Posted on 07/18/2007 10:36:06 AM PDT by jazusamo
“The Bush admin would have been better off to have approached this with a total war mentality and not allowed its efforts to turn into a war of political correctness.”
Winner!!
Problem in Iraq is ... we moved from too timid to being too ambitious.
In 1991, we should have at least supported a semi-autonomous southern Iraq (along with a semi-autonomous northern or Kurdish region).
But, no, instead we settled for an armistice that kept Saddam in power, and in control of the oil fields.
Then, in 2003, we had the idea that the country could be transformed over-night into a multi-party democracy. O.K., so tell me where in the entire history of the world was such a thing accomplished?
As Thomas Sowell points out, the blooming of democracy in the Far East, in South Korea and Taiwan, only took place after a period of time.
Same thing in Spain and in Chile.
I could point out many other examples. And, these are the success stories.
Contrariwise, I could point out dozens of examples of where a government was formed by the holding of an election by outside powers, or by a regime in transition, only to see the country slide first into a the control of a demogogic, semi-authorian ruler, and then into a full-scale authoritarian dictator.
Bearing these things in mind, I would say two things:
First, we should be quick to CONSOLIDATE the advance of liberty and democracy whereever that happens in the world, because while we have an interest in the whole world being free, we can’t really control or dictate when this will happen. This goes for our friends in eastern Europe, in India, in the relatively free small countries of the Persian Gulf, and other places. More to the point, this goes for our friends in Kurdish Iraq.
Second, we shouldn’t be so quick to criticize the authoritarian rulers in places like China that are being slow to open their society, teach their people about freedom, and so forth. The path of slow and steady may be much better than the path of premature elections.
And jazusamo added:
Agreed...Bringing democracy to the region at this time is a monumental uphill climb.
As Mr. Sowell wrote, the prerequisites for democracy must be in place before said "democracy" can arise.
The most important prerequisite is that the nations of Islam must first be "de-Islamicized" - they must be purged of the cult of muhammed.
Converting them to Christianity by force and decree would be a good way to start down this road.
And before anyone says "impossible", did not a Roman emperor convert the entire Roman empire to the same, somewhere back around 900AD?
So long as they remain Islamic, democracy and freedom are impossible and unattainable.
For this reason, I have come to believe that - in spite of our good intentions and the courage of our military personnel - that we may be wasting our time, blood and treasure in Iraq, "surge" or no surge. I don't recommend cutting and running, of course not. But I'm not expecting much more in the way of progress or results. I hope I'm proven wrong by events yet to come.
- John
“The second half on nation building is a huge rebuttal of the neo con belief that we could establish democracy in the Middle East.”
Isn’t this rather reminiscent of what the brits tried to do after WWI?
“I’m all for the surge in troops, I am against any suggestion of pulling out now, and I think that now that we’re there and we are trying to do this, we had better be prepared to be in for a long, long haul and work to finish the job. I just wish I could convince myself that “finishing the job” is a plausible outcome. I’m not even sure I know exactly what “finishing the job” even means in this context.”
In WWII, we killed most of the German and Japanese men of fighting age, and did it in about three years.
The question we should be asking is, “Why are troublesome numbers of radical Islamists, such as the Taliban, still alive at this late date?”
Wasn’t alive back then so I don’t know...
:-)
“Wasn’t alive back then so I don’t know...”
Never saw “Lawrence of Arabia?”
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