted by glatt

I don't have a crystal ball, but my best guess is that if we left Iraq, it would end up being very similar to the situation in Somalia. Lots of warlord type people fighting for dominance. Without the common enemy of the US military, they will turn on each other even more. There will be a resulting refugee crisis, and we must be prepared to help with that. It will be a bad situation, but not significantly worse than it is now. It's already bad today.

Oh, I think it will be much worse. Once the U.S. is gone all that oil power and revenue will be up for grabs. Who do think will end up with that? The fledgling Govt., the terrorists or someone else? If that falls under Al Qaeda, then they will have not only the ability, but also the resources to buy whatever they want. This scenario gets much worse when you consider the autrocities that will certainly escalate after our premature withdrawl also.

[Undertoad]

So let's play a few chess moves ahead for once.

Madeline Albright took responsibility for the death of 500,000 Iraqi children under sanctions...

...and most Americans blame Bush, most non-Americans blame all the US for the deaths during the whole current fiasco...

...so who'll be blamed if there's utter carnage after we're gone?