Posted on 11/30/2006 2:43:38 PM PST by EternalHope
We have heard Maliki say they will be ready within a few months.
So... Is the Iraqi military ready, or nearly so?
The number one thing they have to do is unify their forces whether shia, sunni or kurd into a force that will deal with ANY insurgency harshly, rapidly, and completely.
If the sunni members of their armed forces attack shia more vigorously, or vice versa, they have a huge problem.
Conversion to Christianity or Judaism for starters, and a resounding rejection of tribalism.
They definitely need to do this.
"Ready"?- ready to do what? Ready to turn on the sadrists and to whack them, the harder the better? - doubt it; to whack the sunni triangle? - probably not, either.
That would do it, but I won't be holding my breath...
I don't know when they will be ready, but as soon as they are, they need to take over, kick ass and run the place for about 20 years before even thinking about allowing elections. The Iraqis are not ready. Nothing against them, it took the Filipinos, South Korea, Taiwan and even Greece a long time before they were ready for civil government. Autocratic pro-western governments were necessary while economic, educational and societal conditions were created that allowed for democracy.
I'd say "ready" means "ready, willing, and able" to restore and maintain civilized order in Iraq. In my opinion that will have to include putting ALL of the militias out of business.
Preferably, Sadr will die in the process...
You may very well be right, but we do not have the luxury of that much time.
We won't really know until we give them a chance to prove themselves or fail.
It's very important that we continue to allow them to stand more and more on their own. We need to remain to give the Iraqi's something to fall back on when they stumble, but I think we are doing the right thing by not flooding the countryside with troops and seeking to restore order by force of arms on our own.
The Iraqi people have a difficult task ahead of themselves.
Despite all the setbacks and the difficult times I believe we've done the right thing.
We've heard armchair quarterbacks say how we should have had far more troops and crushed the insurgencies.
Insurgencies don't take vast numbers of organized people, especially when there is a long history of tribal violence.
Even if the insurgencies had been completely crushed. That doesn't keep Iran, Syria, and even Saudi Arabia from stirring things back up.
Iraq needs to build a stable government and a stable society, and us going in and crushing insurgencies doesn't do that.
It's a difficult task, it will continue to be a difficult task to some extent for years if not generations even if they succeed.
All we can really do is try and keep pointing them in the right direction as best we can, and provide enough stability to protect the democratic government from a violent coup as long as they want us there.
The rest is up to them.
I think we should remain as long as the democratically elected government wants us to remain.
I think we should continue to turn over more and more control and responsibility to the Iraqis.
I think we need to remain, but we should interfere as little as we can, because they are the ones that ultimately must solve these problems, not us. We can't step in every time they stumble, but we should stick around and make sure they don't completely fall.
I don't understand what you mean.
Well said!
You have no idea how right you are.
Well, "to restore and maintain civilized order" the army [and the population it is drawn from] needs to be civilized first. As a thought experiment, imagine trying to do it with an army of barbarians. Thus, they will be ready when transcivilized [i.e. when they overcome their sectarianism ant tribalism, for starters], and not a millisecond sooner.
Nowhere have I read anything about an Air Force. How can you possibly protect yourself in the 21st century without air power especially when you have neighbors like Syria and Iran and I am not talking about the other neighbors near and far.
Hate to say this: Rots a rock Iraq.
I take it you don't think they're quite ready...
Trust me, I'm not.
You have no idea how right you are.
Trained them. Trained with them. Islam reigns at the peril of military effectiveness and tribal factionalism will always trump unit cohesion.
That would do it, but I won't be holding my breath...
Trust me, I'm not.
You have no idea how right you are.
Trained them. Trained with them. Islam reigns at the peril of military effectiveness and tribal factionalism will always trump unit cohesion
I meant I don't think we/they have the option of running the place without another set of elections for 20 years, even though you may be right about that being literally the best option.
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