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Originally Posted by dean_acheson
And yes, the work that the allies are doing to bring these 'inalienable' rights to common Iraqis is not only important and right, but is an example of the best western ideals of acting for the good of others.
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The White Man's Burden, eh?. But the fact of the matter is, these inalienable rights are about as foreign to the Middle East as space invaders, and frankly aren't worth a single American soldier's life to try to bring them. Especially when they WILL use these inalienable rights to institute shariah rule eventually (most likely with some 'help' from Iran). And there isn't anything we can do about that, no matter how many Iraqis watch American Idol knockoffs. The Arab/Islamic mindset has always been not only unaccomodating to western political philisophy, but outright hostile to it. Iran is the real threat to stability in the region, and with the turbulence in Iraq we are making it all to easy for them to work their evil. I mean, even SoDamn Insane eventually realized you should only antagonize the West to a certain point before you get the cr*p bombed out of your $hithole homeland. And you damned sure shouldn't openly proclaim to have a nuclear program.
We need to get out of the Iraqi cities. Our troops seem to only accomplish two things there: 1) drive around and wait to get shot at/IED'd and 2) pull random people out of their homes and interrogate them, 95% of which have NOTHING to do with the insurgency. If the Iraqis truely want democracy, fine. But they NEED to be able to do it themselves, because anything REQUIRING our assistance will be patently unworkable down the line when we DO pull out come next (in all likelihood, Democratic) administration. The most valuable thing in Iraq now is the remote airbases, because we WILL need these in at most a decade. We will be able to entice/force the Iraqis to let us keep a few of them through ample reconstruction funding. And House of Saud will not let us use our airbases there for any offensive action against Iranian territory. While the Gulf principalities might, they are far too close to aero ballistic/cruise threats/popup Iranian threats to prove useful and safe.
Face it, our lofty (foolish) ambitions for Iraq are over, and should have been years ago. Shoving democracy down MEastern country's throat is not going to overcome millenia of culture and history. AL's signature sums it up quite well: "Hope is not a strategy."
PD