BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq

Subject: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: GUEST,MM
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 08:38 PM

Considering that "immediate" withdrawal from Iraq will never resemble anything close to immediate, how do all here vote?

I cast mine for immediate. And not to Kuwait. Home.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: pdq
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 08:45 PM

The Democrat position is that the US should withdraw from Iraq in stages over the next six months. However, if the situation gets dire, we could stay up to one year .

The Republican position is that we should withdraw from Iraq in one year. However, if things go very well, things could be stepped up and we would be out in six months.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Peace
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 08:48 PM

lol

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: akenaton
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:03 PM

Immediate withdrawal....

The politicians tell us that if we withdraw immediately there will be a "bloodbath"
If the US had any sort of news media, they would know that Iraq is already a "bloodbath". One which we created.

The only question left to ask, is.....Do we want to preside over our "bloodbath"???.....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Bobert
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:13 PM

Well, yeah, I've been one of the most vocal critic of Bush's invasion and occupation of Iraq but even I can't go for an immediate withdrawl...

But what I can live is a timetable to be announced shortly after a Middle East Summit and an attempt to revive something that looks like the original "Saudi Proposal" that I put forth in the made-dash-to-Iragmire....

It is now very much in everyone's interests that some level of stability be preserved while the Iragi's fight it out and that is going to take a more comprehensive agreement that deals not only with Iraq but also the Isreali/Palestinian situation, Iran and other regional conflicts... And it's gonna involve talking directly with Iran and Syria...

Yeah, revive the "Saudi Proposal" and see what it has to offer the region is the first step....

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: DougR
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:15 PM

Withdraw when Iraqi security forces can provide the necessary security, and not until.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Rapparee
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:26 PM

Anyone who knows shit from shinola knows that you don't do "immediate" withdrawals. You provide covering forces, leapfrogging as you withdraw (i.e., retreat). Anything less becomes a slaughter of the retreating forces.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: akenaton
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:28 PM

Come on Bobert, do you think there will ever be peace as long as we need to export our culture and hypocritical "democracy"?

If we want our economic system to survive, we must continue to export our culture. The leaders of militant Islam may be demented,but they quite rightly despise what we have come to stand for.
I see no easy solution, other than getting all our boys back home, lock the doors, draw the curtains and get heads under blankets...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: MaineDog
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:29 PM

In order to prevent a blood bath in Iraq, we need to find a strong leader that all the factions will follow, either out of respect, or out of fear, if necessary, until the situation improves. If we could find one and dust him off a bit, then we could get out with honor.
MD

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:37 PM

Oh, it'll have to be a staged withdrawal. The US forces must either be replaced by Iraqi forces...or by international forces that did not participate in the original invasion. Since the latter mission is quite unlikely to attract any willing volunteers to put their people at risk, I guess it will have to be the former. Figure a year to disengage. I'd be surprised if they could manage it sooner than that.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:39 PM

Our Supreme Leader has said this is a perpetual war against terrorim and American troops will be in Iraq at least 20 years. Hillary has seconded that stance. Enough said. Persist in this discussion at your own peril.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: number 6
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:44 PM

"leapfrogging as you withdraw"

It's going to be one Hell of a leapfrog, let me tell ya.

Certainly wouldn't want to be in the last platoon leaving Bagdad.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: GUEST,MM
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:52 PM

Funny Bobert, you don't seem to have it on your radar that right wing hawks like Pelosi's boy Murtha, and left wing progressives like Kucinich and Feingold, both support immediate withdrawal.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:53 PM

"Immediate withdrawal. I hear the bishop coming.", as the Sister said to the choirboy.
Seriously though, an orderly pulling back to Kuwait might be saner, remembering what happened the last time we promised freedom to those Iraqis who would stand for it, and then did not back it up.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: GUEST,MM
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 09:54 PM

oh, and pdq, there is no "official Democrat position" regarding Iraq. The party is split on immediate vs phased. The only thing they do agree on is it is time to bring the troops home. If that isn't their position after last Tuesday, it will be by January. Cuz if it ain't, they'll get their asses whipped in '08.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: number 6
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 10:03 PM

Anyone ever read "Retreat from Kabul: The Catastrophic British Defeat in Afghanistan, 1842" by Patrick MacRory.

Good reading concerning the topic of this thread ... a few similarities.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: artbrooks
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 10:56 PM

I've yet to hear anyone advocate immediate withdrawal. The closest anyone has yet come is for a "phased" withdrawal, with the (otherwise undefined) phases to begin as soon as early in 2007. The most intelligent proposal I've heard is for internal security to be rapidly phased into a police operation, primarily run by Iraqis, with the US and other international forces keeping jihadis outside the borders of the country.   One of the (many) mistakes we made from the beginning, and I'm talking about 9-11 and before, is treating what is basically a gang of murdering criminals as a military enemy (as in "the War against Terror") and going after them with soldiers rather than police.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Ron Davies
Date: 16 Nov 06 - 11:24 PM

"if things go very well" or "when Iraqi forces can supply the necessary security".

Dream on.

How many centuries do you envision this will take? I'll clue you--it'll be a while.


In fact, Iraq is busily drifting in the wrong direction--if not rushing in the wrong direction.



I've just heard--you may have also--that one of the top Sunnis, head of one of the most prominent parties in Iraq, is now to be arrested.

Short cut to real civil war.

And there ain't too awful much we can do about it.

As I've said before, our leverage is--severely--limited.

For Maliki, it's a Catch-22.   To undercut the insurgency he has to do the same 2 things I've been talking about for over a year---assure the Sunnis that they will have more oil income than would accrue to just "their" parts of Iraq, and, even more urgently, make sure that Sunnis can trust the police--which they emphatically cannot now. But one of the main supporters of his government, al Sadr, refuses to accept real purging of the Shiite militias now in the police--which is the only way Sunnis could trust them.

Nobody likes the horrendous--and worsening--bloodshed---but the first step to dealing with a situation is recognizing reality.

The perfect Pollyanna attitude, as illustrated by "if things go very well" or "when Iraqi forces can supply the necessary security" is not helpful.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Barry Finn
Date: 17 Nov 06 - 02:43 AM

Immediate, now, tomorrow, yesterday & if we throw Israel into the bargin, to become a new part of Iraq, the Iraqi's will be so busy dividing Israel up that they will forget about civil war & the rest of the mid east would be so overjoyed with the new road maps that they'll make the peace keep it's self. And all's well that ends well.

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Paul Burke
Date: 17 Nov 06 - 03:55 AM

There's no good way out. It was a tragic and stupid case of fools rushing in. Stay, and the slaughter goes on without end. Leave, and there will be mass slaughter, ethnic cleansing and partition.

Given that you can't turn back the clock, and put Saddam back, and come to an agreement with him (doesn't that sound so simple now?), the balance must go towards as quick a withdrawal as can be managed, replacement by a "peacekeeping force" drawn from Islamic countries, and expect the worst. To get a Sunni/ Shia balance, Syria and Iran will have to be included in this force, but also include anyone else that can be persuaded, from Morocco to Indonesia.

Perhaps the Kurds would prefer a more mixed occupation for their bit, with European elements, since their problem is more likely to be with Turkey.

And the US and Britain to pay for the replacement force. It will be cheaper and more humane than staying.

At the same time, do something about the problem that underlies the whole thing. Israel must return to the 1967 borders, and compensation must be given to the descendants of the Palestinians displaced in 1947. The Palestinian economy must be rebuilt, and water issues addressed. Unless that part of the jigsaw is attended to, expect to find Iraq settle down relatively quickly once the allies withdraw, as the militants take the war against them elsewhere.

Most wars end not in victory but in negotiation. If the war against terror is ever to end, it will end that way.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Nov 06 - 11:07 AM

Staying on is fairly obviously pointless, because it's the occupation that fuels the insurgency, and the forces of regime propped up by the occupation that are largely responsible for much of the inter-ethnic violence. But pulling out just like that in present circumstances would also be liable to have terrible immediate consequences for the population. (Leaving aside the danger to the occupation forces themselves, which, while very important indeed, should be a secondary consideration.)

The best option would be negotiate rapidly with a view to handing over directly to the Iranians so far as working with the Shi'ites is concerned, and handing over to the Syrians for working with the Sunni. And being ready to stick around, if requested, in the Kurdish area to provide direct backup for the Kurds in keeping the Turks and others at bay.

It wouldn't be neat, since there are the Shi'ites and Sunni aren't neatly divided off, especially in the Baghdad area. They used to get on reasonably well but there's been a lot of inter-communal violence since the occupation began. However there's a reasonable chance that Syria and Iran could work out some solution, once the Americans were out of the picture.

It'd be reasonable that the Americans and British should cover the cost of all this, on the grounds that the people who made the mess should have the responsibility for making good the damage insofar as possible.

But that won't happen. It would involve an official recognition that what has been done to Iraq was a grotesque blunder. There may be a consensus that this is the case, but it won't be admitted, any more than it was in Vietnam.

What will probably happen is a precipitate withdrawal at some future date, after a good deal more killing, in circumstances that will ensure a disastrous civil war, in the course of which the Iranians and the Syrians, and maybe other neighbours will move in and partition Iraq between them.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Bobert
Date: 17 Nov 06 - 01:39 PM

Yo, GUEST, MM...

As much as I respect Dennis Kucinich, he doesn't tell me what I'm supposed to think...

Doug R,

Training scurtioy folks may not be thr smartest thing to do as many of these folks ure using this training to better kill folks they don't much like...

Others,

Yeah, I'm stickin' with a Middle East Summit to be held ASAP, like yesterday, with a framework similar to the "Saudi Proposal" (Mitchell Proposal) as a starting place...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 17 Nov 06 - 01:45 PM

Part of the idiocy of the intiial unilateral invasion is failing to understand where free societies come from, which is not from external invasions. There have been som empires which successfully integrated conquered nations and made a going concern -- the Incans come to mind -- but they are few. Bush's posture of "Vee haff vays off makink you free" is jejeune and pretentious, as well as being irrational and unrealistic.

The Shiites and Sunnis have demonstrated that they are unwilling to rise above their differences unless they are suppressed into doing so in the style used by Saddam Hussein. Because of their unreasoning tribal loyalties, they have declared for something other than freedom -- the right to dramatize us against them.

Until their is an indigenous demand and some local heros and leaders to focus and crystallize that demand, the ingredients for a freedom-based society are absent. Freedom is not an absence of oppression, so much as it is an insistence on sovereignty. Very few voices coming out of Iraq seem interested in insisting on their own sovereignty as a nation. They want tribal and clan sovereignty, leaving them free to wage war on anyone outside those small cliques they so love.

As far as I know even in the wildest days of our wild western expansion, the biggest problem in bringing law and order was unruly individuals and a few loosely affiliated gangs. There were turf wars of sheep versus cattle, and water wars, but mostly the sides were individuals and thier ranches.

Bringing law and order in a country where the lawmen routinely use their uniforms to mask crimes committed along clan lines is not a workable proposition. No demand for a rule of law, and no demand for freedom, leave us with the uncomfortable conclusion that Saddam may have been right in choosing the iron fist as his management style, a disgusting thought.

It occurs to me that there may be an entirely different button that could serve as a unifying and liberating ralllying cry for both Sunnios and Shiites, much in the way that the notion of "liberty" and "no taxation without representation" rallied the American colonies. A different answer to what these people really, deeply want. Not an exported off-the-shelf answer from a weak minded emperor.

Wish I knew what the hell it was, though.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Grab
Date: 17 Nov 06 - 04:51 PM

But if Syria, Saudi and Iran all get involved and the religious leaders of both sides say "don't do it", things might calm down. When the religious leaders of both sides are just saying "death to America and its supporters", you're screwed, especially since "supporters" from both groups get killed in the crossfire.

For me, that's one of the strongest signs that they never went in there looking for a long-term solution. A long-term solution means a peace that'll hold with the other neighbouring countries and with the religious leaders of both sides. If your first action after invading is to say "fuck off Iran or we'll have you too", you're not going to get much co-operation!

Phased is certainly the only way, but also with assistance from other countries. And yes, a peacekeeping force that's not "contaminated" by having done the invasion would be a good place to start, espccially if it comes from countries that have respect in those parts, like Syria.

Graham.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Nov 06 - 07:48 PM

If the suggestion Amos is making is that the Sunnies and Shi'ites are pretty screwed up and it's natural to them to hate each other because the are different from us, I can't buy that. The inter-communal violence there is no different in principle from that which has happened between different groups of Christians in places like Northern Ireland, former Yugoslavia, Ruanda, the United States.

In times of disruption differences which have been no barrier to neighbours getting along together can turn into something very different, for all kinds of reasons. And you always find there are some people working to accentuate the differences, and thus fan the flames. In the case of Iraq, some of those people are at the heart of the occupation and the occupation backed regime.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: dianavan
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 02:35 AM

U.S. forces should withdraw into Kurdistan and evacuate from there.

Let Iran handle the Shittes and Syria can control the Sunnis.

Israel should return to their 1967 borders and the Palestinian people should be helped, Internationally, to re-build their lives.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: akenaton
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 05:20 AM

It's amazing the number of people here who think we still have any control over the situation.
We have no control. Our forces are largely confined to fortified positions and we are politically impotent.
We have nothing the Middle East wants, and they have everything that we want.

Outright piracy has failed. We need to get to fuck out now, imprison those who led us to this conclusion...Blair Bush and all their acolytes.....Then work out how we are to survive for the next couple of centuries as the "have nots" of this world......Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 11:45 AM

Sounds kind of like Vietnam, doesn't it?

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: skipy
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 11:49 AM

Home - NOW!
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Rapparee
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 06:12 PM

No, no, no! It's NOT like Vietnam! Rumsfeld and Bush have both said so! And if you can't believe them who can you believe?

Besides, the mission has been accomplished, remember?

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 08:39 PM

I am sure we are all in favor of an immediate phased withdrawl when the mission is complete with all deliberate speed.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Rapparee
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 08:49 PM

As long as we stay the course, of course, of course.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 18 Nov 06 - 11:17 PM

So waiting until Iran and Israel Nuke each other into glass*, and then deciciding that being in the middle isn't a sensible option then. I had money on that one in the office sweepstake....




* I would have said back into the stone age, but a) it would appear that in the most important respect, their way of thought, they haven't moved on since then, and b) It's the Neolithic , or Mesolitic, or Paleololithic, not stone age!

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 02:12 AM

Unlikely, Bunn. Possible, but unlikely.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: akenaton
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 05:19 AM

It always pisses me off when folks contrast the cultures of primitive peoples badly against the mess that "progress" has produced.

Humanity has moved so far from nature, and the human brain has become so distorted, that we are now a virus which is surely destroying everything of real value in the world...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: autolycus
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 06:05 AM

I'm in sympathy with a lot of that Ake which is why just because politicians say something,e.g."If we withdraw immediately,there'll be a bloodbath," I don't feel obliged to think they know what they're talking about.

Nor would I let the voters off the hook that easily. Bush,Blair and co. are there because of voters.

In fact, all these matters, Iraq, war,voting,oil, mortgages,religion, power, money,fear, violence all hang together in a single web that we are all part of.

Which takes me back to the deeper matters that give rise to all of this web, not just the Near Eastern mess that we are all party to.

Nice cars, holidays,fashion,vast bank accounts, houses to show off are merely the lovely upside of the horrible downside of Iraq,yobs,murder, and all the rest of our dark side.

So I don't think there is an obvious solution, tho' I'd like to think Dianavan has got a good one,as well as Ake. I'm too ignorant to know if Dianavan's solution can be got to from where we are realistically. I hope so.






       Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Ron Davies
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 07:38 AM

Iran to handle the Shiites and Syria to control the Sunnis?   Only problem is neither group wants to be "handled" or "controlled". Nor should they. People don't seem to realize that co-religionists don't necessarily want to be "handled" or "controlled" by another state.

Negotiations involving these 2 states, fine. But don't forget to include the actual Shiites and Sunnis in Iraq. There's already been enough dictating by outside parties.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Joe Richman
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 10:52 AM

Iraq's situation under Sadam Hussein wasn't a long-term answer to building a nation either. Sooner or later, his minority regime would have collapsed either from within, or more likely from intervention by a neighboring state. I don't think the death rate in Iraq today is all that different from when Sadam was in power, only that the communities suffering death are more fairly distributed now than then. It was like a well-shaken beer bottle, and it's not surprising that the ones who popped the top got a little bit wet.


A man at my work who is from there says that his Brother reports to him that the economy is better now, but the security situation is worse. (He is from the Shia faith and lives in Baghdad now, although the family is from Basra.) Those who benefited from Sadam's kleptocracy aren't into giving up the big slice of pie without a fight.   Many Iraqis blame the Western Powers and Russia for keeping Sadam in power for all of those years, and that feeling hasn't gone away completely. Shi'ites might say 'thanks for eliminating Sadam, now get lost' if we try to dictate democracy (oxymoron intended).


I sometimes wonder what would've happened in South Africa if the Afrikaaner minority had decided to fight it out, or if Mandela had been like Mugabe.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 10:59 AM

Ake, it wasn't my intention to imply they are primitave people in the Middle East and we are not. Too many Westeners have had progress bypass their minds too....

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 11:13 AM

Iran to handle the Shiites and Syria to control the Sunnis?   Only problem is neither group wants to be "handled" or "controlled".

Agreed - which is why expression I used was "work with", which doesn't mean either of those things. And it is something that the USA and the UK can never really hope to do.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: akenaton
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 02:30 PM

Bunnabhain...I recognise that you were not inferring that the Middle Eastern peoples were "primitive"
Persia being the centre of the civilised world at one stage!!

Your inferrence was that primitive cultures were inferior to modern ones and that the madmen of Islam and Christianity have a superior "thought process".
The huge organised religions which cause so much death and destruction,as well as being a handy tool for the power hungry, are a thoroughly modern invention.....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: dianavan
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 03:08 PM

When I said, "Let Iran handle the Shittes and Syria can control the Sunnis," I meant that Iran (being predominately Shiite) and Syria (being predominately Sunni) should take more responsibility for the radical members of their sect. The ties are already there. It would make more sense for Iran and Syria (jointly) to maintain control in Iraq after the withdrawl of U.S. forces into Kurdistan.

If they cannot maintain order in Iraq, then Iraq will have to be divided but I don't think thats the ultimate solution. I do think that the U.S. would have to have a military presence in a separate Kurdistan to protect the Kurds from any fall-out in Iraq.

There is no perfect solution to the problem of how to withdraw but our best chances of saving U.S. troops from being slautered is to retreat into Kurdistan.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Greg F.
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 05:59 PM

Well, today the 'sainted' Henry Kissinger, architect if the VietNam catastrophe, said that military victory in Iraq is impossible.

So, what are the U.S. troops still doing there? Sampling the cuisine?

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 07:04 PM

The priority is indeed likely to be "stopping US troops being slaughtered", rather than stopping Iraqis being slaughtered - and that in itself is an indication of the hypocrisy involved in the pretence that this operation has been for the benefit of Iraq.

Though in reality the priority isn't either of those things, it's the goal of saving face for Bush and his cronies. A completely impossible goal at this point.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Joe Richman
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 09:44 PM

dianavan:

The Syrian government is controlled by Baathist members of a small Shi'ite sect known as the Alawites. Not likely that they could wield influence over the Sunnis except maybe over some Sunni Baathists. I'd look at SAUDI ARABIA as being more of an influence over the current troubles in Iraq. Iran has both friends and enemies in the ruling coalition.   The friends of Iran are already working with them and the enemies are trying to do the opposite. The smaller minorities (Armenians Assyrians, Chaldeans, etc)and the Kurds are the pro-American faction, but the Kurds are afraid we'll betray them to the Turks.

Greg F.:

In fairness to Kissinger, he inherited Johnson's mistakes in Viet Nam and he did work on getting America out, and on dealing with China as a separate issue. I'm sure he gave Iraq a great deal of thought before coming out with a statement like that.


McGrath:

America owes nothing to people who aren't allies. An ally isn't just someone with a common enemy. Think of the USSR in WW II. However, I share your concern that our government will do something dirty to the groups that do support us there in order to weasel out. And that includes Congress as well as the White House.

Joe

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 09:59 PM

Same crap we heard about View Nam...now that we're there, we can't pull out until they can defend themselves. Bring all the troops home, give Bush & Blair fair trials then hang them.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 10:07 PM

The USSR wasn't an ally in World War Two? That certainly wasn't how it was seen by people in Britain at the time. In fact I don't think there has ever been any popular feeling here that the Russians have been real enemies, in the sense that the Germans have been. Or even the French. The Russians weren't real enemies, they were friends with whom there had been a falling out.

For example it's striking the difference between the way the tabloids - reflecting what they see as popular feeling - play up things with football matches when they are against Germany and France, on the one hand, when it tends to be seen as quasi-war, and when the opponent is Russia, when it's just a match.
............................................

"America owes nothing to people who aren't allies." I think there is something owed to its victims as well. And I believe civilian deaths should always be seen as even more intolerable than military deaths.

My worries here aren't particularly for the people involved in the current regime, it's for the ordianry people.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Greg F.
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 11:22 PM

Joe Richman:


Inherited Johnson's mistakes my ass. One word: Cambodia.

If fairness were applied to Kissinger, he would be in jail or executed for war crimes.

Then there's the other 'Once de Septiembre'......

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: Ron Davies
Date: 19 Nov 06 - 11:35 PM

"However, there's a reasonable chance that Syria and Iran could work out some solution"--that sounds suspiciously like immediate partition. Let's make it clear that the Shiites and Sunnis now in Iraq--as distinguished from those in Iran and Syria--have places at the table all the way through. They are not simply extensions of Iranian and Syrian foreign policy.

Subject: RE: BS: Immediate vs phased withdrawal from Iraq
From: dianavan
Date: 20 Nov 06 - 09:01 PM

You're right about Saudi Arabia being closer to the Iraqi Sunnis. Seems to me that Saudi Arabia should also step up to the plate and help solve the problems in Iraq.

In the best of all worlds, the present Iraqi govt. would be able to hold on to power but...

Seems to me that it is a Muslim problem and should be solved by Muslims. The idea of America importing democracy was absurd from the beginning.