An Astonishing Iraq Poll

[Colleen Thomas]

While there may be 'two ways', material progress and security, or ruthless extermination, free-fire areas, 'secure villages/hamlets' etc, you should mention that genuine regional/religious divisions potentially undermine any of these. I'm not sure there's any example of a successful CI (Malaya, Philippines?) where divisions were so marked.

Perhaps a division of regions is the first step. E.g., secure the kurdish area as autonomous.

--
Just to put some numbers on the table, Iraq is about 75% Arab and 20% Kurdish.

However, Iraq is 95% Muslim, divided 60/40 Shi'ite and Sunni.

I infer that a majority of Iraqi Kurds are Sunni, despite the *ethnic* hostilities between the groups.

----

Clearly a Shi'ite state is in the making (unless everything falls apart). I think you will agree, however, that, leaving aside the Kurds, a Shiite state with 40% of its citizens (concentrated in certain areas) supporting an insurgency, is a situation that no 'counter insurgency' program is going to take care of.

The phillipenes are one modle, the British and Boers is another. In the brutal modle, religious/tribal divisions are an advantage. You have built in proxys to do the dirty work and they'll do it with smiles on thier faces.

Again, i'm not advocating either method. I adovcoate getting out, like yesterday. My position has been that the minuite the war ended we shouild have left before it became an occupation. Because we aren't equipped, mentally, or by trining to occupy anyone.

 

[cantdog]

These different groups are not as hostile to one another as you imagine. Read Iraqis on the subject.

When the plan to carve Iraq up, post-war, became public, there was widespread outrage about it.

White House plans outlined in 2003, late February: the U.S. intended to take complete control, postwar, for an indefinite period. [reference Ian Bruce's article in The Herald, 24 February-- 'General Franks to Run Iraq after War']. Meanwhile, the administration announced plans to install 'an American of stature' whose task would be to direct the reconstruction of the country and orchestrate the creation of a new Iraqi government. We saw that happen.

My March, US officials finally revealed that they intended to carve up Iraq into at least three sectors of control, with Baghdad under the rule of former ambassador to Yemen Barbara Bodine, and the northern and southern sectors under two retired US generals ['US reveals post-war carve-up' in The Age, 9 March 2003] Details came out in DEBKA-Net, a weekly, 7-12 March 2003, in an article titled 'Promised: Autonomy for British command, Post-War Assets in Iraq'.

The idea was that there would be a British sector in the southeast, in addition to the other three. British military jurisdiction in a triangular area from Basra, to Sug Al Shaynukh and to Khozistan in the north. Also in the far southeast. American zone from northern oilfields, taking in Kirkuk and Mosul as well as Baghdad and Tikrit in the center and the southern city of Nassiriyah, up to the Kuwaiti border.

The Hawr al Hammar marshlands in the south would be British, but the Iranian border would be jointly patrolled.

All oil in all sectors would be under American administration.

We saw that happen, too.

To Iraqis, the sectors sounded very much like a divide and rule thing. Kurds for one general, Shi'i for another, Marsh Arabs for the British general, Baghdad separate even from those.

The present situation distorts and intensifies the differences, with the exception, always of the poor Kurds, who have been sustaining genocidal attacks from Saddam's Iraq and from Turkey both before and after the war, all seemingly with US blessing. Israelis are in the area of northern Iraq now, arming and advising, and the Pesh Merga is acting on the Israeli/American behalf.

Arab Iraq is far more united, under ordinary circumstances, though. They have lived here, together, for some fourteen centuries, and nearly always under on rule. The mechanisms for resolution of differences are very old, and are social and clerical as much as political.

 

[BlackSnake]

Do anyone think that "our" troops should packup and leave?

 

[thebullet]

Do anyone think that "our" troops should packup and leave?

My wife certainly does. I've had mixed feelings about it, usually leaning towards the "we can't leave them hanging there and just walk out" side.

But the interview I heard yesterday with the former director of the NSA was very convincing. According to him, there may well be a decrease in terrorism in Iraq upon US withdrawal. There will certainly be ethnic strife, but the car bombs and such should diminish very quickly.

The problem is, we are the major cause of unrest in Iraq. The people do not want us there. We are an incitement to insurrection. As Coleen Thomas says, one option is to totally overwhelm them with power. But do we have the men and resources to do that? Does the US have the politcal will for that kind of committment? Where would our status in the world stand after we forced the Iraqi neck underneath the American boot? And how long would we have to maintain the power committment? And what would happen when the boot was removed from the neck? Would we be any better off than we are now?

Iraq will become an Islamic Republic, not a democracy. I think no one doubts that now. Even President Bush is probably willing to accept that fact. Of course, he wants an Iraq that is in thrall to the United States. I just don't see how it will end up that way unless we maintain a significant military presence in that country. Eventually the Iraqi government such as it is, will first ask and then demand the withdrawal of all American troops.

Our presence in Iraq is a stick in the eye to all of Islam. The first step to getting some resolution to this almost universal hatred of America is for us to withdrawl our troops from Iraq.

I guess we should do it right now. Why the hell not?

 

[Pure]

Hi Black Snake

Yes, I think the US should say, in 3 months 1/3 leave. in 6 mos. another 1/3, in 9 months all others not specifically invited by the new gov.

Let the Europeans get in and do some 'peacekeeping' if 'regional stability' and maintenance of order is a problem deserving internation help (in their view). IF, it seems they are wanted by most Iraqis.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

You can do Ci Sucessfully in two ways doc. The first, requres patience, commitment and restraint. Basically, you disprese your troops among the population, having them learn the language and customs of the locals. They operate semi independantly and will eventually learn to distinguish between the populace at large and the insurgents.

Well, that would work, except, as in Viet Nam, the insurgents don't move among the people, the unsurgents are the people. That's the problem right there.

When you've got 80% wishing we were gone and 45% wishing we were dead, who you gonna save? Are you going to kill 8 out of 10 people to save the other 2?

No, I've heard this argument before, that we lost in Viet Nam because the army "had one hand tied behind its back." The fact was, the majority of South Vietnamese were Viet Cong sympathizers if not actual fighting cadres, and there was nothing there to save. We were fighting to liberate the people who were our enemies. The South Vietnamese army was full of communist spies and sympathizers reaching up to the very top. That's why they dropped their guns and ran, not because they were afraid, but because they were the enemy himself. How do you win a war like that?

That's what gave rise to that famous Vietnamese war adage, "We had to destroy the village in order to save it."

I'm afraid we have the same situation in Iraq.That's what we did in Fallujah, right? Destroyed it in order to save it.

I heard a British reporter on the radio--a guy who's been in there since the invasion--and he was saying he thinks the idea of civil war is preposterous and is being used as a canard by the pro-Western government to keep our troops there to save their own backsides. He says what we fail to realize is that Iraq is not (or was not) a sectarian state. It's organized along triballines, not by religious blocks. There is no unified "Sunni" resistance. It's all tribal and regional. The only thing unifying the resistance is their hatred of America.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Do anyone think that "our" troops should packup and leave?

Damn, I don't know. I've been thinking no, we've got to stick it out now taht we're there, but the things I've been hearing and reading make a pretty convincing argument for standing down, as nothing good can come from our continued presence.

The thing we're supposedly waiting for is for the Iraqi army to stand up and take our place, but from what I understand (article in the Atlantic by James Fallows), no one feels any loyalty in the army we're building. They show up for their pay and to do drills and get American equipment, but when they run into fire fights they cut and run. They have no loyalty and no commitment.

The average Iraqi's loyalty is to his tribe, not his nation. They're no more willing to take a bullet for sake of the American-sponsored government hiding in the Green Zone than they are to take a bullet for Israel.

So if the dream of an Iraqi army is false, what are we doing there? Either staying there forever or getting out now and let the Iraqis sort it out amongst themselves without American necks getting in the way.

 

[cantdog]

Well, that would work, except, as in Viet Nam, the insurgents don't move among the people, the unsurgents are the people. That's the problem right there.

When you've got 80% wishing we were gone and 45% wishing we were dead, who you gonna save? Are you going to kill 8 out of 10 people to save the other 2?

No, I've heard this argument before, that we lost in Viet Nam because the army "had one hand tied behind its back." The fact was, the majority of South Vietnamese were Viet Cong sympathizers if not actual fighting cadres, and there was nothing there to save. We were fighting to liberate the people who were our enemies. The South Vietnamese army was full of communist spies and sympathizers reaching up to the very top. That's why they dropped their guns and ran, not because they were afraid, but because they were the enemy himself. How do you win a war like that?

That's what gave rise to that famous Vietnamese war adage, "We had to destroy the village in order to save it."

I'm afraid we have the same situation in Iraq.That's what we did in Fallujah, right? Destroyed it in order to save it.

I heard a British reporter on the radio--a guy who's been in there since the invasion--and he was saying he thinks the idea of civil war is preposterous and is being used as a canard by the pro-Western government to keep our troops there to save their own backsides. He says what we fail to realize is that Iraq is not (or was not) a sectarian state. It's organized along triballines, not by religious blocks. There is no unified "Sunni" resistance. It's all tribal and regional. The only thing unifying the resistance is their hatred of America.

The Vietnamese women came around offering sex at ridiculously low prices, overheard everything they could, and brought the information back. It was not only the fighting cadres who helped win that one.

 

[cantdog]

Do anyone think that "our" troops should packup and leave?

Does anyone believe we should never do so?

No one. So of course we will, one day. But we will retain those permanent bases and a presence in country.

I can see the advantage of fragmenting the country. It worked well in the treaty agreements of 1922. None of the new fragments of the Ottoman empire were in any way likely to become independent with regard to food, water, and energy needs. Kuwait was cut off the Jazira, Syria reduced to a mere portion of the Levant, and Hashemites set against Sharifs. Even Egypt was administered by foreigners, as before. (Nasser was the first actual Egyptian to run the place since the 6th century.)

Dividing Iraq into further atoms will nullify and blunt resistance. But it will also make international forces, like the Islamist groups, stand out all the more as something to rally around. All the same, the Marsh Arabs and the Kurds will probably be manageable. The Jazira Shi'i and the Euphates-valley Sunnis will be a lot less easy to pacify.

 

[shereads]

This was so incredibly, obviously doomed from the start that the idiot who got us into it ought to be put on trial for criminal stupidity. (Personally, I think he committed treason when he lied to us about the yellow cake uranium deal, but I won't hold my breath waiting for him to be held accountable.)

This is why we have history books, for chrissakes. You can't force democracy on people who haven't wanted it badly enough to demand it for themselves.

If only Colin Powell had had the courage to resign and go public with his doubts about the WMD evidence and his concerns about the lack of a workable exit strategy, we might have concentrated our resources where they'd do some good: capturing Bin Laden and securing our borders. Instead, we let Osama play us like puppets. We've turned him into a hero; an Islamic David to our Goliath. We've rid him of his enemy Saddam Hussein, set the stage for civil war and another Islamic theocracy, turned Iraq into a recruitment poster for terrorists, destroyed our credibility on the issue of prisoner treatment, killed so many innocent bystanders that our government pretends it can't even estimate the number, given up some of our most essential rights at home, and reelected the sniveling mama's boy who made it happen.

Powell is said to have warned Bush that invading Iraq would be like shopping at Pottery Barn: "If you break it, you own it." Bush chose to believe a convicted con artist over the only man in his inner circle who had bothered to attend a war before planning one.

We broke it. We own it. Whether we go or stay, we're screwed.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Well, that would work, except, as in Viet Nam, the insurgents don't move among the people, the unsurgents are the people. That's the problem right there.

When you've got 80% wishing we were gone and 45% wishing we were dead, who you gonna save? Are you going to kill 8 out of 10 people to save the other 2?

No, I've heard this argument before, that we lost in Viet Nam because the army "had one hand tied behind its back." The fact was, the majority of South Vietnamese were Viet Cong sympathizers if not actual fighting cadres, and there was nothing there to save. We were fighting to liberate the people who were our enemies. The South Vietnamese army was full of communist spies and sympathizers reaching up to the very top. That's why they dropped their guns and ran, not because they were afraid, but because they were the enemy himself. How do you win a war like that?

That's what gave rise to that famous Vietnamese war adage, "We had to destroy the village in order to save it."

I'm afraid we have the same situation in Iraq.That's what we did in Fallujah, right? Destroyed it in order to save it.

I heard a British reporter on the radio--a guy who's been in there since the invasion--and he was saying he thinks the idea of civil war is preposterous and is being used as a canard by the pro-Western government to keep our troops there to save their own backsides. He says what we fail to realize is that Iraq is not (or was not) a sectarian state. It's organized along triballines, not by religious blocks. There is no unified "Sunni" resistance. It's all tribal and regional. The only thing unifying the resistance is their hatred of America.

So were the phillipinos doc. At first.

Vietnam is the textbook example of how half assed measures are doomed. While your setting up fortified hamlets, you're running sweep and clean missions, while building roads, you're training indiginous minority populations to fight as your proxys, while talking about nebulous ideas like freedom, you're proping up a corrupt unpopular dictoatorship.

You've taken measures from both doctineal approaches and are applying them willy nilly. And the result is you are pissing off just about everyone.

CI is real simple, you do it right, according to one of the two formulas proven to work or you don't do it at all. Any other approach is just asking for a long, drawn out, bloody and unpopular occupation with no end in sight.

Iraq was set up perfectly for either approach you wanted. With so many factions and so much uncertainty, you could have done it the brutal way. with so many people sick of Saddam's abuses and hoping for something better, you could have done it the long term way. I'm not a general. I'm not a statesman. But I am verll read ont he subject.

That we walked in without a firm plan to do it either way and ended up trying the hodgepodge approach guarenteed to fail, is a real indictment on the people in the halls of power. They obviously don't read history. They just as obviously don't study military science. they are, as throughly incompetant to run a war as I would be to organize a manned moon shot from the backyard.

 

[Pure]

Colly, you must be aware that many Great Leaders have shuffled generals, and gotten rid of the good ones or overruled them-- Hitler, Staline, etc. This works against said Leader. I don't think GWB is quite so mad, but the American Century plan of the neocons is fairly grandiose. IF it had a chance, as you imply, the military part would have to be done expeditiously and efficiently.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Colly, you must be aware that many Great Leaders have shuffled generals, and gotten rid of the good ones or overruled them-- Hitler, Staline, etc. This works against said Leader. I don't think GWB is quite so mad, but the American Century plan of the neocons is fairly grandiose. IF it had a chance, as you imply, the military part would have to be done expeditiously and efficiently.

No American military leader wants to fight a Ci campaign. It's not what they study for, train for etc. It basically, removes all the advantages you have worked so hard to achieve on the field.

Ci warfare can work Pure. Historically it can. The neocon's may have grandiose ideas, but with them come unrealistic expectations. The sticking point for them is this, to do it the brutal way, you will appall the voters to the point they will vote you out. To do it the right way, you'll have to exercise those commoditys they have so little of patience, tolerance, restraint. When faced with an either or proposition they don't like, they are want to simply change the parameters to suit. That's what they did here. We don't want to fight a Ci campaign, so we will simply assume there won't be one. The Iraqi's will greet us with open arms.

The military didn't buy this line. They knew precisely what was coming, but with Rummy screwing with thier logistical doctrine in order to do it on the cheap and GW saber ratteling, they really had little choice in the matter.

I don't think any western power at this time has the political will to do it the brutal way. That's so last century. But it does work.

I don't believe any western nation at this time has the training and personelle to do it the other way, with the possible exception of the British.

The point I am trying to make J, is that Ci warfare is a brand of warfare that relies more on intelligence than ordinance. It's more about human psycology than military science. For this reason Military men hate it. Politicans, especially those in power now, don't want to accept it's a different critter entirely than blasting a hapless thirld world military in set piece battles. the don't understand CI. they cdon't understand the doctrines that work or the historical crucible that has brought us those doctrines. they are ignorant of them. I bet GW dosen't even know we fought a CI campaign in the phillipines. i know rummy has no grasp of what makes the US military so effective, if he had even an inkling, he would have kept his hands off the logistics doctrine.

You can win a CI war. The problem is, I'm just an amature porno writer and I can articulate the two formulae that dictate a sucessful campaign. These guys are some of the most powerful in the world and they can't. And that, above all other considerations, is just scary.

 

[Pure]

Note to Colly,

CNN last night has a piece on Counter Terrorism, looking at a number issues, such as the restrictions on liberty (esp. strong in France, but apparently effective.)

They interviewed both British military folks and former IRA activists: there was agreement along the lines you say; small scale targeted efforts are best, that kill or disrupt as few other civilians as possible.
Particularly when the (arresting) police can be Irish. Ham fisted or iron fisted crackdowns with heavy concentrations of troups generally backfire.

On a related noted, in an interview with Israeli intelligence, the Shen Beth person and others stressed the limitations of torture, its tendency to back fire, besmirch reputation, etc. (There have been 'excesses' in the past.) They are not above arresting a whole family, however, to put pressure on one suspect.

It is indeed surprising that Bush, Rummy and others thought that military and policing approaches could be developed 'on the fly.' Gonzales and others were set the task of justifying pre set plans (legitimizing torture, tossing aside Geneva conventions). As we know, history repeats. As the CNN piece made clear--50 years after the fact-- we know that the ruthless French methods in Algeria did uproot the existing terrorist organization and catch its leaders. Yet the whole populace was lost, making French exit invitable. It's quite amusing that
"Battle of Algiers", once denounced as left wing propaganda is now being used in courses (as showing a lession in what not to do).
---


PS. If you have ever seen the photos of the Philippines efforts, early in the 20th century, you know that can't happen now. Pictures of corpses of enemy men women and kids, filling improvised burial trenches. The papers were more jingoistic even than now, and could trumpet about 'kills' of the little brown bandits and show the pics. Now the Army tries to avoid stating counts of enemy casualties, and the gory pics are circulated by subversives, anti war folks, and Al Queda recruiters. (There is at least one website devoted to them.)

 

[Colleen Thomas]

CNN last night has a piece on Counter Terrorism, looking at a number issues, such as the restrictions on liberty (esp. strong in France, but apparently effective.)

They interviewed both British military folks and former IRA activists: there was agreement along the lines you say; small scale targeted efforts are best, that kill or disrupt as few other civilians as possible.
Particularly when the (arresting) police can be Irish. Ham fisted or iron fisted crackdowns with heavy concentrations of troups generally backfire.

On a related noted, in an interview with Israeli intelligence, the Shen Beth person and others stressed the limitations of torture, its tendency to back fire, besmirch reputation, etc. (There have been 'excesses' in the past.) They are not above arresting a whole family, however, to put pressure on one suspect.

It is indeed surprising that Bush, Rummy and others thought that military and policing approaches could be developed 'on the fly.' Gonzales and others were set the task of justifying pre set plans (legitimizing torture, tossing aside Geneva conventions). As we know, history repeats. As the CNN piece made clear--50 years after the fact-- we know that the ruthless French methods in Algeria did uproot the existing terrorist organization and catch its leaders. Yet the whole populace was lost, making French exit invitable. It's quite amusing that
"Battle of Algiers", once denounced as left wing propaganda is now being used in courses (as showing a lession in what not to do).

Lessons in what not to do abound. Unfortuneatly, lessons only help if someone takes the time to study them and learn from them.

 

[elsol]

If only Colin Powell had had the courage to resign and go public with his doubts about the WMD evidence and his concerns about the lack of a workable exit strategy, we might have concentrated our resources where they'd do some good: capturing Bin Laden and securing our borders. Instead, we let Osama play us like puppets. We've turned him into a hero; an Islamic David to our Goliath. We've rid him of his enemy Saddam Hussein, set the stage for civil war and another Islamic theocracy, turned Iraq into a recruitment poster for terrorists, destroyed our credibility on the issue of prisoner treatment, killed so many innocent bystanders that our government pretends it can't even estimate the number, given up some of our most essential rights at home, and reelected the sniveling mama's boy who made it happen.

Powell is said to have warned Bush that invading Iraq would be like shopping at Pottery Barn: "If you break it, you own it." Bush chose to believe a convicted con artist over the only man in his inner circle who had bothered to attend a war before planning one.

We broke it. We own it. Whether we go or stay, we're screwed.

I would not qustion Powell's courage.

He signed up for and did his duty. It takes far more courage to stay the course and be the outside man than it does to cut-and-run.

He did what he thought was right in the situation. I'm not in it so I'm not going to say it was a lack of courage that made him not do what I think is the right thing.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[elsol]

Here's a way that could have worked.

a) Walk in and kick the house down.
b) Get out
c) Watch what people build back up...
d) Decide if you like it or not.
e) If you don't like it, walk in and kick the house down again.

Eventually, they get the message or they run out of building materials.

This is how the third strategy that would have worked for the neo-cons except they let their financial backers into the meetings.

It has the benefits of working to our military strengths and requiring only short-term support from our populace.

The con side is the world doesn't like you very much... oh wait, they didn't fucking like us very much before and they certainly don't like us now.

(I know what you're thinking but there's no 'cause belli'. It's time to use the terrorist network against itself like Reagan did... Why did we bomb Lybia again? Oh yeah... 'misinformation'.)

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[shereads]

I would not qustion Powell's courage.

He signed up for and did his duty. It takes far more courage to stay the course and be the outside man than it does to cut-and-run.

I disagree that there is anything remotely courageous about keeping your mouth shut and going along with what you know to be wrong. Staying the course, when you know the course will lead to tragedy, is not something to be proud of. Even a soldier in the field is obliged to disobey an illegal order.