Comments on: BAGHDAD AS IT IS, NOT AS WE WISH IT TO BE

By: B.Poster

B.Poster — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 17:02:44 +0000

The msm has been very clever at separating Iraq from the broader on terrorism. They have been so successful at this that those who get their information strictl from the msm have no idea what is going on. Iraq is the central front in the war right now. Russia and China are using the terrorists as their proxies in their war against the United States. Russia and China are the enemies behind our Islamic Extremists terrorists enemies. We need to understand that failure in Iraq will mean we lose the war against the terrorists and their marxists allies. If we lose in Iraq the terrorists and their marxist allies will take over. Yhry will use this as a base to plan more attacks against the United States and to take over more middle eastern countries. They already control Iran and Syria. They will use Iraq as a base to take more middle eastern nations. From there they will move onto Europe and finally to America itself. Failure in Iraq would be a “waterloo” of sorts from which America would likley never recover. It would be only a matter of time before Islamic Extremists and their Marxists allies would take over America itself. We need to understand the following: 1.) Success in Iraq, which means setting up and maintaining a goverment in Iraq that will be an ally in the war against the Islamic Extremist/Marxist alliance or at the very least a government that will not support the terrorists and their marxists allies, is mission critical to America’s survival. If we withdraw now the terrorists and their marxist allies will take over very quickly and America’s continued survival as a free country would be very short indeed. 2.)Russia and China are the enemy behind our terrorist enemies. Without the unyielding support of those two countries the terrorists would have only a fraction of the power they currently have. The kid glove treatment currently being extended to Russia and China must end. I think it is time to call these two countries on the carpet and expose their treachery. Russia with its highly advanced nuclear arsenal and its support of every terrorist under the sun makes it America’s single most dangerous enemy.

By: Perfesser

Perfesser — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 13:56:01 +0000

There is little question that additional U.S. troops — say, about 350,000 total — could reduce the violence in Iraq to a level of that in, say, Lebanon. Rumsfeld has said, repeatedly — does anyone listen, I wonder? — that it is an American flaw and virtue that whenever something needs to be done, well by golly, let us Americans do it. There might be some magical path by which we could, in fact, engineer a peaceful transition to democracy, in the same way that NASA might be able to safely send a manned mission to Mars next year. Does anyone here really think that the former is easier than the latter? Our role in Iraq is to keep the balance of power — read terror — about even between the parties while they figure something out that will work for them. It ain’t pretty, but it’ll work better than duct tape.

By: steve

steve — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 11:40:11 +0000

Way to go Rick! It is time to begin the process of deprogramming necessary for the neocons to realize the error of their ways, and to board the reality train once again, where they will regain some semblance of their old republican selves,and this task i’m afraid lies at your doorstep here in the nut house. It will be a long journey for most of you, and many will not arrive at the final destination, but remember, your return to the real world begins with this first important step. Good luck to you all.

By: Chris

Chris — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 01:50:20 +0000

The Tet analogy refers to the media campaign, which is separate from any military operations. This is what the enemy has been expending energy on, winning the propaganda war. I’m not sure what kind of boldness will counteract the pressure of the American media, since any drastic change of strategy or personnel will undoubtedly be portrayed as the last act of a desperate administration.

Fortunately, this administration has over two years left to keep plodding forward. Unfortunately, everyone seems to understand the vagaries of the biennial American electoral process, and the fact that the political leadership in this country is fractured on the topic of the GWOT will be exploited until the fault lines are erased.

By: Bart

Bart — Sat, 01 Apr 2006 22:07:28 +0000

What appears to be happening in Bagdad is that the Shia got tired of being massacred on a regular basis and started to hit back at the Sunni with revenge killings around Bagdad. Whether these killings are accurately targeting Sunni terrorists or are simply tit for tat killing is unknown. Frankly, the Shia have been amazingly patient under this Sunni mass murder campaign against their civilians. We need to get at least a partial leash on this so that revenge killings do not turn into an actual civil war with warring militias.

There has been no discernible spike in Sunni insurgency killings or attacks. If they attempted anything like Tet, the Sunni would be massacred. At most, the Sunni insurgency can muster maybe 20,000 men dispersed across the country and have only launched company size attacks anywhere in the country. They are outnumbered well over 5-1 by the government forces alone not counting Coalition or Shia militia forces. The last time they tried a company size attack against a police station north of Bagdad, the Sunni ran into a government commando unit and were slaughtered.

Consequently, the Sunni insurgency doesn’t even pose a remote threat to Iraqi military or government control of Bagdad or any other area of the country. This is why their attacks have shifted away from the Coalition and toward Iraqi civilian targets. In reality, the threat is that the vastly outnumbered Shia will reap what they sown and will get hurt very badly by the Shia.

The bottom line is that we have already achieved all of our objectives in Iraq. We have replaced Saddam’s dictatorship with a elected representative government and built an Iraqi military which can sustain that government. The terror against civilians will go on for some years but it has no more chance of winning that did the IRA, ETA or the Palestinian terror groups. The Shia and Kurds are not going to give up power in the face of these attacks. The Iraqis will have to come to the necessary political accommodations to resolve that problem. Most of our troops will be coming home over the next year or so.

By: Mark H.

Mark H. — Sat, 01 Apr 2006 21:49:19 +0000

Last time everyone went into a collective depressed funk (prior to the first election if I recall), things improved shortly thereafter. I’ll be looking foward to similar happenings this time around.

By: conerned arab american citizen

conerned arab american citizen — Sat, 01 Apr 2006 21:11:28 +0000

Although Europe has sat back and not helped us out to this point, maybe it spiraling out of control would entice them to try to help us stabilize the area, because they are concerned about iran, and complete crazyness in iraq would make the iran situation more dire.

Plus I think that in order for Europe and USA to start working together to confront roque countries it would be useful for them to feel as if they saved us from disaster, so that we can’t hang ww2 over their heads, which i believe is the true source of much of their anger for us.

By: allen

allen — Sat, 01 Apr 2006 20:43:28 +0000

Greg Djerejian is highly overrated. So is Tom Friedman. Sectarian violence? It’s been happening in the middle east(like Africa, like the Balkans and many other countries) for hundreds if not thousands of years. Cry me a river.

By: kender

kender — Sat, 01 Apr 2006 20:34:16 +0000

Sometimes I wonder if these people have the capacity to govern themselves in a peaceful manner.

By: Rick Moran

Rick Moran — Sat, 01 Apr 2006 19:09:27 +0000

First of all, I don’t think I’m being gloomy in the sense that things are hopeless and I’m giving up. I am saying that bold moves need to be made to salvage the situation and it appears that such moves are being contemplated.

I didn’t put several other pieces of news in the post such as the letter Bush sent to al-Sistani several days ago that the Ayatollah hasn’t even opened and had translated yet so mad he and other Shia leaders are at the Americans right now. Nor did I include the fact despite calls by the Shia alliance for him to step aside, Jaaffari insists he will stand for PM “until the end.” This will fracture the Shia coalition making it even harder to reach consensus on a unity government (also further empowering al-Sadr).

It is the Iraqi political class represented by bloggers and commentators who seem to be losing hope and that to me is more an important sign of what is going on than all the briefings from the military or all the stories in the MSM.

I respect Wretchard and Bill Roggio but Fernandez has been saying for months that the insurgency is dead and Bill’s excellent reporting is, in the end, the grunt’s eye view and I think he loses focus when he pulls back and tries to analyze the big picture. Not saying that they are necessarily incorrect just that they are giving a more optimistic assessment of the situation.

Boldness will salvage the situation. Let’s hope that the Administration has it in them.