Shut up, Stay Scared, and Shop

I got a C in chemistry in high school, but I'm not convinced it was my fault. I was otherwise a "straight A" student, more or less, but that chemistry class and me (I?) were not meant for each other. I recalled asking the instructor for a detailed explanation of something that just didn't make sense to me after class one time, and she---already more than a little frustrated with me---said I would just have to accept some things on faith for the time being until we learned other things later that would make it all clear. She knew my question was valid, but she couldn't answer it because of the way she was teaching the class, so she asked me to suspend my need to know until a later point.

My brain simply doesn't work that way. It stops and sits down until it has the answer it wants, like a five year old at the edge of the toy section of a department store.

I know we've been all over this WOT thing over the past three years, but dang it, I still can't get it through my thick skull. And my "resistance" only got worse as I watched the mindlessly Spartan applause to declarations of American will at the conventions (mostly at the RNC, though...in fact, most of the time I watched the RNC, I had this sense that all these folks were privy to [and cheering for] some "Plan" I didn't know anything about.). And Cheney's boogeyman rountine last week didn't clarify anything for me either...so I'm at it once more:

Ask five different people "What is the War on Terror" (i.e., what is our plan, what are our goals) and you'll get five different, very fuzzy answers.

They'll range from "we're hunting down the members of al Qaeda" to "we're spreading democracy in the Middle East" to "we're fighting radical Islamism" to "we're spreading our military throughout the ME to help prevent WMD from being developed there and/or shipped out of there, as well as to have faster access to terrorists groups there" to "we're doing all of these things."

Do these things add up to a "war" though?

• Hunting down members of al Qaeda: this is a police action.
• Spreading democracy: this is social engineering.
• Fighting radical Islamism: this is, well, I have no freaking idea what this is actually, but it sounds awfully close to proselytizing to me.
• Spreading our military throughout the ME: this is imperialism.

This last item is the only action that's necessarily a war-associated activity, and since we won't admit to wanting to keep our troops there indefinitely, that doesn't really define the WOT either.

Now, there is the precedent of the term "Cold War," and plenty of people who were comfortable with that as an umbrella term for the years of ideological warfare mixed with proxy wars it represented now want to use that model for the WOT. But that feels like little more than Glory Days syndrome to me. The differences between a godless, unpopular political ideology only a few decades old, mostly confined within geopolitical boundaries, and certainly focused within the efforts of a finite number of nation-states and the stateless groupings of international criminals working under cover of a fundamentalist version of a millenia-old religion with billions of followers make the application of the "Cold War" model so much wishful thinking in my opinion. An easy analogy, in other words, but ultimately useless.

Why does all this fuzziness bother me?

Because people are demanding the sort of patriotism and unity the nation depended on during efforts like WWII (think Zell Miller), but we're not engineering the wartime systems throughout the nation---economic, social, cultural, etc.---that were structured to help ensure our victories against Germany and Japan AND helped us stay resolute. We're getting beaten over the head with the rhetoric club, but not supported systematically from the ground up socially. The only homefront sacrifices we're asked to make are to shut up, stay scared, and shop, but we're told we're deluded if we don't appreciate what's going on.

Appreciate it? Hell, I'd just like to understand it. Then perhaps I could move on to other things.

Comments

[Sebastian Holsclaw]

Is it really that fuzzy, or are you worried that it might involve fighting a lot more people than you feel comfortable with? And isn't much of the fuzziness a direct result of our enemies hiding behind civilian populations? Isn't much of it caused by segments of the Muslim religious hierarchies being unwilling to distance themselves from the terrorists?

I understand what you say about chemistry. I had a similar problem while studying physics. I understood it well enough to get an excellent grade, but some of the things I was being taught weren't well formed.

[Edward]

Is it really that fuzzy, or are you worried that it might involve fighting a lot more people than you feel comfortable with?

I'm worried about a lot of what falls under the umbrella called the War on Terror, yes, which is why I'm still searching for a clear explanation of what it is.

It really is that fuzzy.

[lightning]

War on Poverty. War on Cancer. War on Drugs. War on Terror.

Is one of these really different from the others? Why? How?

[Jadegold]

Is it really that fuzzy, or are you worried that it might involve fighting a lot more people than you feel comfortable with? And isn't much of the fuzziness a direct result of our enemies hiding behind civilian populations? Isn't much of it caused by segments of the Muslim religious hierarchies being unwilling to distance themselves from the terrorists?

Yes, it's that fuzzy. I've no idea what you mean by 'fighting a lot more people than you feel comfortable with.' How many people are you comfortable fighting?

No, the 'fuzziness' hasn't anything to do with the tactic of terrorism hiding behind civilian populations. Send in an army to knock down my home and kill my family members and I guarantee you will have created a terrorist. I suspect you'd feel the same way. An old engineering saying is 'the right tool for the right job.' The military is a blunt force tool--a sledge hammer. It does an outstanding job of crushing opposing militaries or prosecuting wars of conquest; OTOH, it doesn't work very well in rooting out and eliminating small cells distributed among a civilian population.

No, much of it isn't caused by those fringe religious groups; a small part of it is. But if you decide to wage war on a religion, you should expect that religion and its fringe elements to coalesce against you. BTW, this was OBL's plan.

[Bender]

"BTW, this was OBL's plan."

if you were OBL, I could take that at face value... should we be calling the FBI?

[Jadegold]

... should we be calling the FBI?

But, but...that would be a police action and, therefore, ineffective. No, the only real way to deal with me is to carpet-nuke the Eastern Seaboard of the US.

To do less, would be unAmerican and somewhat French.

[RD]

One and three do. Two and four are void fillers. Simple as chemistry.

[fdl]

Like most [all?] "wars ON", as compared to just plain wars, the War On Terrorism provides rhetorical cover to broad coalitions with very different goals.

One extreme end is Huntington's "clash of civilizations". As best I can tell, this theory posits that Islam cannot be reconciled with western-style democracy, ever. The christians, jews, atheists and agnostics should, therefore, wage total war on Islam and impose a final solution, i.e., kill everyone who disagrees with our viewpoint. (see, e.g., ann coulter.)

A somewhat less drastic view holds, i think, that the Middle Eastern states have "failed" and their governments must be replaced. So, the governments of Iraq, Afghanistan, North Korea (the Axis of Evil), not to mention Iran, Syria, Eygpt, Saudi Arabia, Libya (?), Sudan (?), Pakistan (?) and a few others (the Automatic Transmission of Evil [to continue using the car parts metaphor]) are all targeted for regime change. The fact that large numbers of people in those societies like things just the way they are is, apparently, just a sign as to the amount of rot which needs to be burned away. (I'd put sebastian in this group.)

The narrowest view of the WOT would argue, I think, that militant Islam is on the rise in many ME countries for a number of complicated reasons, including more than a century of western meddling. The WOT needs, then, to target the extremists who have declared war on the US for execution or capture, while leaving everyone else alone. (Kerry more or less fits here.)

Of course, a major complicating factor is that there are over 130,000 US troops in Iraq.

A second complicating factor is that many ME governments have focused the attention of their citizens on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Whether or not this was a cynical move to divert attention from the repressive nature of the ME governments, all evidence strongly indicates that this issue is of high importance for millions of muslims.

A third complicating factor is that narco-terrorists are flooding into Afghanistan like . . . well, i have no good analogy. but the proceeds from heroin will finance a nice long ghastly civil war in Afghanistan, which could spread into pakistan, chechnya or any other hot spot that the narco-terrorists decide to invest in, as to divert US attention from eradicating them at their source.

A fourth complicating factor is that our ally Pakistan (a) has nukes and (b) has strong ties to the Taliban and possibly Al Qaeda.

Have I mentioned oil? Make that no. 5.

The spread of nuclear weapons technology? No. 6.

Some limit on the amount of blood and treasure that the US taxpayer is willing to pay? No. 7.

Now, feel free to mix-and-match to your heart's content. Should we abandon Iraq to certain civil war? How do you want to deal with Afghani heroin? Pakistani madrasses? Pakistani nukes? Iranian nukes? Saudi madrasses? Israel's land grab? Corrupt Palestinian leadership?

Here's the tough part: how does your solution for one crisis aggravate others? Remember that every single time you bomb something, someone out there vows revenge. The Israelis got away with it when they bombed the Iraqi nuclear facilities in Osirak. But the rest of the world learned the lesson and is putting stuff underground.

So, for example, it appears that the only way to prevent the iranians from going nuclear is (a) invade or (b) use our own nukes on their facilities. So, it may be possible to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. But the price of doing so may be the perpetuation of the radical Islamic government for another generation.

Oh, let me add the final complicating factor: the current president is either unable or unwilling to articulate what the f... he's doing.

So, I reject Sebastian's analysis (surprise, surprise, surprise) of the source of fuzziness. The ME governments are trying to survive in a difficult and dangerous world. Why should we expect them to play by our rules? War is about winning, and both the Saudi govt and Iraqi freedoms fighters are showing remarkable capabilities in evolving strategies designed to even up the odds against them.

The fuzziness comes from a president who is incapable of managing the mess he created.

Francis

[Edward]

Two and four are void fillers.

RD

Can you clarify this? I suspect the something similar, but am not sure my sense of this is exactly what you mean.

the Middle Eastern states have "failed"

This idea drives me nuts. On whose time table have they "failed"? What this really means is they are incompatible with our plans and goals. It's so self-centered. I'm not saying we shouldn't fight them (our survival is paramount), but this rationale is just b.s.

Whether or not this was a cynical move to divert attention from the repressive nature of the ME governments, all evidence strongly indicates that this issue is of high importance for millions of muslims.

And should be a warning sign to us as well about government's power to create passion about a conflict that would otherwise not exist.

Have I mentioned oil? Make that no. 5.

Heard a bit about this yesterday that goes more or less...unless oil is $45/barrel or higher, it's not profitable for the industry to invest in drilling for offshore deposits recently discovered. The argument went that the invasion of Iraq is designed to inflate the price above that mark, more or less, permanently, to thereby start drilling in these new locations. SA et al, of course, are resisting this move, as the new locations are not theirs. Anyone know more about this theory? (if you only want to criticize conspiracy theories in general, I'll pre-emptively agree with you, so you don't have to bother yourself...they intrigue me, ok?)

The fuzziness comes from a president who is incapable of managing the mess he created.

But by golly can he spin it. ;-)

[Bernard Yomtov]

unless oil is $45/barrel or higher, it's not profitable for the industry to invest in drilling for offshore deposits recently discovered. The argument went that the invasion of Iraq is designed to inflate the price above that mark, more or less, permanently, to thereby start drilling in these new locations.

This is utter nonsense. There are vastly easier ways to drive up the price of oil, assuming that is the goal for some bizarre reason, than to start a war. And if you just want to stimulate drilling in an area which is not profitable at current prices you just subsidize the drillers.

[John Kelsey]

I agree with the consensus here that the "war" on terrorism is rhetoric, albeit more appropriate here than, say, the war on poverty, as there really are guns, bombs, and people getting killed. Also, calling it a war on terrorism is misleading as hell. It's a war on the set of terrorists who are trying to kill Americans, at home or abroad.

Hunting down Al Qaida members, and convincing foreign governments that aiding or sheltering them leads to regime change, those seem like obviously correct parts of the war. Trying to redesign the Muslim world to eliminate the root causes of terrorism seems like a dumb idea. (Remember how we were going to eliminate the root causes of crime with our social programs? Let me know when that works out, and then we'll have a go at foreign countries with radically different religion, culture, history, demographics, etc.)

--John

[sidereal]

To echo Bernard's point, we had about 150 billion dollars apparently laying around that went into the Iraq war, which we could have used to subsidized drilling anywhere we wanted.

The new theory is right up there with us intentionally going into recession so we could force China to unpeg their currency.

[Edward]

This is utter nonsense. There are vastly easier ways to drive up the price of oil, assuming that is the goal for some bizarre reason, than to start a war. And if you just want to stimulate drilling in an area which is not profitable at current prices you just subsidize the drillers.

That makes more sense than the conspiracy theory...yes. Wish I had had your rebuttal when presented with it.

What, by the way, are the easier ways of driving up the price of oil?

[sidereal]

Added point. Calling it a War on Terrorism leads to a certain amount of cognitive dissonance when we start harboring Cuban terrorists. We need to specify which terrorists we're at war with and which we're friendly with.

[Edward]

Gary Farber has a brilliantly clarifying post about the issue sidereal references here.

[Sebastian Holsclaw]

the Middle Eastern states have "failed"

This idea drives me nuts. On whose time table have they "failed"? What this really means is they are incompatible with our plans and goals. It's so self-centered. I'm not saying we shouldn't fight them (our survival is paramount), but this rationale is just b.s.

Failed to become healthy functioning states. "On whose timetable", we didn't care until the societies became sick enough to empower people like bin Laden AND let them think that targetting us would be a good idea. Functioning modern societies don't churn out thousands (dare I hope not hundreds of thousands) of people who think that hiding behind civilains while targetting other civilians is a great way to get attention. Functioning modern societies don't spend their court time executing women who have been raped, toppling walls on homosexuals, or forbiding their women from getting an education. And even then we might not care if the Middle East wasn't churning out large numbers of crazies who not only like those things about their societies, but want to press them onto ours (or at the very least as far as Spain.)

If the Middle East were not full of failed states, they could deal with the terrorists in their midst on their own. We aren't talking about invading Germany and France even though terrorists can be found there. Why? Because their governments can actually investigate and capture terrorists. Middle Eastern countries choose not to and/or are incapable of doing so without angering too much of their fundamentalist Muslim population. And why do they have to worry about that? Because Osama bin Laden and his ilk are most specifically NOT rejected by a huge majority of Muslims in the Middle East.

[Bernard Yomtov]

How to raise prices:

You could just buy a lot. Spend the money we spent on Iraq to buy oil and the price rises, nobody gets killed, and we have a lot of oil stashed somewhere. We're spending $5 billion a month on Iraq. Even at $50 you could buy 100 million bbl/month. Besides the US at 20 million bbl/day only japan and China consume more than that, so it would make dent. US daily consumption is around 20 million barrels, so that's significant.

You could bribe OPEC to cut back production.

You could change laws that tend to restrict consumption in the US: eliminate gasoline taxes, get rid of CAFE.

But most sensibly you could just directly subsidize whatever activity you hope to stimulate by increasing prices.

[JadeGold]

Why? Because their governments can actually investigate and capture terrorists. Middle Eastern countries choose not to and/or are incapable of doing so without angering too much of their fundamentalist Muslim population. And why do they have to worry about that? Because Osama bin Laden and his ilk are most specifically NOT rejected by a huge majority of Muslims in the Middle East.

Let's see; we invade Iraq, a secular country whose terrorist ties weren't more significant than our own--but we coddle the decidely non-secular Saudi Arabia, where most of the 9/11 hijackers came from. And, hey, Pakistan is now our best friend despite their intelligence service being practically an AQ branch office and the fact their Govt. operated a Quickee Mart for your one-stop nuclear shopping needs.

As for bin Laden being a hero; guess what? We helped perpetuate that myth.

[fdl]

I find that Sebastian's posts can largely be reduced to the following expression: Floggings Will Continue Until Morale Improves.

I am amazed by the notion that we didn't care about the success or failure (by SH standards) of ME societies until just recently. I am quite sure that SH has heard of the fall of the Shah; where US policy towards Iran up to 1979 fits in his geo-political viewpoint remains a mystery to me. Or his silence regarding the billions of dollars spent on propping up the House of Saud and Mubarak's govt since then.

The last line in his post, though, is a classic. Not only is he wrong in fact (Bin Laden was forced out of Saudi Arabia), but if he's correct then his conclusion does not follow. After all, the core principle of democracy is recognition of the rule of the majority.

What, pray tell, is the difference between (a) unelected judiaries telling american citizens how to treat minority groups; and (b) unelected american soldiers telling iraqi/afghani/saudi/irani . . . citizens how to treat their women? Shouldn't the majority rule? (Can't have those nasty judiciaries determining the rights of the minorities, can we?)

No one has yet adequately explained to me how american conservatives reject central planning by the US govt or the federal judiciary, yet eagerly embrace the idea of remaking societies half the world away, where few americans even speak the language.

jeez, isn't figuring out universal health care in this country hard enough? How does american occupation of Iraq lead to Saudi women getting drivers' licenses, or the recognition of gay rights in Afghanistan?

Ok, we imposed a constitution, and an occupation on japan and germany. so we can, apparently, force american enemies to adopt our concept of constitutional law. before we try to do the same thing around the rest of the planet, shouldn't there be some widespread agreement as to why those two occupations worked?

maybe we do need the russians as an enemy. we can use chechnya as an example, and tell the iraqi (and iranians/ syrians/ saudis/ eygptians etc.) that they have the choice of being occupied by the russians, or occupied by us.

Francis

[Sebastian Holsclaw]

"After all, the core principle of democracy is recognition of the rule of the majority."

Gosh, I know you've heard of constitutions. You write about them in your post.

"Ok, we imposed a constitution, and an occupation on japan and germany. so we can, apparently, force american enemies to adopt our concept of constitutional law. before we try to do the same thing around the rest of the planet, shouldn't there be some widespread agreement as to why those two occupations worked?"

You admit that they worked? I'm actually shocked. I'd love to hear your explanation for why ramming constitutions and major cultural changes down their throats worked so well.

The problem is that successful occupation comes in two parts. First defeat the enemy, THEN rebuild. The problem is that Americans want to skip the painful defeating part and head straight into the rebuilding part. By doing so, we prolong the defeating part which makes the rebuilding part impossible to successfully begin. See especially Sadr.

[Sebastian Holsclaw]

Jadegold, if you don't understand the difficulty of dealing with Saudi Arabia, please investigate "Defenders of Mecca" and think about how picking a public fight with them might bring down on our heads the "Clash Of Civilizations" which you claim to fear.

[hilzoy]

Sebastian: a few points. First, I don't know who, exactly, you think wants to avoid the painful defeating part, in general. I do, however, know a lot of people who mind painful defeating of a country we did not need to attack while following a nonexistent plan that seems to be producing no evidence of any kind that we are, in fact, en route to success.

Second, there are some people who I do believe have this attitude, though I don't think they're the ones you had in mind: the people who ordered first our attack on Fallujah and then our retreat. I think those are probably the same people who had Bush's "bring it on" attitude.

[Bernard Yomtov]

Sebastian,

So, if I may offer crude paraphrase, you think the problem in Iraq is that we are doing a half-ass job militarily, because, as a nation, we are unwilling to commit the resources, and, I surmise, especially to face the losses that would require. Is that an accurate summary of your views?

[Sebastian Holsclaw]

Bernard, I think the US is not yet willing to commit to the killing of other people that will be required.

The sad thing is that by doing so we invite more attacks which I suspect will eventually tip opinion in the US into going far further than I think is necessary. By refusing to act now, because of the fear of appearing brutal, we risk waiting until we overreact and actually become brutal.

[fdl]

Sebastian, I'm not the one advocating for the single largest social re-engineering project since WWII, you are. I didn't want to go to Iraq, you did.

so, since you are willing to spend blood and treasure changing "failed" states, (apparently, more b&t than even the bush admin), you bear the burden of proof on establishing WHY and HOW our occupation of Iraq will be successful, like Japan and Germany, or unsuccessful, like, say, viet nam or iraq to date. Otherwise, you've turned our county into just another colonial, occupying power.

wasn't saddam the enemy? he's been defeated.

liberation sure is tough. the ungrateful bastards, they should love us. but since they don't, now what?

killing everyone who dissents against our rule makes us just another thug. and being a little better than Saddam in the number of people we kill and torture every year is not a measure that i ever thought I would hear used by a Secretary of Defense. talk about the soft bigotry of low expectations!

Francis

[Sebastian Holsclaw]

"killing everyone who dissents against our rule makes us just another thug."

Your willingness to turn Sadr into 'everyone who dissents against our rule' speaks volumes. I'll trust it isn't a common thought on your side.

[fdl]

Since you now want to swap insults, here's one back at you, Seb.

As best I can tell you have left the school of "Floggings Will Continue Until Morale Improves" and joined the school of "Kill 'Em All And Let God Sort 'Em Out." I'll add another: your willingness to kill lots of people who aren't of your religion puts you in great company, with people like ann coulter and the president. now when, exactly, was the last time you volunteered for service? or are you just another member of the 101st Fighting Keyboarders?

now that i've got that out of my system, i'll point out that you haven't actually disagreed with anything i said. so you're ready to demonstrate how to make your massive social engineering project work? And furthermore, what, precisely, are the "volumes" of things i'm saying, that you trust are not "common" thoughts among liberals?

i reject utterly any attempt to place me in any group of so-called mushy-headed liberal multiculturalists by accusing me of approving of Sadr's own views on civil rights. of course Sadr's a hugely unpleasant thug.

but like the rise of Ayatollah Khomeni after the fall of the Shah, the rise of Sadr or someone like him was utterly predicatable even to an Orange County California water lawyer. Are there ANY liberal radicals in the Middle East with even a whiff of power? Who with any serious clout is advocating for a revolution to bring out a constitutional democracy and civil rights in Saudi Arabia?

[crickets]

so, since the extant opposition to the authoritarian regimes consists of religious radicals whose politicals views are an anathema to most americans, our liberation strategy for iraq, iran, syria, eygpt, saudi arabia, pakistan, and any other 'stan that pisses off the imperialists appears to be (a) invade and depose the current leadership; (b) kill all the leaders of religious and political organizations whose views are unappetizing, even though they are the only natural leaders acceptable to the local community, as they lead guerrilla war to prevent the imposition of american values; and (c) stand around getting shot at and wondering while we can't find acceptable leadership.

my god. i thought the republican party was the home of realpolitik. i could have sworn i have read posts from Seb. arguing that the US's conduct in Central America was driven by having to select among bad choices.

So, here we are. Sebastian was, here and at CrookedTimber, a vociferous advocate for the war. And yet faced with an utterly predictable homegrown rebellion against US occupation, Sebastian says (a) kill more; and (b) we're not thugs, no, no, no, no!

yes, we are savage murderous thugs. the occupants of Fallouja and Sadr City don't want our help or to be on the receiving end of Apache rocket barrages. bomb 'em and feed 'em was a lousy strategy in vietnam and it's a lousy strategy now.

most of the other players are thugs, too, like Sadr, and Allawi, and Chalabi.

one last time. i don't like Sadr, but i respect his power. maybe we could have killed him a while back without repercussions. maybe we can still kill him now w/out repercussions. but (a) the odds do not seem to be in our favor and (b) we shouldn't be in this position in the first place.

Francis

[Sebastian Holsclaw]

"I'll add another: your willingness to kill lots of people who aren't of your religion puts you in great company"

What is my religion? My parents would be thrilled to find out.

As for accusing you of being a mushy-headed liberal, you were the one whose response to me mentioning Sadr is: "killing everyone who dissents against our rule makes us just another thug". The shoe fits, so you wear it.

You then go on a tirade about: " the extant opposition to the authoritarian regimes consists of religious radicals whose politicals views are an anathema to most americans".

You attack me for not paying attention to that (though I have) while simultaneously not noticing what that means for your plans. You incessantly whine that our actions supporting authoritarian regimes in the Middle East are a huge part of the problem. You simultaneously acknowledge that most of those who resist are unacceptable religious radicals. You further try to tell me that you find Sadr repulsive. You additionally aren't interested in using force against any of those parties. Which leaves you exactly with nothing helpful to add to any conversation about dealing with terrorism. Oh wait, I exaggerate. You could talk about walling ourselves up and waiting until terrorists sneak smallpox into the country.

"i don't like Sadr, but i respect his power. maybe we could have killed him a while back without repercussions. maybe we can still kill him now w/out repercussions. but (a) the odds do not seem to be in our favor and (b) we shouldn't be in this position in the first place."

People just like you argued that we couldn't kill Sadr the first time he tried to raise a revolution. Bring him into the political arena, they said.

The administration foolishly listened.

Same thing the second time.

Now you want to say it is too late to kill him or capture him. Thanks for all the useless advice.

The prospect of civil war does not exist because we have been too brutal and turned the population against us. In the entire history of occupying forces, I doubt there has been a hand as light as used in Iraq these past months. And don't pretend that in the entire history of occupying forces, there has never been a success. We have spoken specifically about two instances of success. You think there are differences which make Iraq less amenable to successful rebuilding, but you won't tell me what they are.

So. For the sake of argument let us try out this.

A major difference between the occupations of German and Japan on the one hand and Iraq on the other is the number of enemy soldiers killed before their surrender.

Is that the defining difference?

[Anarch]

Is that the defining difference?

If the answer is yes, are you willing to order the execution of the requisite number of people?

NB: That question applies to everyone, incidentally.

[dutchmarbel]

Sebastian: Germany had a democratic past and Japan had one strong leader, accepted by the population. Iraq has neither.

You further try to tell me that you find Sadr repulsive. You additionally aren't interested in using force against any of those parties. Which leaves you exactly with nothing helpful to add to any conversation about dealing with terrorism. Oh wait, I exaggerate. You could talk about walling ourselves up and waiting until terrorists sneak smallpox into the country.
There is a hugh difference between Sadr and terrorist who will try to sneak smallpox into the country. Sadr is about the struggle for Iraq. The people who attacked the US were not from Iraq, or connected to Iraq.

In the entire history of occupying forces, I doubt there has been a hand as light as used in Iraq these past months.
I cannot believe you can type that with a straight face. First of all because of the 'light American hand', and secondly because you use this to argue that more force should be used. As Francis points out: brutal force was/is used by other occupiers (Russia, Israel) and has only led to more (often quite gruesome) violence by the occupied people. The Algerian war for independence (and its aftermath) come to mind too.

We Dutch had our war against islamic jihad with suicidal guerilla's in the atjeh wars 140 years ago. Enormous burden to the taxpayers, too many national troops deployed in one country, backed up leaders who turned against us, you know the drill. Took at least 40 years and we made many mistakes, quite a number down to not really knowing enough about the sociology of the country we wanted to occupy. To quote political scientists describing lessons learned from that adventure:"Fighting without good intelligence consists, at best, of mindless campaigns of destruction conducted in the hope that indiscriminate damage to the other side's arms and body will somehow affect vital but unknown pressure points.".

[John Kelsey]

I think the real difference between Japan/Germany and Iraq is that there was no question about our resolve in occupying those countries. If Japan or Germany had risen up to try to get rid of us, we'd have killed a hell of a lot of people and stayed there, because those countries had demonstrated that they posed a genuine threat to us. It clearly mattered to us that those countries not kick off WW3 in another generation.

This contrasts with Iraq, where it doesn't really matter to us in the same way. We may want to redesign Iraq's government and society, but we're not willing to take huge losses to do it. I think everyone here knows that if we were to lose, say, 5,000 soldiers in the next month or two, Bush would almost certainly lose the election, and Kerry would pull the troops out in some "declare victory and go home" sense as soon as possible. Because Iraqi democracy matters to us in a broad, "wouldn't it be nice?" sense, but Germany and Japanese non-belligerence mattered to us in a "Holy shit, we might lose the *next* war?" sense.

Just my two cents....

--John

[dutchmarbel]

A Harvard panel made a more elaborate comparison.

An additional factor is that many of the highly educated Iraqi's seem to leave the country, due to the safety situation. Those ought to be the new leaders, rebuilders and governers of the country. If you read the latest post of Chris from Back-to-Iraq, the situation seems to be really dire.

[Dave Schuler]

Sebastian:

A major difference between the occupations of German and Japan on the one hand and Iraq on the other is the number of enemy soldiers killed before their surrender.

Actually, I think the reason was more that we had demonstrated the ability and willingness to kill all of the Germans and all of the Japanese. We don't have that willingness now.

Another difference is that both the Germans and Japanese were (are) notorious for obeying orders.

[Edward]

Actually, I think the reason was more that we had demonstrated the ability and willingness to kill all of the Germans and all of the Japanese. We don't have that willingness now.

Nor should we! Japan and Germany were at war with the United States and were willing to come over here and attack us. Iraq never actually was. We attacked them with some pretext of being liberators...we can't now treat the entire nation as if we have a moral carte blanche to kill whom we need to so it behaves itself.

[Bernard Yomtov]

Bernard, I think the US is not yet willing to commit to the killing of other people that will be required.

I don't buy that. I don't see a lot of concern about the number of Iraqis who have been killed. I certainly don't see it coming from the Administration.

I do buy the idea that we are unwilling to lose the lives and spend the money needed to accomplish whatever it is we are trying to do. Why is that wrong? Aren't those critical issues in deciding the wisdom of the war? And isn't it reasonable for the public to decide the costs are too high?

The problem is we have a President who was unwilling to either give up his pet project or tell people what it would cost. The truth-tellers - Shinseki and Lindsey - were fired. The fantasists - Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, etc. - are in control. The guy who wanted to actually pay for the reconstruction and occupation - Kerry - is ridiculed as being unserious, while the guy who puts it on someone else's Visa card is a great leader.

May I suggest that is the root of the problem. A truthful assessment of how the war would go would have destroyed support for it, just as a truthful assessment of the danger Iraq posed would have.

[CharleyCarp]

I don't know as much about Japan as I do about Germany, but I think you can't overestimate the importance of the Germans' sense of culpability. They knew that they had brought the whole disaster on themselves, and knew and accepted the need to move to a pacifist democracy.

There is NO possibility of any outcome Sebastion (or Wolfowitz) can imagine that will convince those Iraqis who might be sympathetic to Islamism that the destruction that they have already suffered -- and will suffer in the future from us -- is their own fault or the fault of the ideology. They will always know that it was caused by (a) the Baath and (b) our internal political/emotional needs. For this reason, no amount of defeat will discredit the ideology -- but instead will only serve to enhance it, because it is, in no small measure, a response to humiliation.

[Sebastian Holsclaw]

"I don't buy that. I don't see a lot of concern about the number of Iraqis who have been killed. I certainly don't see it coming from the Administration."

That doesn't explain our lack of action against Sadr.

[fdl]

i have nothing helpful to add to the debate? thanks a bunch. who's whining now?

here are some helpful thoughts.

1. stop killing and torturing prisoners.
2. stop using airstrikes and other combat methods which inevitably kill civilians.
3. actually invite all major religious figures into a long-term power-sharing agreement, as opposed to reneging. [both sides are guilty here, before i get accused of being pro-Sadr.]
4. stop the random sweeps into people's houses.

and

5. STOP CONFLATING THE WAR ON AL QUEDA WITH THE WAR ON IRAQ! [or does that violate the list of talking points?]

Francis

[Bernard Yomtov]

As far as Germany goes, let's also remember that they faced a serious menace from the Soviets. From the West German perspective occupation by the Allies was far preferable to occupation, and ultimate domination, by the Soviets. There was a real, and wholly justified, sense that the Allies were defenders as well as occupiers.

[sidereal]

"Another difference is that both the Germans and Japanese were (are) notorious for obeying orders."

Another difference is that both the Germans and Japanese were culturally, ethnically, and organizationally homogenous, while Iraq is an overlapping association of religions and tribes. The similitude is. . err. . not.

[James Casey]

I'd add that additional differences are that occupation/rebuilding of Germany and Japan came at the end of the conflict in question, that they were the key enemies in said conflict, and that their occupation marked the end of the conflict.

Iraq was not a key player, and is, according to those in favour of the invasion, part of the on-going WOT.