Chaos in Iraq? by dreamtrove

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Chaos in Iraq?

POSTED BY: DREAMTROVE
UPDATED: Monday, December 26, 2011 13:35
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Friday, December 23, 2011 2:16 PM

I'm vaporizing for the holidays, but here's some thoughts:

http://battleland.blogs.time.com/2011/12/22/is-iraq-falling-apart/
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/23/business/energy-environment/exxon-mo
bil-and-iraq-clash-over-payment.html
Looks like Maliki tried to arrest Hashimi for terrorism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariq_Al-Hashimi
Which started some Sunni riots and bombings, and I didn't see it up here, so I thought I'd toss it up for discussion. (If there's already a running thread on this, then my apologies.

In other news: Biohazard Tebowing

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Friday, December 23, 2011 5:42 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Well, this is working out pretty much as I predicted.

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Friday, December 23, 2011 6:39 PM

DREAMTROVE

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Well, this is working out pretty much as I predicted.

Yes. As my sister who also predicted it said, we really created a mess without a good exit.

Apparently the Shiia have taken the opportunity to kick the Sunnis out of govt. for fear that the Sunnis would press their reform to place themselves into permanent majority, which the population reflects. The Sunnis in turn seem to have resorted to terrorism, which seems to be supported by the Saudis. Ahmadinejad seems to be actually unhappy with us for leaving, showing exactly how complex the situation is.

It's hard for the country to just split when you have some cosmopolitan cities, but you also can't just have a majority ethnic rule, or you end up with Zimbabwe, or a minority ethnic rule and you end up with South Africa.

What a mess.

I suspect that now Saudi Arabia and Iran will compete to fill the power vacuum. Meanwhile, instead of leaving troops behind, we're leaving mercenaries, some 11,000 people in all. The problem I see is that while those mercenaries work for us, they are mercenaries, and other players there are going to offer them a lot of cash.

I was in favor of getting out, but with a plan where we got some international involvement in under a legitimate mechanism. Since we basically know what's going to happen politically, why not make it official and at least shed some light on it. This power struggle is not going to do anyone any good.

Also, we've made another Vietnam situation: It's going to be politically impossible for us to go back in there, just as it was when the VC asked us for help against the Khmer Rouge in '75, there was just no way, even if he wanted to, that Ford could have gotten America to send troops back *in* after we had just fought for the at least 6 years of solid protesting to get out.

My guess is that the stronger power player here is Iran, and the result will be a minority govt, which will lead to a permanent majority resistance with a terrorist front line like the IRA which will be supported by a small minority in the majority, but seen as the face of the majority for most of the world. IOW, we seem to have gone to Iraq, a country that had no terrorism, and permanently installed terrorism. We also seem to have taken a US puppet, however sour, and replaced him with an increasingly anti-US govt. I'd say we did a heckuva job.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Saturday, December 24, 2011 2:02 AM

PIZMOBEACH

... fully loaded, safety off...

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Well, this is working out pretty much as I predicted.

You and about 100 million other people. It's hilarious really, in a black humor kind of way. All that talk and spending, and talk, and destruction, and talk, and you can't help but imagine Malichi looking at his watch on the last day, one eye on the "last chopper' the "last whatever" to leave and another eye on the red phone, drumming his fingers on his steel reinforced desk, trying to act calm before he leaps into action and stirs up some shiite.
Nobody has our stock pile and just sits on it, they're going to find ways and reasons to use it. I remember when Santa brought me my first bb gun, it was only a couple minutes before I got in trouble for shooting my brother in the backside (hey, I didn't think it would hurt too much there and I might get away with it... sound familiar?). We pull out of Afghanistan we'll just go somewhere else... like New York! (merry christmas rwed).

Scifi movie music + Firefly dialogue clips, 24 hours a day - http://www.scifiradio.com

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Saturday, December 24, 2011 5:20 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Just as a reminder, of what I sad lo these many years ago...

We wanted to create a unified, democratic, secular Iraq. Well, the Kurds had NO interest in "unified", the Shiites NO interest in "secular", and the Sunnis NO interest in "democracy" (payback being such a bitch, and all).

So the best thing that can happen to Iraq and to us is what happened to the former Yugoslavia, the former Czechoslovakia, and the former Sudan.

And, as an aside... since getting oil out of Iraq turned out to be such a bust, we turned to... LIBYA! Yaaaay!!!

And now, radical Islamist forces are gaining strength there, too. I think that "we" think we don't care which tyrannical forces are installed, as long as they use our currency. Heh. Some tyrannies cannot be negotiated with.

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Saturday, December 24, 2011 6:49 AM

DREAMTROVE

Quote:
Sig:

I think that "we" think we don't care which tyrannical forces are installed, as long as they use our currency.

I think this has been one of your more compelling insights, the American quest for currency dominance.

The unity of Iraq is an artifact of the British partitioning in 1919, which was done specifically to prevent France from having any oil or regional influence. There's no good reason to maintain that illusion, but I can see where Maliki would want to continue it for the same reason we would: oil.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

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Saturday, December 24, 2011 6:53 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

OIL: It's mine, my precioussss.... yessss..... and pay me in USD, or I will be invaded.

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Monday, December 26, 2011 1:35 PM

RIONAEIRE

Beir bua agus beannacht

Maybe Iraq should split into three countries and then people will get along better. We sure make messes of things don't we? Can we learn from our mistakes? It would have been so much easier if we had the Quadruple S to solve our problems for us, the only time I like the idea of mercinaries.

"A completely coherant River means writers don't deliver" KatTaya

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