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| Iraq |
| Losing One's Nerve in Iraq |
| 2005-12-15 |
| In response to the ever-growing sense that the United States is doing poorly in Iraq, indeed in the view of many is actually losing the war, the U.S. government has launched a campaign to persuade everyone that this is not so. In November, 2005, the U.S. National Security Council published, with great fanfare, a document entitled "National Strategy for Victory in Iraq." And President Bush has been pushing its line vociferously in public speeches. What this document argues is that victory is occurring, but occurring in stages, that victory is a vital U.S. interest, that the U.S. has a quite clear strategy for victory, but that this victory will take time. The key sentence in this wordy document, which evades all concrete analysis of what is actually going on, is a quote from President Bush's speech on Oct. 6, 2005: "In Iraq, there is no peace without victory. We will keep our nerve, and we will win that victory." We will keep our nerve, says Bush. But his Rasputin, Vice-President Cheney, is not so sure, since he constantly asserts that U.S. critics of the Bush administration, however mild their criticism, are undermining this "nerve" and risk making the U.S. lose its resolve. The number of Republican Congressmen and Senators who are worried that the voters have already lost their "nerve" and might vote against them seems to be increasing at a very rapid pace, and seems to be having a great impact on the "nerve" of these Republican politicians. When Rep. John Murtha, ex-Marine and longtime stalwart hawk, called for pulling out of Iraq, most commentators felt he was the unofficial voice of large numbers of senior military officers who were unable to voice their concerns publicly. Is this loss of their nerve? Neither Murtha nor the hidden senior military officers would define it this way. They see a situation in which the U.S. will not at all be able to win the kind of victory Bush is talking about, and by staying in Iraq they believe that the U.S. armed forces are being weakened as a military force able to do its work elsewhere in the world. They want to cut their losses before the U.S. armed forces lose even more. It seems clear now that virtually every member of the U.S. coalition that has military forces in Iraq intends to reduce its number, if not fully withdraw them, in 2006. It seems fairly clear that the U.S. itself will do this. Nobody of course admits to losing their nerve, but public opinion at home and impending elections are taking their toll. What about the Iraqis? There are two main groups of Iraqis - those who are energetically fighting the U.S. forces and any Iraqis thought to be cooperating with them, and the others. Those who are energetically fighting the U.S. are said, in this U.S. document, to be composed of three groups: rejectionists (Sunni Arabs who have not "embraced" the changes); Saddamists (who wish to restore the old regime), and terrorists affiliated with or inspired by Al Qaeda. The U.S., according to this document, has more or less given up on the latter two categories but hopes to persuade "many" of the first group to reduce their opposition. There does not however seem to be much evidence that this is happening. In short, those whom the U.S. calls its "enemies" do not seem to have lost their nerve, or their competence in fighting. But what about the other Iraqis? Here the U.S. seems to be counting on the new Iraqi security forces, presumably under the authority of the new Iraqi government. I say presumably because it is obvious that these security forces are deeply infiltrated both by the "enemies" of the U.S. and by various militias - two kinds of Kurdish militias, and at least three kinds of Shi'a militias - who are pursuing their own objectives under the cover of being the national army. The U.S. says it is counting on these security forces to take over its task of fighting the "enemy" - that is, those who reject all legitimacy to the U.S. invasion of Iraq. But is the objective of those who control various parts of the new security forces really the same as those of the Bush regime? Do they intend to be "a full partner in the global war on terrorism" - the longer-term goal of the U.S. according to this document? Is this credible over the longer run? Even if those who are in the new government now are still there two years from now (itself a dubious proposition), why would they want to play this role when it can only make it more difficult to create even a moderately stable political situation in Iraq? And finally, among winners and losers, more attention is being paid by observers today to the possibility that the big winner will be Iran. It is not that even a Shia-dominated government in Iraq will be in any sense a stooge of the Iranians. It is simply that they will not in any way want to play a role of being hostile to Iran, and therefore could not, will not, be sympathetic to U.S. objectives vis-a-vis Iran. Do not ask for whom the bell tolls in Iraq. They toll for George W. Bush, and the United States. Bush claimed the U.S. went into Iraq so that it would not have to fight this "war" on U.S. soil. But the contrary is happening. The turmoil is coming to U.S. soil with a vengeance. One of the claims as to why the U.S. should not immediately withdraw from Iraq is that it might result in an Iraqi civil war. But no one discusses what kind of civil war might be in the process of developing in the United States. by Immanuel Wallerstein |
| Posted by:Claper Choluter8856 |
| #8 Ah yes, one of the "notables" from my old school, SUNY-Binghamton, deigns to honor us with his pithy comments. My logic prof, in shooting down fuzzy-minded liberalisms, used to say "young man, that argument might pass muster with Wallerstein and his acolytes but it won't wash in my class..." |
| Posted by: MarkB 2005-12-16 00:03 |
| #7 Asylum shit, top quality. |
| Posted by: twobyfour 2005-12-15 22:54 |
| #6 Immanual Allerstein: Yale Sociologist. Author of: 'The Rise and Future Demise of the World Capitalist System' I have made an effort to piece apart what I think of as the five major cleavages of our modern world: race, nation, class, ethnicity, and gender. I have to acknowledge that there were three turning-points in my political and intellectual development. The first, as I have already indicated, was my struggle with the issues that have plagued the left for most of its organizational history — the struggle between the Second and Third Internationals. The second was my encounter with Africa and with national liberation movements, which enabled me to put the debates of the Internationals into their proper context, as essentially debates primarily within the pan-European world, debates that ignored the fundamental ongoing polarization of the capitalist world-economy. And the third was the world revolution of 1968, which I experienced directly at Columbia University I acknowledge a continuing intellectual debt to Marx, Freud, Schumpeter, and Karl Polanyi. In his own words, an old Marxist, ivory tower socialist at an Ivy League bastion of liberalism. Now do you understand why he is such a self-aggrandizing lefty nutsack? |
| Posted by: Oldspook 2005-12-15 22:54 |
| #5 Lefties like you Wallerstein are welcome to start a civil war. I promise you'll die quickly, but no promises about cleanly. See, you lefties forget who serves in the armed forces, and who owns the guns as civilians... hint: its neither you nor the left. Bring it on. |
| Posted by: Oldspook 2005-12-15 22:45 |
| #4 Article: But no one discusses what kind of civil war might be in the process of developing in the United States. I'm trying to figure out whether the author is threatening to take up arms against the elected government of these United States. Or maybe he's saying that lefty criticism of the Iraqi campaign is the moral equivalent of civil war. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2005-12-15 21:45 |
| #3 Yeah, getting your head hacked off by Jihadis is EXACTLY the same as listening to Cindy Sheehan bloviate. /sarcasm |
| Posted by: DMFD 2005-12-15 21:33 |
| #2 Is this moron comparing political disagreement at home with people getting blown up by bombs at home? Just wanna make sure I didn't misread that cause it is just so over the top stupid I feel like I must be mistaken. |
| Posted by: Damn_Proud_American 2005-12-15 21:23 |
| #1 Bush claimed the U.S. went into Iraq so that it would not have to fight this "war" on U.S. soil. But the contrary is happening. The turmoil is coming to U.S. soil with a vengeance. The difference being that it's not the jihadis that's bringing it here. It's being sown and cultivated by home grown traitors. |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2005-12-15 20:21 |