A Few Words on Iraq

This is a cross-post from a thread I was discussing some current issues with over at MMORPG.com. yeah, politics on a gamers forum -- go figure. Anyway the guy was saying how he was against the Iraq war, and that Saddam Hussein didn't harbor terrorists there. This led me to make this post, which I thought was worth saving here:

Actually, Abu Nidal lived in Iraq. Saddam certainly harbored terrorists, just not Al Qaeda. He also backed terrorists in Palestine. Militant, or Political Islam is not one big monolith -- there are many rivals for the same prize -- a caliphate over the Muslim world. Some are more secular than others, Saddam Hussein and Momar Qaddafi come to mind; and others are more religious -- the mullahs of Iran and Osama bin Laden are fine examples.

All are, to a greater or lesser extent -- part of the Jihad. They may hate one another, but they hate us more. hate is mostly what they do, so if they are just mildly disgusted, that is akin to being friends in the West.

On 9/11, Palestinians hit the streets and cheered -- they didn't have anything to do with it, but we can see where their sympathies lie. sadam had a mural of it painted and celebrated it. In the last years of his reign he rediscovered his faith and got more religious, because he saw the tide turning.

Now, I feel you have it backwards. Bin ladin's biggest enemy (other than us, of course) is Saudi Arabia. By encouraging tyranny in any part of the Muslim world, we help him. By encouraging liberty, we harm him.

The old realpolitik is a failure. Desiring stable discatorships (there really is no such thing, but whatever) serves HIM. The Bush doctrine, while horribly applied and admittedly even more poorly sold by perhaps the worst communicator to ever sit in the White House, is sound. We need to encourage liberal democracy in that part of the world, since that is the only way to defat political islam.

That requires strength, patience, and deliberate action. Bin laden himself said, the people will follow a strong horse. He is right on that. Does this mean we go attacking dictatorships willy nilly without regard to prudence? No. Does it mean we bite off more than we can chew? No to that as well.

Should we rely more on trade and friendship to get this done? Of course.

Back to Iraq. Iraq was a convenient place to start this for several reasons: one, he was already in violation of the terms of surrender; two, he was a particularly nasty piece of work, and three, Israel needs a free fly zone if they are going to hit Iran down the road.

It served multiple purposes and what did it do as well? We defeated them, and only lost a few thousand men. Any loss of life is bad, but think how that looks to the world of the Jihad -- how many of THEM will have to die vs us?

That alone, had the press not been against the war and the Democrats openly seeking to undermine it, could have demoralized them. It did, at first, until the media and the left erased all that. Bush, had he been an effective communicator like a Ronald Reagan could have gone to the people and turned that around. Bush...well blech.

Anyway Iraq may not have been the wisest place to start this -- maybe Iran would have been better. But then, people would make the argument that Iran was Shiite instead of Sunni...and a bad place for that reason -- once again not looking at the big picture.

This is a generational war that we did not start. In fact this is a millennial war that has been going on since the 600s. We better get used to it, and stop dividing over it. It is true, them being divided helps US -- but US being divided helps them much, much more.