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| Bring the boys back home | |
A year on from the sacking of the House of Hussein in the cradle of
civilization, things are looking anything but. Iraq has been a learning
experience for the Coalition of the Willing. Some lessons are easy, some are
hard. Here are some things we now know - The tooth fairy, the man-friendly lesbians, and the weapons of mass
destruction are clearly well hidden in the desert sands - either that or
they don't actually exist in significantly large numbers.
- Arabs really do hate Americans - it's not just a bad
press.
- Less Americans die in war
than in the 'peace' that
follows it.
- Governments are
good at toppling governments - not good at fighting anarchic militias. There is an
impedance mismatch which greater fire power does not solve.
- Exit strategies are best determined before the war, not in the
messy aftermath.
Iraq is like a disappointing marriage. There are painful
memories, lots of emotional
commitment, the loss-of-face in being seen to fail, and the ever-present
temptation to cut and run. Should we or shouldn't we? Cut and Run One problem the Americans (and their partners) have is that they have to be
good guys. Any excess of force will be written up by Lefties and Islamicists as an atrocity; any
atrocity committed by terrorists will be rewritten
as justifiable anti-imperialist resistance. A puppet Iraqi government wouldn't
have that problem. Massacring a hundred innocent civilians in order to root out a terrorist
cell would be easy for an Iraqi government - even a democratic one. So the
solution is to train the locals in 'interrogation' techniques, hand over power
and simply say - "if you don't follow the election rules in the
constitution we wrote up for you, we'll be back to lock you all up with your
mate Saddam". It might not produce the caring, compassionate, or free democracy we have
in The West, but Iraq
isn't The West - it's the Middle East, and maybe a
faulty, corrupt, violent democracy is the best democracy a Muslim nation can
hope for. Sticking It Out The comparisons with Vietnam are pretty sound. Those who see the big
picture realize that Vietnam wasn't a war - it was a frontline military
operation in a larger war that The West won. Reagan's
'evil empire' was defeated, and socialism was totally
discredited (except in the eyes of a few die-hard losers who are unable to
admit defeat). We now have a new ideological war - with Islam (or Islamicists of we
insist on being politically
correct). Iraq is the currently the frontline for that war. The Islamic
psychos are congregating in the heart of the Middle East instead of flying airplanes into
buildings closer to home. The best place to fight a war is on someone else's territory. Ask any
vietnamese. The choice Australians (and Americans) will make their decisions at the ballot boxes
later this year. Little Johnny's supporters are adopting a stiff upper lip, and
insisting that 'victory is closer than ever', and the Mark (Maddog) Latham
supporters are rubbing their hands with glee over the blood, death, and
Floundering of the Willing in Iraq. Even the RSL is asking what Little Johnny's
exit strategy is. Which is a bit silly really. Of course Little Johnny has an
exit strategy - retirement.
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