Iran trying to take over Southern Iraq?

[mrbeast]

Saddam's strategy was a gamble. By keeping the world guessing about his WMD capabilities; by obstructing the inspectors, wheeling out the odd Al Hussain(?) missile infront of the cameras every now and then; he managed to keep his main opponant Iran in check. As Iraq's military was fatally weakened by the Gulf War, WMD capapbilities were all that was preventing Iranian domination. Saddam calculated that the US and her allies would not be stupid enough to remove him as this would hand Iran control of the gulf on a plate.

Unfortunately for Saddam, he had no idea who he was dealing with. G W Bush and the neocon agenda were not like the elder Bush he'd dealt with before.

If the inspectors had been able to visit and see everything they wanted I suspect that they would have discovered the cupboard was bare afterall.

[bradclark1]

Originally Posted by Trex

It's just a pity Washington didn't do much thinking about what had to happen post-Saddam before they launched. Another Marshall Plan and Iraq could have been an R&R choice for tired Yank troops. And it would have cost far less than the war.

Are you sure about that? Yes we sure as hell could have done a lot better than nothing after post Saddam but what we have today would have happened anyway. Our stupid inability to think ahead and the arrogant assumption that we would be seen as heroes by all Iraqi's just accelerated the problem. We just put a blindlfold on and jumped in with one foot. Jumping blind and one footed will always hurt when you land and fall.

[Trex]

Originally Posted by Tchocky

I'm not sure on this one.
What we've found out about the coercive intelligence regime in Washington leading up to the war leads me to believe that it was going to happen one way or the other.
Also, the amount of people in the run-up to the war saying there ain't any weapons, tells me that the whole idea of WMD was a pretext, an excuse. You can't go to war without public support, so you run around keeping the same couple of phrases really close together, "saddam....9/11.....al-qaeda". Overt stating isn't required.

That is however my point. Regardless of what spin was or was not happening inside Washington, had Saddam or his UN ambassador publicly announced (and followed through on) an open-door policy for the inpections, public support for the invasion would have been lower than whale poop. The best defence against darkness is light, after all. Even the hottest hawks could not have surmounted that one, I suspect.

mrbeast has a good point. Saddam, not for the first time, but just about for the last time, misjudged the consequences of his actions. Of course, any tyranny has to keep an iron grip on its own people or risk a coup or revolution; the open-door policy might have been seen as a sign of weakness.

Bottom line - good riddance to him.

[Trex]

Originally Posted by bradclark1

Are you sure about that? Yes we sure as hell could have done a lot better than nothing after post Saddam but what we have today would have happened anyway. Our stupid inability to think ahead and the arrogant assumption that we would be seen as heroes by all Iraqi's just accelerated the problem. We just put a blindlfold on and jumped in with one foot. Jumping blind and one footed will always hurt when you land and fall.

When it comes to winning conventional wars, nobody can match the USA. That is a given. But afterwards? My admiration drops off rather steeply, sorry.

It was clear as the fighting ceased that there was in most circles in Iraq a lot of relief that the monster was gone. People can accept a lot of short-term hardship in return for freedom, but the masses forget pretty quickly. From what I have read (and I will admit that I was not there), public opinion started dropping when it became clear that their lives were not going to improve anytime soon. Had the coalition moved immediately (with a plan as detailed as the invasion op plan) to get power back on, rebuild bridges, restore communications, restock hospitals, provide school supplies, etc, the average Iraqi would have been able to draw a good conclusion about the foreign invaders. Had there been a simple, clearly-stated roadmap, with firm deadlines, for the foreign troops to leave, it would have done much to diffuse the feeling that the USA were only there to seize Iraq's oil. Had the requirement for substantial security forces in Iraq to deal with the inevitable chaos been agreed to by the politicians (the generals seem to have seen it), then either there would have been far more coalition troops to keep intial order or else segments of the existing Iraqi army might have been maintained. Had funding been provided to the various minority churches for refurbishing their temples and shines, it would have brought enormous good will.

This sort of thing is not rocket science. I and a friend discussed it as the war was just starting. Truman's Marshall Plan kept Europe from going communist after WW2; a repeat would have done much to prevent the problems we see now. There are of course never any guarantees, but it was the best card in their hand - and they did not play it.

But then governments rarely miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.

[August]

Originally Posted by Trex

This sort of thing is not rocket science. I and a friend discussed it as the war was just starting. Truman's Marshall Plan kept Europe from going communist after WW2; a repeat would have done much to prevent the problems we see now. There are of course never any guarantees, but it was the best card in their hand - and they did not play it.

"Trumans" Marshall plan?

IIRC it took George Marshall three entire years after the end of WW2 to finally get Truman to agree to that plan and then only after thousands had frozen to death in their own homes due to lack of fuel.

But I believe you're right. Once it got off the ground the Marshall plan did help a lot, however it also depended on the citizens of those countries recieving aid, especially Germany, to step up and do most of the recovery themselves. This didn't happen all that much in Iraq where in spite of similar aid programs the population as far as i can tell basically sat back and expected it all to be done for them while they engaged in settling old scores with their neighbors.

IMO what was needed in immediate post war Iraq was not a Marshall plan but rather
a period of martial law backed up by a huge military presence comparable to the Allied armies total and complete occupation of Germany in the first three years after the war ended.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Trex

When it comes to winning conventional wars, nobody can match the USA. That is a given. But afterwards? My admiration drops off rather steeply, sorry.

It was clear as the fighting ceased that there was in most circles in Iraq a lot of relief that the monster was gone. People can accept a lot of short-term hardship in return for freedom, but the masses forget pretty quickly. From what I have read (and I will admit that I was not there), public opinion started dropping when it became clear that their lives were not going to improve anytime soon. Had the coalition moved immediately (with a plan as detailed as the invasion op plan) to get power back on, rebuild bridges, restore communications, restock hospitals, provide school supplies, etc, the average Iraqi would have been able to draw a good conclusion about the foreign invaders. Had there been a simple, clearly-stated roadmap, with firm deadlines, for the foreign troops to leave, it would have done much to diffuse the feeling that the USA were only there to seize Iraq's oil. Had the requirement for substantial security forces in Iraq to deal with the inevitable chaos been agreed to by the politicians (the generals seem to have seen it), then either there would have been far more coalition troops to keep intial order or else segments of the existing Iraqi army might have been maintained. Had funding been provided to the various minority churches for refurbishing their temples and shines, it would have brought enormous good will.

This sort of thing is not rocket science. I and a friend discussed it as the war was just starting. Truman's Marshall Plan kept Europe from going communist after WW2; a repeat would have done much to prevent the problems we see now. There are of course never any guarantees, but it was the best card in their hand - and they did not play it.

But then governments rarely miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.

Careful with Marshal plan comparisons Europe vs middle East. when the US had won in Europe, they nevertheless had to deal with people a.) being totally down to the ground and defeated and depleted of any will to carry on, and b.) having grown up in a very similiar cultural society and history - after all, America shares more with Europe than with any other part of the world. In Japan, it was condition a.) fulfilled. but in Iraq, neither there was a people that was totally flattened on the ground, nor was raised in a cultural context that was close and familiar to that of the West. And after all, neither the US nor the West are seen as the guardians of the holy grail in the middle East anyway.

You can cream them with sugar and gold from head to toe, and you will still be considered to be a foreigner, a stranger, an outsider, and often: an infidel, because it is a Westerner creaming them. Not to mention that you (American, l I assume) are a close ally and supporter of Israel.

Comparison between Iraq and postwar-Germany, -europe and - Japan do not work and did not work from the beginning.

[bradclark1]

Originally Posted by August

IMO what was needed in immediate post war Iraq was not a Marshall plan but rather a period of martial law backed up by a huge military presence comparable to the Allied armies total and complete occupation of Germany in the first three years after the war ended.

Yep! That would have been the right way if we were going to do it.

[Stealth Hunter]

[quote=Wreford-Brown][quote=Stealth Hunter]He told us Saddam had WMD's. No WMD's to be found.

If you want to kill a million people with conventional weapons you need a huge armoury to hide them in. If you want to kill a million people with WMDs you may only need a few barrels, and there's a lot of desert to hide a few barrels in.

If Saddam had WMDs then we may never find them, and in 50 years when the barrels have deteriorated enough to start leaking, no-one in the West is likely to care about a few dead bedouin, even if we find out.

I seem to recall that Bush knew their exact location, and expressed it in his speech about going to war with Iraq. Until we find proof, these WMD's never existed.

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by Stealth Hunter

I seem to recall that Bush knew their exact location, and expressed it in his speech about going to war with Iraq. Until we find proof, these WMD's never existed.

You recall wrong. I never heard that. Maybe in your dreams you heard that! All the speeches are on youtube somewhere, so listen to them. I remeber Bush saying that they will find them, but its going to take time to search. Well, the damn Israelies got to it first and destroyed the party in Syria last year.

-S

[August]

Originally Posted by Stealth Hunter

Until we find proof, these WMD's never existed.

Right. All those dead Kurds in Halajba died of natural causes as did several thousand of your countrymen during the Iran/Iraq war? You know that once a regime like that gets WMD they always have the capability to create more whenever they need it. Know-how is everything, especially in chemical weapons where building up stockpiles can be as easy as raiding a pool cleaner supply house.

Coupled with Saddam himself pushing the idea there's nobody that can honestly say that those "WMD's never existed" even today, but most importantly before the war without the advantages of hindsight.

[Wreford-Brown]

There's also a deep seated misunderstanding of the Iraqi ethos. Iraq is not a country, it's a group of tribes who do not understand the Western meaning of democracy. If you tell an average Iraqi that he can vote, he'll go to his tribal leader and ask who he should vote for. This is not democracy as we understand it in the West.

The closest analogy I've been able to come up with is a group of football supporters. Everyone support their own team (tribe) and will fight anyone who supports another tribe to increase the strength of their own. If another tribe tries to muscle in on your territory, you combine with your nearest neighbour (that you were fighting yesterday!) to kick out the interloper. The main difference is that these tribes are fighting with modern automatic weapons and mortars. In order to bring together the tribes you need either a very strong, charismatic leader or a brutal one. Saddam was one of the latter. The tribes don't care about the 'nation' of Iraq, all they want is to improve their own tribal power.

The tribes also don't care about national boundaries. There are tribes that are split across all Iraqi borders and they get free passage across the borders. It should therefore come as no surprise that other 'nations' are also allegedly fighting in Iraq. In fact, there's a border post 3km inside Iraq near Al-Amarah. It's an Iranian border post. It always has been Iranian, the Iraqis know it's Iranian and the Iranian know it's Iranian - the only reason that it's inside Iraq is because of some arbitrary border drawn on a US produced map, much as the old colonial powers tried to do in Africa.

The Vietnam war was started due to the fear of a 'Domino Effect' of communism through the Far East. Looking at this from the other side, should they be worried about a Domino Effect of democracy through the Middle East?

[Platapus]

Originally Posted by SUBMAN1

I guess you also believe that the World Trade Center thing was a conspiracy. I'd probably add in there that you probably think the Holocaust was a lie, and I bet you think the US never landed on the moon either, huh?

That's about the jist of what I get from your post.

-S

Then I respectfully think you need to work on your reading comprehension.

It is ok for you to have a different opinion, but so does he.

[Platapus]

Originally Posted by SUBMAN1

You recall wrong. I never heard that. Maybe in your dreams you heard that! All the speeches are on youtube somewhere, so listen to them. I remeber Bush saying that they will find them, but its going to take time to search. Well, the damn Israelies got to it first and destroyed the party in Syria last year.

-S

I believe it was Herr Rumsfield, Minister of Propaganda, who said "we know where they are". Not bush.

[Brag]

Originally Posted by Platapus

I believe it was Herr Rumsfield, Minister of Propaganda, who said "we know where they are". Not bush.

If it wasn't so tragic, it all belongs in a comedy

[Trex]

Skybird, August,

There are indeed different versions of whose idea the Plan was. From my readings, I lean towards Truman, but I acknowledge others differ. In any case, it was my intent to mean the Marshall Plan which took place during the Truman administration.

Regardless of the differences between 1945 and now, there are still many similarities. The Iraqi infrastructure had been systematically targeted by air strikes, leaving a large slice of the population without clean water, electricity, a satisfactory transport net, telephones, etc. By some accounts the hospitals and medical system had been crippled by a long embargo (again, I wasn’t there and there is little doubt that this last was at least in part due to Saddam himself, but the important point is that there were problems). All in all, the basics of life had been pretty seriously degraded. By some accounts, this situation has not even yet been completely resolved. It’s pretty hard to be enthusiastic about anything when you are shivering in the dark.

I think that spending a relatively minor amount (compared to the cost of the war to date), in a timely fashion, starting right now, to get the electrical grid up and running, restore bridges and roads, fix water and sewage treatment plants, get hospitals operating as they should – these things would have been perceived by the Iraqis as positive. The message should have been that: 1) We came here to get rid of Saddam. We did that and we are now going to leave as soon as possible to allow you to get on with your lives in whatever manner you decide. 2) We are, before we leave, going to make Iraq a better place in which to live buy getting the country back on its feet. 3) Even after we are gone, we hope to remain friends of the Iraqi people.

Such a move, despite all the cultural differences, would have made a big difference in how the average Iraqi saw the coalition and its presence.

There is no argument whatever that there should have been far more attention paid to keeping the peace in liberated areas, but that is but one piece of the puzzle. Rebuilding the country was critical, and the coalition muffed it.