Via this comment from David Blue (who I’m glad to see has stuck around), I’m sent over to Michael Yon’s, which I’m remiss for not following more closely.
Go read this whole piece, and get reminded why he is, in fact, a hella journalist. But here’s something he tossed off that we all need to think about:
bq. Every country practices censorship, in one form or the other. Just this week, Thailand is having a Texas-cage match over censorship, accuracy in reporting, and alleged slanderous swipes at the King. Last week, in America, a radio producer for a large syndicated program in the United States called me requesting that I go on the show, a show that has hosted me many times and where I’ve been referred to as, “Our man in Iraq.” But when I said Iraq is in a civil war, that same producer slammed down the phone and, in so doing, demonstrated how much he reveres truth.
There’s a lot to unpack in that, and in the rest of his post.
I’m working on it…and you should too. And no, if the reality is that Iraq is moving toward a civil war, it doesn’t mean we come home or laager up. We’re in until we win – or until someone gets elected who’s willing to settle for less. in which case it’s going to be a very, very bad decade.
Yes, I saw that too – and I stopped and read it three more times. Kind of hard to argue with a producer like that. Also kind of hard to argue with Michael – him being there and all… and while there are other opinions who don’t lend credence to Michael’s (yet), even the Iraqi blogs are a little cautious now.
Omar from “Iraq the Model”:http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/ – _A military confrontation between the Sadr militias and the American (and possibly Iraqi) army is imminent and it’s the Sadrists themselves who are pushing in this direction and preparing their forces for a battle they want to have to disrupt the political process and drag Iraq into an irreversible state of civil war._
Getting a little tight. BTW, Omar has a pretty incisive look at the current political scisms going on with Jaafari – and Bill Roggio at “The Fourth Rail”:http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/ pretty much supports Omar with his analysis.
The “civil war” debate has always perplexed me. It’s nothing but semantics. If you define “civil war” in such a way that The Current State Of Affairs In Iraq qualifies, then it’s a “civil war”. If you define “civil war” in a narrower way which excludes TCSOAII, then it’s not. Big woop. It is what it is.
The question is, what, exactly, is supposed to hinge on whether or not we call TCSOAII a “civil war”? The answer is “nothing”. (Right?) So what’s the point of the entire discussion? Is semantics *that* interesting?
For those who think we are playing a game called ‘gotcha’, it’s significant. For those who believe the game is ‘survival’, less so.
http://www.strategypage.com/qnd/iraq/articles/20060410.aspx
“… With about four million Sunni Arabs still in Iraq, many of them are already moving to traditionally all Sunni Arab towns and neighborhoods. That may be safer for the moment, but makes it easier for a Shia Arab dominated government to turn these areas into concentration camps, thus encouraging more of these people to leave the country. Unlike civil war, this population movement isn’t theoretical, it’s been going on since 2003, and is accelerating. The Sunni Arabs can offer no effective resistance. They have no allies. That’s not a civil war. That’s hopeless.“
The war on Iraq was ‘lost’ the day Bush launched it. Americans just will not support a war based upon lies. We will not!
Without our support the war is over.
You can say Iraq deserved to be destroyed, you can say all those people deserved to die, you can say anything you want. What we hear you saying is what a rapist says about his victim: she deserved what she got because she was so provocative.
We know the war was a crime. We cannot undo the damage suffered by a rape victim, neither can we restore to life all those who died because of Bush’s actions. What we can do is bring Bush and his gang to justice however, if we have the moral courage to do the right thing.
bq.We’re in until we win – or until someone gets elected who’s willing to settle for less. in which case it’s going to be a very, very bad decade.
Look at the unknown context as well- We may not have a choice in the matter if full blown Somalia style street fighting lets loose. As it may be in the beginning stages of.
There’s always a choice, including siding with one or more factions (an approach with a very long history).
And recall that many parts of Iraq are pretty homogeneous. Conflict at any level will be confined to specific areas within Iraq, as is largely true right now.
There may be hard choices ahead (then again, things may also work themselves out without full scale ethnic violence). But there’s no inevitability in any of it, or in the resulting choices.
Folks like ken, who regret Saddam’s departure, will continue cheering for the other side. Folks like me will continue cheering for the folks like Omar among all of Iraq’s ethnicities, who want a better future and are making major daily sacrifices and commitments to get there.
And I’ll also continue cheering Michael Yon, whose reporting is so very many notches better than most of the so-called “professionals” over there. He has earned his credibility the hard way, and his observations deserve to be taken seriously.
Ken (#5) wrote:
bq. You can say Iraq deserved to be destroyed, you can say all those people deserved to die, you can say anything you want.
Ken writes far too eloquently to be a troll, which means that he’s been reading the “Mirror, Mirror”:http://www.ericweisstein.com/fun/startrek/MirrorMirror.html WoC site. In that universe, his “you can say” claims are entirely correct.
Joe, I do not defend the provocative dress the rape victim wears, I do condemn the rapists.
So too with Iraq, I am not defending Iraq, I am condemning the Bush crime in killing Iraqies.
You of course, thinking just like the rapist, think that Iraq deserved to be destroyed, and that Iraqies deserved to be killed because they were such a tempting target for your irrational hostility.
Ken, you’re an idiot. No-one thinks innocent Iraqis deserve to die except Saddam and his progeny, who you are apparently championing. Go away.
Mark, you are wrong. Joe admits to supporting the war on Iraq. Unless you think wars do not kill people then it is clear Joe, along with many others, supported killing innocent people.
Iraq may have been provocative and presented a tempting target for those with raging hostility hormones, but just like the tart who gets raped, the Iraqies never did anything that justifies Bush launching his war against them.
Supporting a war that inevitably inflicts collateral damage does not translate into believing innocents deserve to die. Only a moron could believe that. We fought WW2 tooth and nail but that didnt translate into believing every Germnan and Japanese civilian deserved death.
And by your own logic you supported Saddams murder of Iraqis. Why did they deserve to die under Saddam but not now? What did they do to deserve you allowing Saddam to continue murdering them by the hundreds of thousands?
Why am i bothering with this idiotic nonsense? Thats the real question.
AMac (#8) wrote:
bq. Ken writes far too eloquently to be a troll…
Ken, welcome to WoC. As a commenter, you’re free to disagree with Armed Liberal (the author of this post) or Joe Katzman. You’re obliged to follow the Winds Comment Policy (see the right sidebar on the main page). That means reasonable and supported arguments, no flaming, avoiding ad hominem attacks–that sort of thing.
Look around in other comment sections, then come back and elevate the tone of the debate with your arguments! You may win some converts or improve your own position, or both.
But please be aware that useful debate isn’t served by some of your remarks in #s 5, 9, & 11.
Recall, Winds’ comments are moderated.
Mark, in an unjust war of agression, against any nation, then by definition, all deaths, intentional or not, are the deaths of innocents.
I go back to the analogy of Iraq as the raped tart, of low moral charactor, and provocatively dressed. No matter that the rape produced a child, a miracle we are normally all grateful for; no matter the victim moaned and orgasmed; no matter the belief of people like you that she ‘deserved’ to be raped – a crime was still committed.
None of the Iraqi soldiers, none of the Iraqi civilians, deserved to die at the hands of the American military. They were all innocent.
Ken, on some level all of us are innocent.
You claim that the war was an unjust war of aggression, and therefore all the deaths it caused are unjust (I’ll skip your colorful metaphor). I claim that the war was necessary to prevent a greater war which we’re still at risk of – and therefore the deaths of many more ‘innocents’.
That doesn’t make me less sad about those who died – on both sides. But I accept that there is only greater and lesser injustice, not imaginary perfection.
Ken, if you’re a truly elightened being who avoids killing bugs when you walk, and consumes nothing so that others may have more, I’d respect your position morally, but suggest that you don’t have much to say politically.
If you’re not, and if you enjoy the fruits of modern society – like, say the Internet – while claiming high moral status, I’ll suggest that you don’t have much to say morally either.
A.L.
“Mark, in an unjust war of agression, against any nation, then by definition, all deaths, intentional or not, are the deaths of innocents. ”
Poor, poor Uday and Kusay. Say a novina for them.
You keep going back to your rape analogy and it remains lame. The correct analogy is running up to stop a murder, fighting the assailant, and the victim dying accidently in the crossfire. The victim was dead either way but at least you stop the attacker from killing again. Standing by and letting him continue to murder is morally repugnant. You may imagine your hands are clean but they are not. Inaction is an action in itself.
If everyone is morally responsible for all the consequences of their actions, that includes doing nothing. Hence you had blood on your hands for everyone Saddam murdered- which was and would have been far beyond what the war has wrought. By that definition, we have in fact saved lives in the balance.
Marshall, there is a morally abhorent attitude around here that the ends justifies the means.
This rationale has been used people to justify all kinds of horrors – the war on Iraq being the most recent – down though the centuries and has been roundly condemned by ethicists, moral philosophers, and catichisms ever since man developed a moral sense.
I am trying to break through the hard hearts of those around here who think they are above moral reproach because they think that the ends they wish to achieve give an excuse to kill innocent people.
It is a harsh truth that people like Joe and others must learn, but it is the truth nevertheless.
Ken (#17):
When I put on my Marshal’s badge, it was to warn you that you have to make a good faith effort to follow this site’s comment policy. Otherwise your sermons will end up at some more-permissive site, nestled among personal attacks, off-topic rants, and obscenity-laden diatribes.
bq. there is a morally abhorent attitude around here that the ends justifies the means.
Instead of trading platitudes with you, I’ll note that it’s a consensus view here that real-world results (ends) do matter. Thus, necessarily, we have to grapple with the ends/means/justification question. As Mark (#16) pointed out, refraining from action is also an action, with its own consequences. In some situations, certain people (or movements, or societies) have had their own clean hands as a priority. These spectacles are not as morally uplifting as you may suppose.
bq. This rationale has been used people to justify all kinds of horrors
If you wish to discuss Michael Walzer’s Just War doctrine, please do.
bq. I am trying to break through the hard hearts of those around here…It is a harsh truth that people like Joe and others must learn…
… but a piece of advice. Make your cogent, powerful, convincing arguments first. Then, afterwards, there will be plenty of time to preen about your superior moral sensibilities.
Doing it your way is easier on the writer, but less illuminating for readers.
AMac,
It is funny that you don’t find my commentary up to your standards around here, which by any casual perusual shows a pretty low quality of critical thinking by the regulars who infest this place.
If it is your desire fill this place with circle jerking conservatives oozing with delight over the horrors Bush unleashed in Iraq, then consider me a small voice of rationality. I don’t expect to have much effect, I am not qualified to treat people who are crazy.
But to anyone here who is less than insane I will offer this:
1) “Thou shalt not kill” This applies to you so don’t be pointing the finger at anyone else as an excuse for bad behavior.
2) If you are going to break rule number one, do so in full knowledge that your immortal soul is at stake. If you are justified in killing someone else, you will be forgiven.
3) You do not get to decide if you are justified or not. Your self interest will not allow you to judge fairly.
4)The ends cannot be used to justify the means. The action is judged on its own merits.
4) For my part, I rely a great deal on religious leaders judgements on whether an action to kill someone is justified or not.
5) Enough religious leaders, from the Pope on down, have judged that the war on Iraq was not a just war to convince me that Bush is a criminal, morally at least, if not legally as well.
6) No one here has the credibility, the moral authority, or even any standing, with which to contradict these people.
7) Every reason Bush gave us for his ‘justification’ for going to war against Iraq turned out to be lie.
8) Your personal private deeply felt reasons for going to war against Iraq is irrelevant. Facts matter, your hostility does not.
ken, you’re not enough of a problem to get banned (yet), but you’re heading down that road. I will just give up on interaction and just start ignoring you for now.
And note that it isn’t because you’re on the other side of issues from me; I love a good debate. But you’re not interested in debating, you’re just hauling stone tablets down off the mountain and making grade-school pronouncements.
Just as a side comment, it’s “Thou shalt not murder” in the original Aramaic. Not sure that would make any difference to you…
A.L.
“6) No one here has the credibility, the moral authority, or even any standing, with which to contradict these people.”
Not that im particularly interested in who you think has moral credibility, but i will note that i’ll match up plenty of folks here in a morality contest with the pedophile shuffling golden idol worshippers we call religious leaders in this day and age. Funny little world we live in where the bible describes one of the few times Christ showed anger was at the money changers in the temple, and yet the Vatican sees no problem having a bank. Moral authority is a relative thing apparently.
A.L. your claim to love a good debate is premised, I suspect, on the assumption that you will not be personally, in a moral sense, held accountable for your views.
Throughout this entire site you and your ilk talk about war, war strategy, war tactics, war politics, war munitions, etc. as if you are talking about the hottest video game in which the real death and destruction wrought is no more real than the ‘virtual reality’ of the game you think you are playing at.
I understand that people have a hard time accepting the moral consequences of their actions and often times dig themselves in deeper by trying to convince themselves that they alone are right and the rest of the world must be wrong. But that doesn’t mean we have to allow you this indulgence, especially when it has real world consequences beyond your imagined reality.
I would guess you guys do have some redeeming qualities others can point to: your good to your dog, you go to church, you read bedtime stories to you kids, or whatever. But the overriding truth is that someone, Bush, you?, is responsible for killing all those innocent Iraqis, for destroying their country and for unleashing the dark forces of war madness that has taken a grip on the imaginations of the baser elements in our population.
How much of this are you responsible for, Joe? That is the question you will have to answer eventually. To god, or to your grandchildren.
Sigh. Just when I thought I was out…
Ken, grownups know that we all exist in a state of moral hazard. I don’t know where you live, or what you do for a living, but if it’s in North America, my Native American and Hispanic ancestors are pissed off at the opportunities you inherited from those who stole from them. If you live in Europe, it’s the German Jewish ancestors who are pissed.
Every day you wake up to riches you didn’t earn that were stolen from the bodies of those killed by the people you inherited from.
Now there are two responses to that realization: First, to claim a childlike innocence, and proclaim that you’ll make up for all of it be preaching nonviolence and driving a Prius.
The other is to accept that you’re part of the great system of history, and do what you can to make it better. Making it better involves both trying to do right actions as an individual, but also participating with your polity to minimize the level of present and future ‘badness’.
The people who originally argued for the war against Islamism to focus on Iraq believed (as I did and do) that not to do so was to leave the door open to a much worse future, much as those who ignored Hitler’s actions in Europe in the hope that they would not have to relive the horrors of Verdun instead gave us Bergen-Belsen, Stalingrad, Litice, and Dresden.
You’re trying to be a free rider on other people’s moral choices, and to me that’s the most immoral act of all.
A.L.
Returning closer to the topic of the post, a major moral and practical difficulty that’s been much commented on here and elsewhere is the meaning of “what-if.” In the absence of OIF, would the Iraq of 2004-2009-2014 have slowly developed as a civil society, shaking off Saddam, Qusay, and Uday? Or would the Ba’athists have plunged it back into strife?
There’s no way of knowing with any certainty. Especially if one rejects the Marxist idea of a definite historical progression, and thinks that contingency is a dominant process.
Francis Fukuyama–never a personal favorite–was interviewed on an NPR show yesterday, and he reasonably pointed out the way that passions can dominate interpretations on this point. For those who were against the war, it’s emotionally difficult to deal with the evidence that Saddam’s Iraq was a bad place for its citizens, as well as for the rest of the world–and that there were excellent reasons to suppose that things would get worse (from our point of view) from 2003 on.
Likewise, many of those who were in favor of the war have a hard time with the evidence that things have in some respects gone quite badly, worse than they would have in many scenarios of a no-invasion world of 2003-2006.
In 2003, Fukuyama (along with Ken Pollack) thought that the prospects of a no-invasion Iraq developing reasonably stably were pretty poor. He’s since changed his mind, but hasn’t indulged in the revisionism that says that his new stance was obviously the moral and correct one, all along.
My own opinion is that things in Iraq have worked out pretty badly, although not altogether worse than we should have expected. And that there are very good reasons to think that Iraq would be a far worse problem than it is now, had we not invaded. In other words, if one takes a long view, there’s more tragedy than comedy in history. Given the severe problems of the region and the ruthlessness of Saddam, his successors, and his Party, it wouldn’t have been unlikely that his continued rule would have led to hundreds of thousands of deaths, instead of the tens of thousands that we have seen to date. But this is just speculation. It’s still too early to tell how matters will stand in a few years.
A.L. some of the most evil people in the world are very comfortable with the line of argument you use to justify ‘cleansing’ the world, or their part of it anyway, of ‘undesirables’.
This may come as a shock to you but you do not have the priveledged position of judging who is worthy of death and who is worthy of life based on your nebulous notion of their “future badness”. (I can’t even believe that someone in America believes that, it is the stuff of tyrants, but you are the one claiming that position.)
For your further edification I will point out that the no war option, which you deride as ‘leaving the door open to a much worse future’, also leaves the door open to a much better future or at least a maintenence of a not bad, from our perspective, status quo.
It is without a doubt, unequivically true, that Iraq did not pose a danger or threat to the United States grave enough to warrant an ill conceived, hastily arranged, and poorly executed pre-emptive war. We could have waited. Things were not getting any worse. In fact, with a concerted effort on diplomacy capitalizing on the overwhelming level of worldwide good will we enjoyed, things could have gotten a lot better. In light of the strength we had to utilize the peaceful options the war option was clearly immoral.
Your steadfast refusal to accept moral accountablility for the results of the actions you endorse is understandable but cowardly.
Not only is your side responsible for the destruction of Iraq and the killing of thousands upon thousand of innocent people, we now have war madness spreading like a virus throughout the baser element of the populations on two continents, North America and the Middle East.
And you think to lecture me on ‘free riding’? You are a moral midget.
Ken,
Haven’t you heard….truth is relative to the right-wing alpha male in charge?
All of these right-wing nihilists have decided that war and killing is justified if the born-again leader desires it.
Hey NeoDude –
The graffiti section is over at Kos or Free Republic. This is where you come to make arguments and have discussions.
I’ll let you tag the place once, but the next one will vanish.
A.L.