in case you thought Patraeus was apolitical ...

[AEON]

That's not the point. We're not talking about the effectiveness(or non-effectiveness) of democracy. We're talking about the idea of forcing ANY governmental system on ANY country. Going from a totalitarian dictatorship to a democracy(or any governmental shift of that magnitude) is a revolution, and more often than not in world history, revolutions start within, not externally. This is not about whether democracy works or not, it's about why America feels like it has the right to force any governmental system at all on anyone. What gives us that right? Why do we think it's our place? Some of us think it is our place, and some of us think we have absolutely no right. That's what this is about.

Was it right for the US Army to invade the Confederate States of America in 1861 and impose its version of democracy? Was the world a better place as a result of this invasion?

 

[BVS]

Was it right for the US Army to invade the Confederate States of America in 1861 and impose its version of democracy? Was the world a better place as a result of this invasion?

Wow, what a revisionist perspective of history...

 

[AEON]

yeah, you do, when you say the loss of that many lives is a "good thing" then yes you better back it up with something, it's apparant you can't...

You still haven't told me why democracy HAS to be spread...

If you don't already see that South Korea is a functioning, globally participating, thriving, vibrant, free society and that North Korea is the exact opposite - then nothing I could post would convince you otherwise.

 

[AEON]

Wow, what a revisionist perspective of history...

Are you a Civil War Denier?

 

[BVS]

Are you a Civil War Denier?

No I just deny your warped perception of the civil war...

 

[BVS]

If you don't already see that South Korea is a functioning, globally participating, thriving, vibrant, free society and that North Korea is the exact opposite - then nothing I could post would convince you otherwise.

Look back at your posts, you said those lives worked for KOREA, and obviously they didn't. But then again revisionist history seems to be your thing...

 

[namkcuR]

Was it right for the US Army to invade the Confederate States of America in 1861 and impose its version of democracy? Was the world a better place as a result of this invasion?

It's not the same thing and you know it. That was a CIVIL war, CIVIL being the operative word. Meaning that it was a war between two factions of the same country. I don't care if the south called itself something else, the point is that the south wanted to eventually control all of the country and so did the north. It was a conflict within one country, and both sides wanted it to be one country, they just had different ideas of what morals and ideals and principles the foundation of that country should be based on. It's totally different to invading a completely different country and trying to force on them a system that they never asked us for.

 

[AEON]

Look back at your posts, you said those lives worked for KOREA, and obviously they didn't. But then again revisionist history seems to be your thing...

The war is called the Korean War - and casually referred to as "Korea" just as the Vietnam War is referred to as "Vietnam" or "Nam" - even though the result in the Korean War was to preserve the democracy of South Korea.

I'm sorry for assuming that when I mentioned a democracy on the Korean peninsula people would understand I was referring to SOUTH Korea.

 

[BVS]

Nice cover...

 

[Diemen]

I think Aeon is working under the assumption that any American-established (or instigated) democracy in a foreign country will automatically be pro-America.

Let's be honest here. Democracy is a secondary goal here. What Bush and the neocons really want is a pro-US government that will essentially do what we say and give us a stronger foothold in the region. Freedom to the people is a nice slogan, but we (and by we, I mean Bushco) really only care if they do what we say.

 

[anitram]

I think Aeon is working under the assumption that any American-established (or instigated) democracy in a foreign country will automatically be pro-America.

Well if they should elect a crazy cleric, you can just bomb them back into submission!

 

[AEON]

I don't care if the south called itself something else,

The South refers to it as the War Between the States, and they most certainly thought they were a separate government. They had their own president, congress, judicial system, ambassadors...etc.

It's totally different to invading a completely different country and trying to force on them a system that they never asked us for.

The fact is, the United States imposed a system of racial equality that the Confederate States did not want. Was this right? Most people tend to think so (although most of those living in the South in 1861 would disagree with me).

 

[AEON]

I think Aeon is working under the assumption that any American-established (or instigated) democracy in a foreign country will automatically be pro-America.

Let's be honest here. Democracy is a secondary goal here. What Bush and the neocons really want is a pro-US government that will essentially do what we say and give us a stronger foothold in the region. Freedom to the people is a nice slogan, but we (and by we, I mean Bushco) really only care if they do what we say.

Are you saying that if spreading democracy was the Primary, not Secondary, goal - then you would support the mission in Iraq?

 

[namkcuR]

The South refers to it as the War Between the States, and they most certainly thought they were a separate government. They had their own president, congress, judicial system, ambassadors...etc.



The fact is, the United States imposed a system of racial equality that the Confederate States did not want. Was this right? Most people tend to think so (although most of those living in the South in 1861 would disagree with me).

I'm really starting to feel like you're missing the point on purpose.

The South may have had its own government and what not, but they eventually wanted control of the WHOLE country and they wanted to implent their government on the WHOLE country, and the North wanted their government to STAY implemented in the whole country. It was two factions of the same land fighting for control of that land. It's more comperable to the civil war that's going on in Iraq right now(multiple factions of the same country fighting for control) than it is to any kind of American imperialism.

 

[Diemen]

No, not at all, and I don't see how you could draw that conclusion. All I'm saying is that all the Right's rhetoric around this war has been at best half-truths, and, more realistically, bald lies meant to pull at the emotions of average Joe America, without any real substance behind them.

WMDs/Immediate threat? Hah.
Depose a brutal dictator/freedom for the people? If Saddam had been pro-America, Bush wouldn't have lifted a finger.
Spread democracy? Only if they do what we say.

 

[BVS]

The fact is, the United States imposed a system of racial equality that the Confederate States did not want. Was this right? Most people tend to think so (although most of those living in the South in 1861 would disagree with me).

Interesting view, one most conservatives wouldn't take, at least southern conservatives...

But you still don't have it quite right... and it's interesting how you twist the facts of this war, equate it to this war. Very telling.

 

[AEON]

Interesting view, one most conservatives wouldn't take, at least southern conservatives...

But you still don't have it quite right... and it's interesting how you twist the facts of this war, equate it to this war. Very telling.

It was a good point...

 

[BVS]

It was a good point...

No Not if the facts aren't right...

What are you smoking?

 

[Infinity]

Comparing the Civil War to the Iraq War is like comparing apples to oranges. In case you didn't know AEON, the Confederacy was a part of the United States which declared themselves that they were separate. Unfortunately, under the United States Constitution, no state can seccede from the country. The U.S. federal government overules any state or multiple state government. The U.S. federal government does NOT however overule the government of a foreign nation. We should never attack a foreign nation unless they are a threat to us.

Oh, and about spreading Democracy. That reason is BULLSHIT. That is not why Bush went into Iraq. There are many countries around the world that are not democracies. Some of these countries also hold WMD's and are safe harbors to al-Qaeda. Why not invade them?

Why not invade Pakistan?

Is Pakistan a democracy? No

Does Pakistan hold WMD's? Yes

Is there a strong al-Qaeda (the al-Qaeda that attacked us) base in Pakistan? Yes, and that region of the country is even out of the control of the Pakistani government.


What about North Korea?

Is it a democracy? No

Does it hold WMD's? Yup.


What about China:

Is it a democracy? Nope.

Does it contain WMD's? Yup.




Now lets compare this to pre-2003 Iraq:

Was it a democracy? No.

Did it contain WMD's? No.

Did it harbor the al-Qaeda that attacked us on 9/11? No. In fact, Osama bin Laden hated Saddam Hussein and vice versa. In the first Gulf War, Osama bin Laden offered the Saudi government his own al-Qaeda fighters to fight AGAINST Saddam Hussein. Also, Saddam Hussein has always hated terrorists. He always wanted full control in Iraq. He didn't care for fundamental Islam. Had Osama bin Laden ever entered Iraq pre-2003, Saddam would have seen him as a threat to his influence and would have had him murdered within seconds.




Now I am not supporting an invasion of any of these nations. But I wonder why Bush hasn't even mentioned war against any of them. They all seem to be far more dangerous to the U.S. than Iraq was under Saddam Hussein. So why not "spread democracy" by bombing all of these nations?

 

[AEON]

So why not "spread democracy" by bombing all of these nations?

The best question of the night. And I admit - other than resources, and I can't think of a good reason. (with the exception of China - which is showing progress)

 

[maycocksean]

(with the exception of China - which is showing progress)

. . .and also tangling with China would be highly impractical.

 

[maycocksean]

WMDs/Immediate threat? Hah.
Depose a brutal dictator/freedom for the people? If Saddam had been pro-America, Bush wouldn't have lifted a finger.
Spread democracy? Only if they do what we say.

Truth. I dare anyone to actually suggest that we would have invaded Iraq if Saddam had been exactly the horrible dicatator he was, except that he was friendly to the U.S. instead of hostile.

 

[BVS]

The best question of the night. And I admit - other than resources, and I can't think of a good reason. (with the exception of China - which is showing progress)

Wow, just wow...

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/09/13/brian-williams-calls-out-_n_64260.html

"Yesterday, NBC's Brian Williams picked up that ball with a vengeance, directly challenging General Petraeus on that point:

Over the last two days of testimony, you mentioned Al Qaeda, by our count, 160 times. Now for a lot of Americans, al Qaeda - that's the guys who flew those planes into the buildings in New York, and Washington, and Pennsylvania. Explain what you mean — because Al Qaeda in Iraq wasn't around that day.

Petraues responded that Al Qaeda in Iraq was "part of the greater al Qaeda movement" and "the
the organization that has carried out the most horrific, most damaging terrorist actions in Iraq." Petraues had previously referred to al Qaeda as "public enemy number one" in Iraq, even though it represents at most 8 - 15% of the total insurgency — and that's the uppermost estimate. Various intelligence reports put that at a much lower number, all the way down to only 2 -5% of the total insurgency.

That's the background. Watch how Williams gets Petraeus to backtrack on that point:

 

[Irvine511]

well done, Bush.

you've totally just passed the buck onto the next president. here's to 10 years of "Cindy Sheehan lost Iraq!"

 

[AEON]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/09/13/brian-williams-calls-out-_n_64260.html

"Yesterday, NBC's Brian Williams picked up that ball with a vengeance, directly challenging General Petraeus on that point:

Over the last two days of testimony, you mentioned Al Qaeda, by our count, 160 times. Now for a lot of Americans, al Qaeda - that's the guys who flew those planes into the buildings in New York, and Washington, and Pennsylvania. Explain what you mean — because Al Qaeda in Iraq wasn't around that day.

Petraues responded that Al Qaeda in Iraq was "part of the greater al Qaeda movement" and "the
the organization that has carried out the most horrific, most damaging terrorist actions in Iraq." Petraues had previously referred to al Qaeda as "public enemy number one" in Iraq, even though it represents at most 8 - 15% of the total insurgency — and that's the uppermost estimate. Various intelligence reports put that at a much lower number, all the way down to only 2 -5% of the total insurgency.

That's the background. Watch how Williams gets Petraeus to backtrack on that point:

It is very interesting how you responded to that interview and how I respond to it. I thought the general articulated his points well, was logical, and very straightforward. I guess we hear what we want to hear.

He also responded to his "I don't know" answer with the same answer I posted here - his focus is Iraq and not the GWOT.

It almost seems like this is sort of a witch hunt - with many of you hoping to catch the general in some mistake of words to use against him and to support your own antiwar position.

 

[Irvine511]

there's so much to say, but a former war supporter says it far, far better than i can:

[q]He seemed almost broken to me. His voice raspy, his eyes watery, his affect exhausted, his facial expression almost bewildered. I thought I would feel angry; but I found myself verging toward pity. The case was so weak, the argument so thin, the evidence for optimism so obviously strained that one wondered whom he thought he was persuading. And the way he framed his case was still divorced from the reality we see in front of our nose: that Iraq is not, as he still seems to believe, full of ordinary people longing for democracy and somehow stymied solely by "extremists" or al Qaeda or Iran, but a country full of groups of people who cannot trust one another, who are still living in the wake of unimaginable totalitarian trauma, who have murdered and tortured and butchered each other in pursuit of religious and ethnic pride and honor for centuries. This is what Bush cannot recognize: there is no Iraq. There are no Iraqis. There may have been at one point - but what tiny patina of national unity that once existed to counter primordial sectarian loyalty was blown away by the anarchy of the Rumsfeld-Franks invasion. The president's stunning detachment from this reality tragically endures - whether out of cynicism or delusion or, more worryingly, a simple intellectual inability to understand the country he is determined that the United States occupy for the rest of our lives.

The low-point was his almost desperate recitation of a poignant email that posited that this war is one between "good" and "evil". I don't doubt the sincerity of the sentiment; I don't doubt either that the murderous extremes of sectarian hatred or religious fanaticism are, at some level, evil. I know that the motives of many people who supported this war - and many who still support it - are honorable. And I know that America is ultimately a force for good in this world. But that doesn't mean that America is incapable or error or immorality. And to reduce the immense complexity of Iraq to such a binary moralism is a sign of a president reaching for comfortable, Manichean abstractions as a replacement for strategic judgment and knowledge. The American people deserve better from a war-president: more honesty, more candor, more realism. Even now; even in the face of the horror we have witnessed for four years; even in the face of the failure that is still staring at us, he still cannot see what he has done or what is still unfolding in the Mesopotamian morass. And he has no policy that effectively matches the crisis with adequate resources. Short of a draft, we don't have them.

None of us wants to lose this war in Iraq; no one wants defeat.

It rips many of us apart to think of the pleasure that some vile human beings may draw temporarily from our retreat. But they gain far more pleasure by America's permanent entrapment in a quicksand from which there is no escape and which has already replenished the ranks of the enemy. I supported this war for a long time; but I cannot honestly blind myself to the reality of failure out of pride or sheer wishfulness. We need a president able to acknowledge this reality, to tell us how to salvage what we can from the wreckage of a broken country, how to disengage in a way that maximizes our interests and weakens our enemies. Only on those grounds can we unite again and find a way forward. Not on these grounds; not with this president; not without many, many more troops for many, many more years.

But it seems he will get his way; and his party will live with the consequences. So, alas, will all of us. If the Democrats and adult Republicans cannot stop this slow march to an even lower circle of hell, then we have only one recourse yet: to pray that we're wrong, that a miracle can happen, and that the enormous sacrifices of so many good, brave and brilliant men and women are not ultimately in vain.[/q]

 

[AEON]

Petraeus’s Success
Follow the general.

By Charles Krauthammer

© 2007, The Washington Post Writers Group



As always, the inadvertent slip is the most telling. Discussing the performance of British troops, Gen. David Petraeus told Sen. Joe Biden of the Foreign Relations Committee that he’d be consulting with British colleagues in London on his way back “home.” He had meant to say “Iraq,” where he is now on his third tour of duty. Is there any other actor in Washington’s Iraq-war drama — from Harry Reid to the Joint Chiefs — who could have made such a substitution? Anyone who not only knows Iraq the way Petraeus does, but feels it in all its gravity and complexity?

When asked about Shiite militia domination of southern Iraq, Petraeus patiently went through the four provinces, one by one, displaying a degree of knowledge of the local players, terrain, and balance of power that no one in Washington — and few in Iraq — could match.

When Biden thought he had a gotcha — contradictions between Petraeus’s report on Iraqi violence and the less favorable one by the Government Accountability Office — Petraeus calmly pointed out that the GAO had to cut its data-gathering five weeks short to meet reporting requirements to Congress. And since those most recent five weeks had been particularly productive for the coalition, the GAO numbers were not only outdated but misleading.

For all the attempts by Democrats and the antiwar movement to discredit Petraeus, he won the congressional confrontation hands down. He demonstrated enough military progress from his new counterinsurgency strategy to conclude: “I believe we have a realistic chance of achieving our objectives in Iraq.”

The American people are not antiwar. They are anti-losing. Which means they are also anti-drift. Adrift is where we were during most of 2006 — the annus horribilis initiated by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s bringing down the Golden Mosque in Samarra — until the new counterinsurgency strategy of 2007 (the “surge”) reversed the trajectory of the war.

It was being lost both in Iraq and at home. On the home front, Petraeus deftly deflated the rush to withdrawal that appeared poised to acquire irresistible momentum this summer. First, by demonstrating real and irrefutable territorial gains on the ground. And second, by proposing minor immediate withdrawals to be followed by fully liquidating the “surge” by next summer. Those withdrawals should be enough to hold the wobbly Republican senators. And perhaps even more important, the Pentagon brass.

The service chiefs no longer fight wars. That’s now left to theater commanders such as Petraeus. The chiefs’ job is to raise armies — to recruit, train, equip and manage. Petraeus’s job is to use their armies to win wars. The chiefs are quite reasonably concerned about the enormous strain put on their worldwide forces by the tempo of operations in Iraq. Petraeus’s withdrawal recommendations have prevented a revolt of the generals.

Petraeus’s achievement is no sleight of hand. If he had not produced real demonstrable progress on the ground — reported by many independent observers, including liberal Democrats, even before he came back home (i.e., the U.S.) — his appearance before Congress would have swayed no one.

His testimony, steady, and forthright, bought him the time to achieve his “realistic chance” of success. Not the unified democratic Iraq we had hoped for the day Saddam’s statue came down, but a radically decentralized Iraq with enough regional autonomy and self-sufficiency to produce a tolerable stalemated coexistence between contending forces.

That’s for the longer term and still quite problematic. In the shorter term, however, there is a realistic chance of achieving a separate success that, within the context of Iraq, is of a second order but in the global context is of the highest order — the defeat of al Qaeda in Iraq.

Having poisoned one country and been expelled from it (Afghanistan), al Qaeda seized upon post-Saddam instability to establish itself in the very heart of the Arab Middle East — Sunni Iraq. Yet now, in front of all the world, Iraq’s Sunnis are, to use the biblical phrase, vomiting out al Qaeda. This is a defeat and humiliation in the extreme — an Arab Muslim population rejecting al Qaeda so violently that it allies itself in battle with the infidel, the foreigner, the occupier.

Just carrying this battle to its successful conclusion — independent of its larger effect of helping stabilize Iraq — is justification enough for the surge. The turning of Sunni Iraq against al Qaeda is a signal event in the war on terror. Petraeus’s plan is to be allowed to see it through.

 

[Infinity]

The best question of the night. And I admit - other than resources, and I can't think of a good reason. (with the exception of China - which is showing progress)

I'm guessing you didn't notice the sarcasm when I asked that.

But I forgot some countries. What about Cuba and Venezuela. And how can I forget Iran??

So here is the list of countries we should bomb:

-Pakistan
-North Korea
-Iran
-Cuba
-Venezuela
-China...but you say they are making progress so bombing them is not necessary. Why do you think they are making progress? Just because they have a booming economy and are our biggest trading partner doesn't mean they are making progress on the democracy front.

 

[Infinity]

What about Saudi Arabia? Here is a quote from wikipedia:

"The Basic Law of Government adopted in 1992 declared that Saudi Arabia is a monarchy ruled by the sons and grandsons of the first king, Abd Al Aziz Al Saud. It also claims that the Qur'an is the constitution of the country, which is governed on the basis of Islamic law (Sharia)"

And weren't most of the 9/11 hijackers Saudi?

So we have to invade them too! I know it sounds silly right? Saudi Arabia are our friends so how can we invade them? But that is exactly the reason we should, because they are our friends and they need our "help" in installing a democracy.

EDIT: And I also forgot Sudan.

Okay AEON, here is our list of countries to invade:

-Pakistan
-North Korea
-Iran
-Cuba
-Venezuela
-Saudi Arabia
-Sudan
-China?

How great would it be if we lent a helping hand to all of these nations by destroying them and rebuilding them?