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2005-02-21 Iraq-Jordan

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Posted by Dan Darling 2005-02-21 1:08:31 AM|| || Front Page|| [3 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Article: Although they have no immediate plans to halt attacks on U.S. troops, they say their aim is to establish a political identity that can represent disenfranchised Sunnis and eventually negotiate an end to the U.S. militaryâs offensive in the Sunni triangle. Their model is Sinn Fein, the political wing of the Irish Republican Army, which ultimately earned the I.R.A. a role in the Northern Ireland peace process. "Thatâs what weâre working for, to have a political face appear from the battlefield, to unify the groups, to resist the aggressor and put our views to the people," says a battle commander in the upper tiers of the insurgency who asked to be identified by his nom de guerre, Abu Marwan. Another negotiator, called Abu Mohammed, told TIME, "Despite what has happened, the possibility for negotiation is still open."

IRA-style negotiations work when you're doing IRA-style attacks. IRA-style negotiations in conjunction with mass casualty attacks? These guys are dreaming, and soon they'll be resting - in freshly-dug graves.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2005-02-21 2:34:51 AM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2005-02-21 2:34:51 AM|| Front Page Top

#2 Sinn Fein succeeded at the ballot box long before the current NI peace process.

Posted by phil_b 2005-02-21 2:42:36 AM|| 2005-02-21 2:42:36 AM|| Front Page Top

#3 The very fact that they run to TIME magazine shows they can't be trusted.

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 2:50:07 AM|| 2005-02-21 2:50:07 AM|| Front Page Top

#4 What do the insurgents want? Top insurgent field commanders and negotiators informed TIME that the rebels have told diplomats and military officers that they support a secular democracy in Iraq but resent the prospect of a government run by exiles who fled to Iran and the West during Saddamâs regime. The insurgents also seek a guaranteed timetable for U.S. troop withdrawal, a demand the U.S. refuses. But there are some hints of compromise: insurgent negotiators have told their U.S. counterparts they would accept a U.N. peacekeeping force as the U.S. troop presence recedes. Insurgent representative Abu Mohammed says the nationalists would even tolerate U.S. bases on Iraqi soil. "We donât mind if the invader becomes a guest," he says, suggesting a situation akin to the U.S. military presence in Germany and Japan.

LOL! You'll get nothing and like it.

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 2:54:54 AM|| 2005-02-21 2:54:54 AM|| Front Page Top

#5 2b...I would go further and say if Time prints it never count on it! Their record of fact and prognostication is an infinitesimally smaller percentage than random.

Posted by rag 2005-02-21 3:09:36 AM|| 2005-02-21 3:09:36 AM|| Front Page Top

#6 2b: Insurgent representative Abu Mohammed says the nationalists would even tolerate U.S. bases on Iraqi soil. "We donât mind if the invader becomes a guest," he says, suggesting a situation akin to the U.S. military presence in Germany and Japan.

This isn't the Sunnis being broad-minded - it means they've accepted that they're not going to win even if American forces pull out. It's a major psychological milestone for the Sunni community.

Now that Sunnis have accepted inevitable defeat, with or without GI's, I think they are finally starting to figure out that having American troops on Iraqi soil is the Sunni community's best insurance policy against mass reprisals by the Shiites or the Kurds. Having understood the inevitability of Iraq's demographics, Sunnis are starting to come to the same conclusion that led to their forebears siding with the Brits during the 1920's. If the Sunnis work it right, I predict that they could become our new best friends in the years ahead. If the Japanese and the Germans could become reconciled to their new American friends after their cities were burned to the ground, the Sunnis can become reconciled to American forces after the comparatively soft peace they've gone through.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2005-02-21 3:09:50 AM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2005-02-21 3:09:50 AM|| Front Page Top

#7 That's a good point about the willingness to "tolerate bases" but I'm not so sure that they will become our new best friends. Germans and Japanese didn't indiscriminately kill their own citizens or cut their own services.

The Sunni's aren't "the Germans", they are the Nazis.

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 3:16:25 AM|| 2005-02-21 3:16:25 AM|| Front Page Top

#8 2b: That's a good point about the willingness to "tolerate bases" but I'm not so sure that they will become our new best friends. Germans and Japanese didn't indiscriminately kill their own citizens or cut their own services.

There were a few million hard-core fascists in Germany and Japan supported passively by tens of millions of the population. At war's end, there might have been tens of thousands of them left. Note that both regimes practised the same kind of thing that Saddam did - opponents were tortured to death or assassinated. The reason they did not revolt en masse was because they were tired of war - too many of their men had been killed, and too many of their cities had been burned to the ground. Overall, the Japanese and the Germans were far more vicious than Iraq's Sunnis. There is simply no comparison.

And to talk about Iraqis Sunnis killing their own citizens is to misunderstand what Iraq is all about. You can talk about Germans killing their own citizens, or Japanese killing their own citizens - these nations had a well-developed sense of nationhood as of WWII. But Iraq is the accidental nation - the land of the three tribes - Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites. When Sunnis kill Shiites, they don't think they are killing their own people (and vice-versa). As to the Sunni habit of killing collaborators, the Nazis and the Japanese executed suspected traitors with great cruelty.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2005-02-21 3:44:50 AM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2005-02-21 3:44:50 AM|| Front Page Top

#9 But Iraq is the accidental nation - the land of the three tribes - Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites. When Sunnis kill Shiites, they don't think they are killing their own people (and vice-versa).

interesting point. And the Sunni's are educated making it possible for many of the Sunni people to work with the US. But I suspect they will be more like the French - unable to cope with the loss of their own sense of greatness and squander opportunities to achieve real but moderate gains. Like a gambler having lost big - trying to win it all back in increasingly risky bets...but ever spiralling downward believing the next roll will be the one - because it just can't be that he's lost so much.

Maybe not, but one difference I see that makes it almost impossible to predict what will happen in the "Arab" world is their lack of honor as compared to Western or Japanese civilization. Words, truces, deals are virtually meaningless. "Deals" are meant to secure something today..right now. You give me something, I'll give you something. The West doesn't seem to understand the mindset that when they secure a deal with promises - that's the deal....you got words in exchange for whatever it was that they got.

The reason I bring this up is that unlike Japan or Germany, that do have a culture of honor...or whatever word you want to use to describe the concept of honoring "deals" for the long term consequence of being able to secure additonal "deals" in the future based on trust - the Arab world seems incapable of understanding the benefits of honoring agreements as a bargaining chip for future negotiations.

Ok...I'm getting too deep into this, but my point is that I just don't think you can look at Germany or Japan and predict outcomes in the Arab world.

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 4:18:18 AM|| 2005-02-21 4:18:18 AM|| Front Page Top

#10 2b: The reason I bring this up is that unlike Japan or Germany, that do have a culture of honor...or whatever word you want to use to describe the concept of honoring "deals" for the long term consequence of being able to secure additonal "deals" in the future based on trust - the Arab world seems incapable of understanding the benefits of honoring agreements as a bargaining chip for future negotiations.

The Japanese and the Germans broke deals all the time. They conquered one region after another in this way - signing non-aggression treaties that they broke one after another. They stopped breaking deals after we stopped making deals with them - accepting nothing but unconditional surrender - butchering their armies and burning their cities to cinders.

They had no choice about submitting - their alternative was for us to turn both countries over to the Russians. We killed between 5% and 10% of their populations before we got their submission. We flattened their cities. Think of Iraqi with 2 million dead, 80% of the housing wrecked and most of the population starving. An war-weary, impoverished and hungry population is a meek population - just ask some of the most ruthless and despicable opponents on the face of the planet - the Germans and the Japanese. What we're seeing in Iraq has nothing to do with honor - we simply did not kill enough Iraqis or inflict enough destruction.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2005-02-21 4:45:46 AM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2005-02-21 4:45:46 AM|| Front Page Top

#11 There is a difference between the tryrants that create wars of aggression and ordinary people who, sans the tyrant would happily operate within an honest society. A tyrant is a tyrant - evil by nature.

In most western societies and in Japan, business and governments can and do run on trust. Just like e-bay. The majority of the people are honest.

But it seems to me that it simply isn't so with the people we are dealing with in these countries. A hudna? Completely meaningless. While it's true that in other wars, agreements were broken, a cease-fire generally meant something.

The the orginal point was that you said that the Sunni's might become our best friends. I seem them about as useful of friends as the Turks. Don't turn your back or take your hand off your wallet. Maybe we are just arguing over the meaning of the word, "friends". Can they possibly useful to us in the future..perhaps. Friends - never.

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 5:05:42 AM|| 2005-02-21 5:05:42 AM|| Front Page Top

#12 I see them..not seem them

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 5:08:35 AM|| 2005-02-21 5:08:35 AM|| Front Page Top

#13 And one last point - I don't mean to demean all Turks, Sunni's etc. etc. There are many, many, good honest people there.

But there is a distinct cultural difference in terms of the binding nature of a "deal". Lying is much more accepted and lacks the shame or embarrassment it brings in western societies. Their culture is based on a buyer beware mentality. All agreements are are subject to change, if possible. It's to be expected.

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 5:16:40 AM|| 2005-02-21 5:16:40 AM|| Front Page Top

#14 2b: The the orginal point was that you said that the Sunni's might become our best friends.

I was using the phrase "our new best friends" as an ironic turn of phrase - in the sense that they are going to come groveling to us as if we had been good friends all along and that all the bad blood from them having sent over a thousand of our boys home in body bags is ancient history. Not because they like us - but because they know they're beaten and fear what comes afterwards - if Uncle Sam leaves.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2005-02-21 5:19:10 AM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2005-02-21 5:19:10 AM|| Front Page Top

#15 oooh....well then...I agree! :-)

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 5:21:18 AM|| 2005-02-21 5:21:18 AM|| Front Page Top

#16 2b: But it seems to me that it simply isn't so with the people we are dealing with in these countries. A hudna? Completely meaningless. While it's true that in other wars, agreements were broken, a cease-fire generally meant something.

Hudnas only work with Westerners. The Shiites or Kurds aren't going to fall for a hudna - Middle Easterners play for keeps - they have the mass graves to show for it. Uncle Sam is the prison guard - the Sunnis are the fresh-faced skinny new kid on the prison block - fresh meat for the Shiites and the Kurds. Once the Sunnis figure out that they have lost, I think they're are going to be acting real clingy with Uncle Sam.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2005-02-21 5:27:06 AM|| [http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2005-02-21 5:27:06 AM|| Front Page Top

#17 I agree. You make a good point about that list of demands. Lots of bluster to save face, but the last one, "tolerating bases" may be their idea of a kiss blown our way.

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 5:32:47 AM|| 2005-02-21 5:32:47 AM|| Front Page Top

#18 disenfranchised Sunnis

My client is an orphan whose parents were murdered.

Posted by Shipman 2005-02-21 9:10:48 AM|| 2005-02-21 9:10:48 AM|| Front Page Top

#19 shouldn't that be, My client is an orphan who murdered his parents?

Posted by 2b 2005-02-21 12:20:26 PM|| 2005-02-21 12:20:26 PM|| Front Page Top

#20 Someone once said, 'You can't buy an Arab's friendship, you can only rent it.'

Posted by phil_b 2005-02-21 2:50:04 PM|| 2005-02-21 2:50:04 PM|| Front Page Top

#21 'You can't buy an Arab's friendship, you can only rent it.'

The list of groups for which this is not true is much shorter than the list of those for whom it is.

Posted by Mrs. Davis 2005-02-21 2:56:35 PM|| 2005-02-21 2:56:35 PM|| Front Page Top

#22 We killed between 5% and 10% of their populations before we got their submission.

3 percentum seems to be the key number.

Posted by Shipman 2005-02-21 4:03:31 PM|| 2005-02-21 4:03:31 PM|| Front Page Top

#23 The thing the Arabs need to remember is that we're always nastier the second time around - just look at Germany. It's not a good idea to treat us in a way that would make us WANT to come back a second time. Unfortunately, I don't think there are enough Arabs intelligent enough to understand that.

Posted by Old Patriot 2005-02-21 6:08:37 PM|| [http://oldpatriot.blogspot.com/] 2005-02-21 6:08:37 PM|| Front Page Top

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