Posted on 12/16/2006 7:30:10 PM PST by shrinkermd
When does a rebellion become a revolution? That’s easy — when it wins. When does an uprising attain the level of an insurgency and qualify as an insurrection? That’s harder to answer because the meanings of those synonyms flow into one another.
And when do all of the preceding amount to a civil war? That term usually denotes the struggle of an armed group of citizens within a nation seeking forcibly to seize control of the government from those in power. But that does not reflect the complexity of the war in Iraq today, which makes it hardest of all to define.
The linguistic dogmas of civil wars past are inadequate to the stormy present. In olden times — a generation or so ago — civil war required each major combatant to control some territory, have a functioning central authority and be recognized by some outside country — or some combination thereof. But guerrilla operations, suicide attacks on civilians, secret foreign support angrily denied, counterfeit uniforms and splintered insurgent forces supported by foreign terrorists make obsolete the past definitions of civil war — especially when the insurgents or terrorists are trying to overthrow a new government backed by a coalition of foreign troops.
...Soon after the U.S. election victory of Democrats, the definers of the nature of the fight as a civil war made a tactical lexical breakthrough in the media. A few days after The Los Angeles Times began describing the fighting in Iraq with that phrase, Matt Lauer of NBC announced that his network had adopted the usage. Lest this be seen as a “Cronkite moment,” recalling the CBS anchor’s denunciation of the Vietnam War as being “mired in stalemate,” James Poniewozik of Time magazine noted that “polls and common sense indicated that most Americans already believed Iraq’s...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
As good a conclusion as one is apt to get.
Would seem to suggest that the American Civil War was not a civil war since the south was not seeking to gain control of the federal government.
I honestly think that despite the Democrats' moonbat tendencies, after President Tom (Ahmedinajihad, or whatever) led that Holocaust denial meeting, and has been preaching about the demise of Israel, even the bizarros in the Dem party know that they need to be REALLY careful, or they're going to get a bunch of us killed.
They don't actually care whether we live or die or not, of course. They just don't want a bunch of Americans killed on their watch (most likely liberal Americans, because it will be a city that's attacked), because it might remove them from power again.
If Americans die and they regain power, or get more power, that's OK. If Americans die and they lose power, that's unacceptable. Am I really that cynical? Hell yes. The Democrat Party I've seen over the last twenty years has given me no other choice but to think that way.
That definition is what an insurgency is. An uprising normally has little leadership and only limited objectives. An insurgency has as its goal the eventual overthrow of the established government. A civil war is usually characterized by having the ability to hold geography, and threatens to topple the government. So far, in Iraq, the war is characterized as insurgencies and uprisings that threaten each other, hold no land, and do not directly threaten the government. The goals are to drive the coalition out, and reduce the effectiveness of the other insurgencies. Ultimately, should several join into an effective coalition, they can certainly threaten the government.
My God. This is just too rich, coming from the New York Times!
We have all been saying this about THEIR reporting over the years, and they always deny it and say they are impartial!
Just unbelievable.
The military people who have served and are serving know what is going on. I believe them.
The New York Times either doesn't know what is going on in Iraq, or knows full well and chooses to misreport it, slant it or twist it.
Anyone have an idea of how unified the country was before the civil war and how people people from different states thought about the country as a whole? In other words, were people more patriotic about state citizenship or national citizenship?
I'm sorry, I thought the NY Times already answered the question for Mr. Safire. Its a civil war when the MSM decides that it is - which tends to come when they believe they need to get rid of the GOP controlled congress and tricking W into conceding defeat in Iraq and handing America its second loss ever. (hey, it worked in Vietnam)
That's right...it never wuz a civil war
We Southerners refer to it as "the War between the States" or quite simply "The War of Northern Aggression" ;-)
Sunni VS. Shiia. Been going on for over a millenia now. WGAF what the DBM wants to call it this week.
Call it anything you want. Some Iraqis are fighting against some other Iraqis. You can call it a civil war if you want to.
The fact remains that we are not neutral between these two factions. One is made up of the people we overthrew, backed up by Syrians, Iranians, and Al Qaeda fighters. The other is made up of the people we have put in power, hopefully to build a civilized government in a place that has known precious little civilized government. If we see ourselves as neutral in a war between the people we overthrew, and the people we recruited into government, we have lost all moral authority, we will have proven ourselves unworthy of trust.
This isn't the first time we've been at this juncture. Our withdrawal from Viet Nam cost the lives of millions. Our failure to back up the insurrection we called for after the first Gulf War cost hundreds of thousands of lives, who died while our troops watched from a distance. If we pull out now, the people who have trusted us will be dead inside of a month.
So true. So sad. Never acknowledged by the left.
Safire conveniently does not mention mention third-party al-qaeda, the insane murderous catalyst muzzie cult that randomly stirs the pot with rampant bloodshed that incites 'civil' war that likely wouldn't exist otherwise between mohammedheads given their new freedom, courtesy of the USA.
Well, no. I hesitate to disagree with William Safire, who prides himself on word definitions, but that's not what I understand by civil war. A civil war is when two major armed factions within the same country fight it out, for various reasons. Thus the Spanish Civil War was fought between the Communists and the party of Franco. The English Civil War was fought between the Puritans and the Cavaliers. The American Civil War was fought between the Yankees and the Confederates. It may or may not be someone trying to seize power from the previous rulers.
For what it's worth, dictionary.com says "a war between political factions or regions within the same country."
There are all the makings of a civil war in Iraq: Kurds, Sunnis, Shiites. But it is not yet a civil war in any real sense.
Of course if the Times has its way and we pull out, then no doubt we will see a civil war, as well as probable invasions by Syria and Iran and perhaps Turkey as well, as these various groups start to fight it out.
They fled to the Ohio Valley to the new "Free States" there.
They later on came back and gave you'all their opinion on their fathers and grandfathers having been driven from their homes and having all their stuff stolen.
Now that's a "civil war" for you ~ and I can still hear the crackling of the fires in the towns in Georgia, SC and NC.
Southerners, as a whole, tended to be more patriotic about state citizenship. Particularly those in the Deep South, who seceded immediately upon Lincoln's election.
Northerners became a lot more galvanized and prideful in terms of national citizenship once Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, turning the Civil War into a moral war of sorts.
Absolutely, and I regret that I didn't catch that. Good point.
I guess the South only wanted one half the country.
LOL..now that's funny.
Even Lincoln woulda toldja it didn't have nutin' ta do wit "dem people".
I agree with one thing though, it's just semantics, just like Iraq. What difference does it matter whether you call it a civil war, an insurgency or a war between factions. Lot of people wind up dead until one side finally yells "uncle".
Somehow we've gotten the idea that "civil wars" are strictly local matters not of our interest.
In this case, though, we have a former subservient class of people, the Shia, being attacked by a former ruling class, the Sunni.
Think of it as a Master/Slave situation. Obviously we do not want to encourage the Masters, but they have cousins in Saudi, Syria, Egypt and North Africa. At the same time we'd like to help the slaves, but they have cousins in Iran (the Democrat party's hereditary enemy).
The only civil war I can see going on is right here where the Democrats and their running dog lackeys in their captive MSM are trying to convince the rest of us that the equivalent of a former slave class in Iraq is actually quite happy with their lot and will be happy to see the return of their masters.
Hey, that's how we did that thing from 1860 to 1865 isn't it? The Democrats told us everybody was happy ~ but Lincoln was wise and took the MSM and locked a bunch of them up down here at Point Lookout, MD ~ he then sent out a large army to kill as many Democrats as could be dug out of their holes too.
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