August 17, 2004, When Life Imitates Godzilla Movie (Arabic subtitles)
A peace mission from Iraqis 1,300 delegate national conference (not to be confused with the "Iraqi National Congress") sent a mission to Najaf, to try to talk Muqtada al-"Baby" Sadr out of his long holdout at the Imam Ali Mosque and shrine, which is just causing all kinds of trouble.
Instead, more fighting broke out during the conference delegation's visit. We're sending bombers, and helicopters, and troops and s***.
We are f***ing crazy. We just shouldn't be there; it is every bit as bad in a p.r. sense (and in a karmic sense) as if we landed in Saudi Arabia and cordoned off Mecca and Medina and started lobbing mortar shells. At a time when it has become obvious that our failure to win hearts and minds has led to the failure to win the peace, doing everything we can to piss off every one of the one billion Moslems world wide is a really bad idea. Sadly, there is too much stubbornness on the line; the correct answer is to just pull out, and give Sadr's militia Najaf. It's strategically meaningless (translation: no oil under it), and we can only lose by winning there. The people of Najaf won't be happy-- but like we give a s*** about people in Iraq!
It's now 9 months later; polls have finally evened out-- the country is evenly divided on whether they think the Iraq war is a good idea and whether they support it. Bush should not be happy about this poll-- old people are bailing on him. Sure, Southern, White Republicans earning over $50K are de-lighted with him. But there are just not enough of them to carry him to victory. And as goes your feelings on the war, so go your feelings toward Bush-- and it is trending against him.
We need an exit strategy, and it's obvious that Bush doesn't have one. "Get more of our people killed" is not a good answer.
But while we can probably afford to wait the five months or so until President Kerry can start our draw down overall, we must leave Najaf immediately. We just cannot take a chance on damaging that mosque. I realize it sounds stupid to some people-- but that's the way it is: that building is more important than the human lives in it.
The fact that we may be too pig-headed to realize that the Iraqis see it that way is no excuse.
Comments
You may already have seen it, but there's a very interesting piece by Cullison in The Atlantic Monthly, in which he tells how he got hold of a computer used by al-Qaeda members full of documents.
The story they tell is of an organization in trouble, saved and made into a mass movement by Bush, who did exactly what they needed him to do.
I posted a short excerpt on my blog here.
Posted by rorschach at August 17, 2004 05:50 PM
Gee thanks, George
Toad!
See ... I'm not really dead yet.
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