My way is theonly way to force them to do what you said we are there to do, ie steal their oil. But our options now do appear to be basically three: get nasty, pull out or keep getting troops killed. Which do you prefer or do you have another option?
Bush Disapproval Rating on Iraq Exceeds 50% in Poll
- Thread starter ARogueTrader
- Start date
My way is theonly way to force them to do what you said we are there to do, ie steal their oil. But our options now do appear to be basically three: get nasty, pull out or keep getting troops killed. Which do you prefer or do you have another option?
I don't recall suggesting we steal their oil. Unless you see stealing their oil as our brand of capitalism.
What we "need"to do is to gain the support of the Iraqi people, and earning that support will come neither through the withdrawal of troops that will leave a power vacuum and certainly a return to power of Saddam or someone like him....nor through an attempt to blast them into submission.
If we want to demonstrate democracy in action, we should act in a more democratic manner and bring in troops from other countries who will benefit from a long term stability in Iraq and a development of a society that will be more beneficial to the majority of the citizens in Iraq and worldwide.
We did not act in a democratic manner when we ignored the rest of the world and blasted our way into power in Iraq via our war, we acted unilaterally with the support of a few allies. We are preaching democracy, yet we acted unilaterally. That inconsistency doesn't put forth a great example of the ideals of democracy.
I would have Bush finally get real and admit to the world that while his intentions may have been good, in practice what we have in Iraq is now a mess, that we made some errors, and that now we need help from the free world.
Bring in the finest minds from all the world, and let's make this a world problem of how to help Iraq. Let's consider more solutions form outside sources. Let's see funding from other countries who will stand to benefit from a modernized society in Iraq.
What you don't seem to accept as a valid concern is the manner in which we are viewed by others in this world, with the opinion that if they don't like it we can simply blast away all of our enemies.
It doesn't work that way, it never has in the long run.
If you look at Israel, it is well know that they respond to violence with violence...has it stopped the violence?
The good people of Iraq need to be on our side, which means we need to show them that we are truly on their side...not just on the side of our own special interests.
Showing some willingness to bury the political hatchet with France, Germany, the Soviets and China to created a united front against terrorism in Iraq and the establishment of a democracy.
This has to be a world wide effort to bring peace to the middle east, and it will take quite a long time in my opinion, maybe a couple of generations.
During that period, soldiers will likely die in the cause of freedom, but they need not be only American soldiers, they should be soldiers who are fighting for what is best for the free world...and should be represented by those countries who are in support of a free wold.
You will find many those soldiers in many of the countries who supported our efforts in Afghanastan....but those countries need to believe there is something in it for everyone....that we also care about what they think.
Unfortunately, Bush has burned a lot of bridges with this war and his dismissal of other countries and their opinions about what was best for Iraq, and I don't know if he is capable at this point of bringing the free world together in the development of Iraq.
There has to be a compromise, something GW hasn't show he is capable of doing with many foreign leaders.
Obviously Rumsfeld and Bush never saw the movie "Earthquake". If they had, they would have remembered Marjoe Gortner's character: "Get those looters" BANG!
Now Reagan would have remembered and would have gotten those looters!
One thing about Ronnie and his boys, they didn't fuck with us on his watch.
And what's with this Condi Rice as National Security Advisor? How unmacho is that? RR would have never done that, although his wife Nancy made George S. Patton look like a fairy.
There's only one solution for Iraq: clone 100,000 Mike Tysons and dispatch them Iraq.
Ok, you didn't say "steal" but we hardly needed to take over the country to buy their oil at world market prices.
We've asked other countries to get involved. They have declined. They want us to fall on our face and be humiliated. We tried for over a year to get the "international community" to go along with us. They refused. Many of them had lucrative weapons deals with Iraq, were raking off money on the oil for food scam or were getting paid off by Saddam.
At the end of the day, the President and Congress decide what is best for the US. Not the UN, not France, not Germany, not Russia.
It's hard for many Americans to grasp that much of the world does not share our values or interest in defeating terrorism, particularly if we are the ones getting hit. They would love to see us suffer a humiliating defeat.
Our support for Israel is a key factor in the hatred for us. Should we just abandon Israel, as the "world" wants us to do?
I look forward to these issues being addressed in the Presidential campaign. I have a lot more faith in the sense of the American people than a bunch of international diplomats.
You're an idiot. Ironically Moslem's don't eat pork, but you Bung, Nolan-Vinnie-Sam, Waggie, jbtrader23 spend a lot of time chowing down Islamic dick sandwiches. Coming soon to a mosque near you
As someone that used to live one block from the World Trade Center and spent 10 years of my life as a floor trader at the CEC in #4 WTC, I can honestly say that I was indeed effected by the tradgedy and loss of life of 911.
As for Ms. Maureen Dowd, you are without a doubt a:
TOTAL MORON and WHITE PIECE OF TRASH.
As someone that used to live one block from the World Trade Center and spent 10 years of my life as a floor trader at the CEC in #4 WTC, I can honestly say that I was indeed effected by the tradgedy and loss of life of 911.
As for Ms. Maureen Dowd, you are without a doubt a:
TOTAL MORON and WHITE PIECE OF TRASH.
Yes, there is a difference between stealing oil, and securing stability of price and supply. I can understand the need to secure flow of oil and stable price and supply...though it does little to free ourselves from dependency on foreign oil in the long run.
Other countries want us to be humiliated? What a surprise, after all the humility GW has shown them.
Yes, Bush may have acted in a manner that was best for the U.S....that is a subject of debate at present, but best for the U.S. in a global economy and global community often means having to compromise. He was fixed on his plan, and there was no talk of compromise or of deals to be made behind the scene. He had some big burr up his ass to take out Saddam, and acted as if there was some dramatic need for action....which we all now know there wasn't. We could have waited, and worked with all involved parties toward a different solution.
I believe the rest of the world wants to defeat terrorism, the problem is that many think the way we acted in a unilateral manner was on the basis of not what is right, but on the basis of military might that allows such unbridled action without consideration of the long term political consequences.
When you have the power to basically do as you please, compromise is often not a consideration.
Should we abandon Israel? No, but we should hold them to the standards of common sense, something we often have been unwilling to do where Israel is concerned.
Israel could do more in the area of compromise...but with the attitude of "chosen people" being dominant, compromise is a difficult subject for many Israelis.
Even among the Jewish community in America, there is a beginning of a questioning of some of the politics of Israel.
I too look forward to suggested solutions to the problems we face in Iraq.
Bush II makes Nixon look like a Boy Scout.
US agrees to international control of its troops in Iraq
By Leonard Doyle and Stephen Castle in Brussels
17 November 2003
The United States accepts that to avoid humiliating failure in Iraq it needs to bring its forces quickly under international control and speed the handover of power, Javier Solana, the European Union foreign policy chief, has said. Decisions along these lines will be made in the "coming days", Mr Solana told The Independent.
The comments, signalling a major policy shift by the US, precede President George Bush's state visit this week to London, during which he and Tony Blair will discuss an exit strategy for forces in Iraq.
Mr Solana underlined the change of mood in Washington, saying: "Everybody has moved, including the United States, because the United States has a real problem and when you have a real problem you need help." There is a "growing consensus" that the transfer of power has to be accelerated, he said. "How fast can it be done? I would say the faster the better."
He added: "The more the international community is incorporated under the international organisations [the better]. That is the lesson I think everyone is learning. Our American friends are learning that. We will see in the coming days decisions along these lines."
The Bush administration spelt out over the weekend its new plans for the faster transfer of power from Americans to the Iraqis, with a transitional government now scheduled to take over from the end of June. Before, US officials had said that Iraqi leaders should write a constitution first, then hold elections.
As the EU's foreign policy representative, Mr Solana has been playing a significant, behind-the-scenes role. Until now, the US had resisted putting the allied forces under international auspices, although there is growing support in Washington for a Nato role.
Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State, arrives in Brussels tonight for talks with EU ministers, which he will combine with a meeting with the retiring Nato secretary general, Lord Robertson of Port Ellen. Diplomats say that Mr Powell is expected to "test the water" about the involvement of the transatlantic alliance in Iraq. The litany of setbacks, growing US casualties and the recent killing of 18 Italian servicemen has brought intense domestic and international pressure on the Bush administration to give the occupying force more legitimacy.
Eager to counter this domestic unease, the American military sought to advertise their latest crack-down. They declared that they had fired a satellite-guided missile at what they said was an insurgents' training camp west of Kirkuk.
But there was more grim news on Saturday with the collision of two Black Hawk helicopters after one was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade. Seventeen American soldiers died, the worst single loss of life in one incident since President Bush ordered the US-led invasion.
He insisted yesterday that the US would not "cut and run". In an interview with Breakfast with Frost on BBC1, the President said the United States would not spend "years and years" in Iraq. But he rejected as "not a fair comment" claims that the US was unprepared for winning peace. Mounting violence in Iraq was "nothing more than a power grab". He added: "There are some foreign fighters, mujahedin types or al-Qa'ida, or al-Qa'ida affiliates involved, as well."
America's chief post-war administrator in Iraq, Paul Bremer, also suggested that US-led forces would remain on a different basis. "Our presence here will change from an occupation to an invited presence," he said. "I'm sure the Iraqi government is going to want to have coalition forces here for its own security for some time.
There have been no specifics yet about how the international community would control the mainly American and British forces in Iraq. Nato remains the only strong possibility because it would provide international credibility while leaving control with a military organisation which Washington dominates.
Nato has already proved its willingness to act outside its traditional sphere of operations by taking a role in Afghanistan. But to allow it to deploy in Iraq would mean getting the approval of all 19 Nato allies including France, Germany and Belgium, all staunch opponents of the war.
They would need to be satisfiedthat the UN had been given a sufficient role in the political control of Iraq. Diplomats say that the US and Britain will need to be certain that no one will block an Iraq mission before they make a request.
With the US-led occupation likely to be declared over the next year, Mr Bremer said that work would start on a constitutional settlement. "We'll have a bill of rights. We'll recognise equality for all citizens. We'll recognise an independent judiciary. We'll talk about a federal government," he said.
Mr Bremer explained that the Americans would work with the Iraqi Governing Council in writing the interim constitution. There would also be a side agreement dealing with security and the presence of American and coalition forces in Iraq, he said.
Al-Qa'ida claimed responsibility for the bombings of two Istanbul synagogues which killed at least 23 people and vowed further attacks, the London-based Arab newspaper al-Quds al-Arabi said yesterday.
By Leonard Doyle and Stephen Castle in Brussels
17 November 2003
The United States accepts that to avoid humiliating failure in Iraq it needs to bring its forces quickly under international control and speed the handover of power, Javier Solana, the European Union foreign policy chief, has said. Decisions along these lines will be made in the "coming days", Mr Solana told The Independent.
The comments, signalling a major policy shift by the US, precede President George Bush's state visit this week to London, during which he and Tony Blair will discuss an exit strategy for forces in Iraq.
Mr Solana underlined the change of mood in Washington, saying: "Everybody has moved, including the United States, because the United States has a real problem and when you have a real problem you need help." There is a "growing consensus" that the transfer of power has to be accelerated, he said. "How fast can it be done? I would say the faster the better."
He added: "The more the international community is incorporated under the international organisations [the better]. That is the lesson I think everyone is learning. Our American friends are learning that. We will see in the coming days decisions along these lines."
The Bush administration spelt out over the weekend its new plans for the faster transfer of power from Americans to the Iraqis, with a transitional government now scheduled to take over from the end of June. Before, US officials had said that Iraqi leaders should write a constitution first, then hold elections.
As the EU's foreign policy representative, Mr Solana has been playing a significant, behind-the-scenes role. Until now, the US had resisted putting the allied forces under international auspices, although there is growing support in Washington for a Nato role.
Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State, arrives in Brussels tonight for talks with EU ministers, which he will combine with a meeting with the retiring Nato secretary general, Lord Robertson of Port Ellen. Diplomats say that Mr Powell is expected to "test the water" about the involvement of the transatlantic alliance in Iraq. The litany of setbacks, growing US casualties and the recent killing of 18 Italian servicemen has brought intense domestic and international pressure on the Bush administration to give the occupying force more legitimacy.
Eager to counter this domestic unease, the American military sought to advertise their latest crack-down. They declared that they had fired a satellite-guided missile at what they said was an insurgents' training camp west of Kirkuk.
But there was more grim news on Saturday with the collision of two Black Hawk helicopters after one was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade. Seventeen American soldiers died, the worst single loss of life in one incident since President Bush ordered the US-led invasion.
He insisted yesterday that the US would not "cut and run". In an interview with Breakfast with Frost on BBC1, the President said the United States would not spend "years and years" in Iraq. But he rejected as "not a fair comment" claims that the US was unprepared for winning peace. Mounting violence in Iraq was "nothing more than a power grab". He added: "There are some foreign fighters, mujahedin types or al-Qa'ida, or al-Qa'ida affiliates involved, as well."
America's chief post-war administrator in Iraq, Paul Bremer, also suggested that US-led forces would remain on a different basis. "Our presence here will change from an occupation to an invited presence," he said. "I'm sure the Iraqi government is going to want to have coalition forces here for its own security for some time.
There have been no specifics yet about how the international community would control the mainly American and British forces in Iraq. Nato remains the only strong possibility because it would provide international credibility while leaving control with a military organisation which Washington dominates.
Nato has already proved its willingness to act outside its traditional sphere of operations by taking a role in Afghanistan. But to allow it to deploy in Iraq would mean getting the approval of all 19 Nato allies including France, Germany and Belgium, all staunch opponents of the war.
They would need to be satisfiedthat the UN had been given a sufficient role in the political control of Iraq. Diplomats say that the US and Britain will need to be certain that no one will block an Iraq mission before they make a request.
With the US-led occupation likely to be declared over the next year, Mr Bremer said that work would start on a constitutional settlement. "We'll have a bill of rights. We'll recognise equality for all citizens. We'll recognise an independent judiciary. We'll talk about a federal government," he said.
Mr Bremer explained that the Americans would work with the Iraqi Governing Council in writing the interim constitution. There would also be a side agreement dealing with security and the presence of American and coalition forces in Iraq, he said.
Al-Qa'ida claimed responsibility for the bombings of two Istanbul synagogues which killed at least 23 people and vowed further attacks, the London-based Arab newspaper al-Quds al-Arabi said yesterday.
When the Course Can't be Stayed
By William Raspberry
Monday, November 24, 2003; Page A21
It's hard to know which is the better analogy for our predicament in Iraq: Vietnam or Israel.
Vietnam is tempting, since it is what the word "quagmire" brings to mind -- and Iraq increasingly is looking like "a difficult, precarious, or entrapping position," which is how my Webster's Collegiate dictionary defines quagmire.
What makes me think of Israel, though, is last week's American bombing raid near the central Iraq town of Tikrit -- an attempt to wipe out the anti-occupation guerrillas thought to be ensconced there. It sounds for all the world like the retaliatory raids that follow virtually every suicide bomb attack in Israel. And the logic by which the decision to strike at largely civilian targets is the same.
The individuals who carry out the deadly terrorist attacks are most often dead at their own hands, and therefore beyond retaliation. The only retaliatory response that makes sense is to hit those who sent them. And since these cowards hide among civilian populations, the painful reality is that doing what is necessary involves civilian casualties.
What happens, of course, is that every such retaliatory strike spawns more terrorists and vastly increases the number of civilians who, forced to choose between the home-grown terrorists and the alien retaliators, take the side of the terrorists.
Sometimes, whether in Iraq or in Palestine, they think they don't have a choice. The price of siding with the outsiders can be high.
For the American-led coalition forces in Iraq, the difficulties are tragically obvious. They were fine when all they had to do was win a war against a weakened and largely unresisting Iraqi military. But then they were asked to cap their military victory by establishing peace in a place whose government they had removed, whose language they didn't speak and whose economy and civic order they had wrecked.
Even Iraqis who hated the now-deposed Saddam Hussein couldn't be expected to love the outsiders who not only overthrew the dictator but who also killed untold numbers of their relatives in the process. There are plenty of reasons for the locals to dislike the coalition forces -- at least to the point of giving cover to those who would strike out against the invaders.
But our guys can't just sit back and let that happen. So a week ago, in what may have been a turning point in the postwar, U.S. forces hit a Tikrit-area village with helicopter gunships, tanks, satellite-guided rockets and 500-pound bombs.
"We have to use these capabilities to take the fight to the enemy," Maj. Gen. Charles H. Swannack Jr., commander of the 82nd Airborne Division, explained. "And why not?"
It's a good question -- if your principal objective is either to protect your own forces or to wipe out guerrillas. But if your mission is to win over the Iraqi people, bringing the war to their neighborhoods works about as well as it has worked in Palestine. At least the Israelis are clear that their own security is their first priority.
The problem for the coalition is that the terrorists are not necessarily some ragtag band of malcontents that can be hunted down and taken out one by one. They may be more like a particularly aggressive virus that is spread by the very medicine prescribed to cure it.
And they may be more than that. One hears more and more some version of the theory I first heard from D.L. Cuddy, author of a book about Iraq called "Cover-Up: Government Spin or Truth?" Cuddy's notion is that the guerrilla war we're now flailing against is precisely the war Saddam Hussein intended to fight all along. That, he argues, is why Hussein offered only token resistance, preferring to wait for the coalition to disperse into smaller patrols, vulnerable to hit-and-run assaults. Saddam, in this scenario, doesn't need victory; he only needs chaos, uncertainty, demoralization -- and the fervent wish by most Iraqis that the outsiders just go home.
For all the Bush administration's brave talk about staying the course, the course they've chosen may become increasingly unstayable -- and not just because a presidential election looms.
Maybe all we can do is turn things over to some legitimate-appearing Iraqi authority constituted under the aegis of the United Nations and hope that it can keep it together long enough to get us more or less gracefully out of town.
By William Raspberry
Monday, November 24, 2003; Page A21
It's hard to know which is the better analogy for our predicament in Iraq: Vietnam or Israel.
Vietnam is tempting, since it is what the word "quagmire" brings to mind -- and Iraq increasingly is looking like "a difficult, precarious, or entrapping position," which is how my Webster's Collegiate dictionary defines quagmire.
What makes me think of Israel, though, is last week's American bombing raid near the central Iraq town of Tikrit -- an attempt to wipe out the anti-occupation guerrillas thought to be ensconced there. It sounds for all the world like the retaliatory raids that follow virtually every suicide bomb attack in Israel. And the logic by which the decision to strike at largely civilian targets is the same.
The individuals who carry out the deadly terrorist attacks are most often dead at their own hands, and therefore beyond retaliation. The only retaliatory response that makes sense is to hit those who sent them. And since these cowards hide among civilian populations, the painful reality is that doing what is necessary involves civilian casualties.
What happens, of course, is that every such retaliatory strike spawns more terrorists and vastly increases the number of civilians who, forced to choose between the home-grown terrorists and the alien retaliators, take the side of the terrorists.
Sometimes, whether in Iraq or in Palestine, they think they don't have a choice. The price of siding with the outsiders can be high.
For the American-led coalition forces in Iraq, the difficulties are tragically obvious. They were fine when all they had to do was win a war against a weakened and largely unresisting Iraqi military. But then they were asked to cap their military victory by establishing peace in a place whose government they had removed, whose language they didn't speak and whose economy and civic order they had wrecked.
Even Iraqis who hated the now-deposed Saddam Hussein couldn't be expected to love the outsiders who not only overthrew the dictator but who also killed untold numbers of their relatives in the process. There are plenty of reasons for the locals to dislike the coalition forces -- at least to the point of giving cover to those who would strike out against the invaders.
But our guys can't just sit back and let that happen. So a week ago, in what may have been a turning point in the postwar, U.S. forces hit a Tikrit-area village with helicopter gunships, tanks, satellite-guided rockets and 500-pound bombs.
"We have to use these capabilities to take the fight to the enemy," Maj. Gen. Charles H. Swannack Jr., commander of the 82nd Airborne Division, explained. "And why not?"
It's a good question -- if your principal objective is either to protect your own forces or to wipe out guerrillas. But if your mission is to win over the Iraqi people, bringing the war to their neighborhoods works about as well as it has worked in Palestine. At least the Israelis are clear that their own security is their first priority.
The problem for the coalition is that the terrorists are not necessarily some ragtag band of malcontents that can be hunted down and taken out one by one. They may be more like a particularly aggressive virus that is spread by the very medicine prescribed to cure it.
And they may be more than that. One hears more and more some version of the theory I first heard from D.L. Cuddy, author of a book about Iraq called "Cover-Up: Government Spin or Truth?" Cuddy's notion is that the guerrilla war we're now flailing against is precisely the war Saddam Hussein intended to fight all along. That, he argues, is why Hussein offered only token resistance, preferring to wait for the coalition to disperse into smaller patrols, vulnerable to hit-and-run assaults. Saddam, in this scenario, doesn't need victory; he only needs chaos, uncertainty, demoralization -- and the fervent wish by most Iraqis that the outsiders just go home.
For all the Bush administration's brave talk about staying the course, the course they've chosen may become increasingly unstayable -- and not just because a presidential election looms.
Maybe all we can do is turn things over to some legitimate-appearing Iraqi authority constituted under the aegis of the United Nations and hope that it can keep it together long enough to get us more or less gracefully out of town.