jihadi
31-03-2006, 01:47 PM
Here is an intelligent analysis of the situation in Iraq & the options open to the crusaders.
Three years into Operation Iraqi Freedom one thing should be apparent: Iraq was not a cakewalk. Maybe the fight against the Iraqi military on the open battlefield was a cakewalk, but everything since President Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1, 2003 has been anything but. And it should be clear that resolving the current situation will also not be a cakewalk.
So what's a superpower to do? The United States basically has three options: the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The "good" option is probably better described as the least bad option. The administration needs to give up on its fantasy of creating a democracy in Iraq. Instead, the United States must be realistic, make the best of an admittedly bad situation, and do what's in the best interest of U.S. national security: fashion an expeditious military exit, whatever government is formed in Iraq – even an Islamic government – as long as it does not harbor or support terrorists who would do harm to the United States.
The "bad" option is pouring more troops into Iraq. The history of the British experience in Northern Ireland (a close parallel to America's precarious position in Iraq) suggests a need for as many 500,000 troops. But the paradox of a larger force is that it would only make the problem worse – confirming that the United States is an occupying power and increasing Iraqi resentment and resistance among the general population.
The "ugly" option is the course the Bush administration seems to be charting, which is a faux exit. The current administration plan (if you can call it that) is a train wreck in the making. It is the worst of all worlds – a combination of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, where military action to suppress the insurgency creates more new terrorists and an endless cycle of violence; the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, where Muslims from around the region (if not the world) flock to Iraq for jihad against the American infidel; and our own experience in Lebanon in the 1980s, when U.S. forces got caught in the crossfire of a civil war.
Complete text (http://www.antiwar.com/pena/?articleid=8771)
Three years into Operation Iraqi Freedom one thing should be apparent: Iraq was not a cakewalk. Maybe the fight against the Iraqi military on the open battlefield was a cakewalk, but everything since President Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1, 2003 has been anything but. And it should be clear that resolving the current situation will also not be a cakewalk.
So what's a superpower to do? The United States basically has three options: the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The "good" option is probably better described as the least bad option. The administration needs to give up on its fantasy of creating a democracy in Iraq. Instead, the United States must be realistic, make the best of an admittedly bad situation, and do what's in the best interest of U.S. national security: fashion an expeditious military exit, whatever government is formed in Iraq – even an Islamic government – as long as it does not harbor or support terrorists who would do harm to the United States.
The "bad" option is pouring more troops into Iraq. The history of the British experience in Northern Ireland (a close parallel to America's precarious position in Iraq) suggests a need for as many 500,000 troops. But the paradox of a larger force is that it would only make the problem worse – confirming that the United States is an occupying power and increasing Iraqi resentment and resistance among the general population.
The "ugly" option is the course the Bush administration seems to be charting, which is a faux exit. The current administration plan (if you can call it that) is a train wreck in the making. It is the worst of all worlds – a combination of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, where military action to suppress the insurgency creates more new terrorists and an endless cycle of violence; the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, where Muslims from around the region (if not the world) flock to Iraq for jihad against the American infidel; and our own experience in Lebanon in the 1980s, when U.S. forces got caught in the crossfire of a civil war.
Complete text (http://www.antiwar.com/pena/?articleid=8771)