Originally posted by: chucky2
Originally posted by: eskimospy
First of all, we will get no discounted oil. Oil is a global commodity. Secondly saying that staying in Iraq is somehow preventing terrorist attacks in the US is extremely dubious reasoning. If anything our invasion of Iraq has increased the numbers and resources of people wishing to do us harm here in America. (yes, in America, not in Iraq although that's now a whole ton of people too). The 'we're fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them over here' argument relies on specious reasoning, and has no basis in fact or analysis.
If Iraq continues to improve, and there isn't a mass radicalizing of the government there (cough, Iran, cough), you can bet we'll be getting discounted oil, global commodity or not. And I never said it was magically preventing terrorist attacks
today, my point all along is that Iraq is a long term benefit - if handled right.
In Pakistan the reason Musharraf doesn't attack the Taliban/AQ in his northeast is because he can't. His troops come from a lot of the tribes in those areas and they simply won't fight those people a lot of the time. To launch a large scale operation there would almost certainly lead to the overthrow of his government. A threatened US attack would not change this, but would just further galvanize the opposition. In short, using our military to threaten these countries is the absolute worst thing we could possibly do. Doing nothing is vastly preferable. Not only is it cheaper, but using our military actively damages our cause.
If Musharraf isn't willing to go after these loony POS's, then that's fine - but there's no reason to prevent our SF types from going in there and cleaning them out. The opposition is already the opposition there, you ain't going to be doing much more damage by going in. Taking a head in the sand approach up there has already made the job that needs to be done there that much tougher.
I think your perception of Iraq as compared to Vietnam, Algeria, Panama, etc. is naive. Hell, we claimed we were there to help Panama too. Countries on imperialist ventures always say this. It's almost like it's required on the invasion checklist. Last time I was in Panama city I saw a group of about 20 homeless people living in a burned out house right across from the (heavily guarded, fortress like) presidential palace. Changing a country for the better through invasion has an atrocious historical record. There is no reason to believe that Iraq will buck this trend. If anything the first few years of occupation indicate that it will be even worse then normal.
The last time you were in Japan, or N. Korea, or the Philipeans, did you see the same thing? Wierdly, when the US wants to make it happen, and the people there
band together to make it happen too, we've got a pretty decent track record. The Iraqi's are getting decades of hate, frustration, and repression out of their system...for us the only bad part of that is we get caught up in that, either directly or indirectly. Whether it's because areas have formed along religious lines and/or because they're getting it out of their systems is not totally clear (and most likely it's a mixture of both), but the
fact is things
are improving in Iraq. What's the next excuse from the America is an Imperialistic POS crowd when in 7-10 years Iraq is years ahead of where it ever was, has no brutal repressive dictator to worry about (and neither does the rest of the world), is a model of something good in the ME, and a source of gain for us (reduced ((from what they would be)) oil costs, oil availabiity, intelligence, etc)? Is the excuse then going to be that that all would have happened naturally had we not gone in..that the people would have overthrown Saddam themselves?
Again, if not going into Iraq to start affecting real change for long term benefit in the ME, what is the solution to changing the whole mindset over there of The West? How are you going to go about doing that when the Leadership over there (political and especially religious) brainwashes and/or represses their people?
Chuck