Backlash in Iraq
This NY Times article describes how the youth of Iraq are strongly turning away from religion and its jihadi excesses in Iraq as a result of the violence perpetrated on the population there.
This is good news—and, as Abe Greenwald of Commentary blogs points out, it’s also good news that the Times is reporting on this particular good news.
Greenwald writes that the phenomenon in Iraq indicates that the notion that war there might lead to changed hearts and minds was not a pipe dream, but is becoming a reality. And although I agree that this is true, I’m not so sure the connection to American efforts there is clear. especially if you read the Times piece carefully. Author Tavernise has managed to compose an article of over 2000 words on the subject without crediting the Americans—or mentioning the surge.
There is no question that the article’s main premise is correct: there is a unique and intense backlash by the population of Iraq, including the young people, against the violence and rigidity of the jihadis there. But this did not happen in a vacuum. The postwar post-Sadaam chaos and the occupation both created the opportunity for these jihadis to temporarily flourish, and provided the means for the Iraqis to cooperate with the Americans to crush them.
When you think that religion has made all hopes for a positive outcome utterly impossible — civility, secularism, and even moderations of religiosity, can still win the day, until the rats come back up from the sewer to begin it all again. And what spawns these rats in the first place?
All i can say is that the surge is not working
What are the Iraqi youth turning towards? As long as it isn’t towards materialism, feminism, and matriarchy just like Western Civilization. Because soon after that, they’ll begin legislating misandry just like the West. Maybe throw in a few abortions, a high divorce rate and the destruction of the traditional family to go along with it. Sprinkle in some gay marriage, some slut feminism, a massive rate of STDs, and the greatest trojan horse of all: Women’s Rights.
we also have to credit the brutality of Al Qaeda in Iraq in a sense. Given the murderous and abuse nature of their actions compared to the security and freedom offered by the Americans, i think the choice was inevitable … inevitable as long as the Americans remain to exist as a viable choice. Withdrawing US troops would be a disaster humanitarian wise.
Women’s rights … like the rights of blacks, like any other rights are an excellent idea ! As long as it remains limited to :
“everybody gets a chance”
That 90% of women cannot get through a fireman’s interview, that involves carrying a 180 pound man out of a building, and 90% of men are just not capable to get a baby to stop crying at a teacher’s evaluation is unfair.
It is, however, how God made us, and this is only ours to accept. We can’t change it. Everybody gets to try. Those that suck, whether male or female, gets to … try something else. This WILL NOT result in equal numbers of men and women everywhere, and that can never be the intention.
Likewise, unless immigrants study, they’re not going to get engineering positions. Same goes for natives, so where’s the problem ? If they don’t want to study – they don’t get the jobs, nor the pay.
Same for blacks. How many years have passed since the last white person won the 100m sprint ? Is that discrimination ?
“Everybody gets to try” for a job, gets to bid on a house, gets to … etc. Nothing less, and especially nothing more.
The whole concept of human rights can not be a basis of any sound legal code, because rights of some humans obviously incompatible with rights of others. We can not resolve these conflicts without some prioritization. Note that in US constitution human rights are never mentioned, and even Bill of Rights is about quite another matters – restrictions on government intervention. This modern obsession with human rights would be ridiculous to next generations.
Recent developments in Pakistan are also revealing. Elections results there were a huge blow to Mussaraf – but to jihadists too. Radicals lost there miserably to coalition of a moderate Muslim party and of secularist Bhutto party.
So basically you’re saying we had to invade Iraq to cause a huge upsurge in islamic fundamentalism which would then make everyone sick of Islamic fundamentalism?
The irony is that the reactionary leftist meme that “We are creating terrorists when we kill Iraqis” turned out to be exactly correct, except it was completely wrong, that the reality is that it was al Queda was creating anti-terrorists.
“So basically you’re saying we had to invade Iraq to cause a huge upsurge in islamic fundamentalism which would then make everyone sick of Islamic fundamentalism?”
Strangely enough, yes. But sometimes that’s the way wars go.
“No war plan ever survives contact with the enemy.”
We learned.
al Queda didn’t.
We, and the Iraqi people, win.
>HLVS Says:
March 4th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
So basically you’re saying we had to invade Iraq to cause a huge upsurge in islamic fundamentalism which would then make everyone sick of Islamic fundamentalism?
Seems like it.
So basically you’re saying we had to invade Iraq to cause a huge upsurge in islamic fundamentalism which would then make everyone sick of Islamic fundamentalism?
Nope, it just happened to turn out that way.
We had to bring, to Iraq, awareness of the God given rights to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. Then we had to surf the circumstances of history until truth prevailed. We need to keep surfing. In a macro sense, the need to surf never ends.
Pingback:Prose Before Hos
Our nihilist, freedom-hating Democratic Party defeatists explain this all away as a fluke, a rejection of the point that allows the antiwar cadres to blame it all on the occupation.
These are the same folks who compared the Taliban’s 12 year-old boy terrorists – who inflict beheadings and live-immolations on their hostages – to the Catholic Church’s scandals of homosexuality.
It’s all moral relativism. Indeed the U.S. is even worse than our enemies, claim the antiwar types: The Bush administration’s is the new Nazi regime.
We’re winning in Iraq: The administration sees it, the military sees it, the American people see it, and Iraqis themselves see it – as they increasingly renounce their own religion’s fight against the historic forces of freedom.
Yes, that’s victory, on the largest scale imaginable.
Jeezus. A Marine threw a possibly live puppy off a cliff.
I think I will head down to the abortion clinic to see happy stuff that will get my mind off that poor puppy.
So basically you’re saying we had to invade Iraq to cause a huge upsurge in islamic fundamentalism which would then make everyone sick of Islamic fundamentalism?
We’re saying we had to fight and kill the French in Africa before going to Italy and Germany, two nations that didn’t attack us, before finally ending up in Japan with a nuke or two.
“So basically you’re saying we had to invade Iraq to cause a huge upsurge in islamic fundamentalism which would then make everyone sick of Islamic fundamentalism?”
We invaded Iraq to apply solutions to a set of interrelated complex destructive problems, eg, corrupt despotic governments in a mutually enabling cycle with Islamic extremism, not to mention the “Leader of the Free World” trapped in that cycle after Desert Storm. Anyone who understands the complexity of the region’s problems understood that any serious solution had to be ambitious and complex. and, just like any ambitious real-world venture, actual implementation in Iraq would involve evolutionary changes, challenges, and risks. Successful leadership usually is not about a immaculate implementation of Plan A (eg, the failed Bremer-led CPA), but a navigation of failures, with seizures of opportunities and adjustments, toward the ultimate vision.
Certainly, the Islamists have understood better than most Westerners the threat posed to them by our vision for post-Saddam Iraq. For terrorists, the death, destruction and outrages of war are good for them. Therefore, for us to wage war in the War on Terror without aggressive peace-building would have helped the terrorists. Corrupt despotic governments, together with sectarian failure of effective government, are good for them, so for us to settle for allied tyrants – as was our Cold War ‘realist’ way – would have helped the terrorists. On the other hand, the radical changes threatened by our peace-building in Iraq poses the greatest danger to the terrorists’ world vision. As such, they’ve fought the American-led nation-building of post-Saddam Iraq as best they could. In doing so, however, in a way that cuts through the terrorists’ propaganda advantage, they’ve also provided a sharp, interactive contrast to the way of life and society championed by us versus the way of life and society championed by them.
To address neo’s point about our military not getting the credit it deserves for changes in Iraq, I don’t mind that. This isn’t imperialism; it’s not about us owning Iraq. From day one, for us to succeed, we had to take a leap of faith that Iraqis would come to own our vision for Iraq, which meant it needed to become their version of our vision. Victory in Iraq won’t be through the US receiving credit or by winning popularity contests. We’re trying to catalyze self-sustaining and self-reproducing fundamental changes – a geopolitical evolutionary mutation – that will grow independently of our direct control. Certainly, our long-term support to bulwark and cultivate will be necessary, such as it has been in Europe and East Asia, but the more that it’s an Iraq-owned evolution, the better that bodes for our mission.
Wow.. anyone hear of this.. remember Obama would meet with Chavez who is supporting FARC as well as hosting Hezbellah:
Colombia said on Tuesday that FARC rebels had been planning to make a “dirty bomb” with radioactive material, threatening the entire Latin American region.
The charges by Vice-President Francisco Santos, at the United Nations-sponsored Conference on Disarmament, marked a dramatic turn in a regional crisis that has seen Venezuela and Ecuador cut diplomatic ties with Colombia.
Bogota has already accused Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez of funding the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrillas, after Colombian forces crossed into Ecuador and killed a senior rebel commander on Saturday, sparking troop movements and warnings of war.
“Just yesterday (Monday) our national police submitted an initial report regarding the content of two computers found with Raul Reyes, second in command of FARC, who was killed last Saturday,” Santos said.
They contained “information from one commander to another indicating that FARC was apparently negotiating for radioactive material, the primary basis for generating dirty weapons of mass destruction and terrorism,” he added.
“Jeezus. A Marine threw a possibly live puppy off a cliff.”
That Marine sealed his career on that one – real or not he is in trouble.
Real and it is obvious why – that definitely falls into the realm of animal cruelty and *should* be punished. However, I’m one that is siding on not real at this point.
Not real and the guy is incompetent enough that he ought to be punished – does *anyone* on this planet think that video would do anything other than allow people who want to paint the military as a bunch of bloodthirsty hooligans to talk about it non-stop? Part of their oath and standards of conduct prohibit this type of thing – at the least a severe rank reduction of not something worse.
In either case it doesn’t represent the military in general, the military is large enough that it will have pretty much all walks of life and its own criminals.
One can generally find teenagers that do cruel stuff like that yet we all know we can’t paint all teens with that brush. If they are from a predominantly liberal area we also know we can’t use that brush for everyone from them. But from a group that is OK to be prejudiced against (military, rural people – especially south east US, or several other groups)? Then all we have is rock solid proof that their prejudice and bigotry is correct, correct I tell you!
I just read Aayan Hirsi Ali’s book Infidel and I think there are parallels between her experiences and the experiences of the people who have turned against religion in Iraq. She grew disenchanted with Islam because she felt it was backward and inhumane. She had ambitions for herself and other women and it seemed to her that Islam had to reform or it would remain a threat to those ambitions.
In other words, she saw Islam and the modern world and chose the modern world. Perhaps the violence perpetrated by AlQaida in Iraq together with their blatant desire to return to the past has become something that the majority of the young people in Iraq simply refuse to believe in. After all Islam is a religion that preaches predestination. As Allah wills it. If this is what Allah wills, then more and more young people will doubt that there is an Allah.
As for that awful puppy video, all I can say is that I hope the thing is a hoax. But it should be remembered that Saddam threw people off of buildings.
I just read Aayan Hirsi Ali’s book Infidel
Some keep saying we need to moderate Islam?
They forgot one thing here; the moderation is not for Islam the moderation is for people and how they think and their mindset.
Back to Iraq neo may I add this to give wide picture what’s going on there?
For more than 20 years the Iraqi opposition groups and their supporters from Iran, UK, US, keep saying they will works for Iraq and Iraqis.
After the invasion we saw a huge change for many reasons power vacuum, lawlessness, and power hunger.
Those guys who set by Iran like Da’awa Party and Sader “Mahidi Militia” and other religious groups who rush to take their share from “wallcake” Like Fadilaa party, Hezbollah and other religious gropes.
What Iraqi discover and now many from southern Iraq start writing openly about the corruptions, lies and fake Islam these Mullah and turban start deploying in Iraq.
Killing women’s in Basra because they did not cover their heads (250killed) to bringing fake and inhuman practice stick it to Islam which never been in Islamic teaching or Koranic teaching, (Ashura’a) and more over the corruption and misleading of those “religious “ leaders as they call themselves who rush to occupying governmental assets and properties or stealing and killing some farmers or other Iraqi who hold good land and properties all sort of doggy things that they accused old regime doing it’s they showing they are far more corrupt and doggy from old regime practice under name of Islam.
I thing Iraqi were watching closely in status of Shook & Awe what happing to them to their country and to their future, after five year most of the public services are down from electricity to roads schools hospitals and universities, make Iraqi asking where is the promises by those Mullah who never stopping their call that old regime did horrible things in southern Iraq.
So in today time Iraqi see things life and watching very closely who promises them to bring them to haven but they still living in hell
I remember one Iraqi woman on TV after the invasion 2003 specking about covering here head and why Iraqi women covered their heads during Saddam time?
She said because of his Son Uddy most Iraqi women did (of course she lied)
I wish see her now and ask her why now Most Iraqi Women covering their heads and their body from the top to bottom?
So how many new Udday “Mullah” now?
Soviets also used women liberation card against Islam in Central Asia, and with some success: I never met a veiled woman in Tashkent, Bukhara or even in high-mountain Tajik villages. But misogyny of traditionalist Asian society can always find other ways to express itself even without Sraria codes.
Whatever progress you may see in Iraq is illusionary. I intend to remove all US forces within three months of my inauguration.
Iraq will fall to the anarchist, genocidal forces of evil. Get used to it. Move on.
No new blog, so I’ll comment. Is a blog on Iraq some sort of giant Roarshack? (I have no clue about spelling and don’t care to take the time to look it up so I’ll play with it.) I read the first few comments and they all seemed so totally off the wall and unrelated to your post that I wanted to ask if it’s always like that or just when you bring up the war?
Re: marine and puppy
My solid suspicion: that was not a Marine, the puppy was dead, the puppy “yelps” were absolutely fake.
However, it’s an absolute certainty that some of our uniformed personnel will, from time to time, do things which are atrocious and immoral. Therefore, lets pretend it was an actual Marine(which, at this point, I doubt), and lets pretend it was a live puppy. If you are a person who is fervently linking to and encouraging people to watch that video: what, exactly, is your point?
“Marines do bad things, and therefore the U.S. should withdraw from Iraq”?
If that’s your point, you are saying: Marines do bad things, and therefore the Marines should abandon the Iraqi people to Al Qaeda, to Iran, and to chaos. Bluntly, you are an idiot. Maybe I’m having a bad week or something, but you are an idiot. I don’t feel like being gracious.
abandon the Iraqi people to Al Qaeda, to Iran, and to chaos.
Iraqi already are abandoned to Iran, we saw Ahmadinejad in Baghdad which give very clear singes that no world leaders went to Iraq on announced visit to Iraq just Ahmadinejad, he welcomed with top “Iranian” officials in Iraq so what’s that tell?
Also Iraqi now telling and saying long time Iranians fiddling inside Iraq no one listen to the degree make suspicions that this deliberates acts.
US keep for that first 3yeras accusing Terrorist comes from Syria and other parts of Iraq they never mentioned Iran at all as if Iran have no borders with Iraq, as if Iran did not harbour the terrorist like Magnyiah and other Al-Qaieds terrorists who were passed through Iran to Iraq and other part in ME.
Finally Iranian have pushed and control oil filed (Majnon) that on the borders in south Iraq and “Iranian/Iraq” keep quite lips what really happen but Iraqi engineers and technical staff was pushed and banned to go to those sites.
you are in a logical trap:
If Iran already controls Iraq, you would simply be pointing out that truth. You would have no need to promote (fake?) puppy videos. You would not waste your time on puppies, and on individual Marines(?), because you could point to the elephant which was Iran dominating Iraq.
That you spend time promoting puppy videos is ipso facto evidence that you cannot make the case that Iran already controls Iraq.
It’s a logical trap. It’s a Catch 22. You are in it. There are only two ways out:
1) legitimately make the case that Iran controls Iraq;
or, since that case cannot actually, factually be made
2) come into the light, man! Come to reality! It’s a happier, more satisfying, more fulfilling place to be!
legitimately make the case that Iran controls Iraq;
or, since that case cannot actually, factually be made>/i>
Give your evidences I will show mine?
Tell us why you 100% sure Iran not control Iraq? Show us who wasting his time man.
We all are waiting your evidences.
legitimately make the case that Iran controls Iraq;
or, since that case cannot actually, factually be made
gcotharn, Give your evidences I will show mine?
Show us where your elephant hiding
Tell us why you are 100% sure elephant Iran not controling Iraq?
Let see who wasting his time man.
We all are waiting your evidences.
Truth:
I see, so the soon to be president of the United States can snuggle up to the mad mullahs, but if Ahmadinejad goes to Iraq that means he runs the country. They are neighbors, would you prefer another war between them? The last one killed a million people.
See this is how the left works: if the Iraqis try to be civil with the Iranians then they are catering to them and betraying us so we must leave.
IF, however, George Bush does not go hat in hand to kiss butt for the mad mullahs, he is just being an arrogant war mongering tyrant who refuses to admit his mistakes.
Yeah, that makes sense.
Terrye
would you prefer another war between them? The last one killed a million people.
You should ask yourself and other follow American first this question why GWB elected TWO times to WH? What’s that mean Americans prefers war?
What should be between neighbors is the respect of Iraq.
If these “mad mullahs” as you said behave like normal neighbors which in Iraq case no one of its neighbors have show Iraqi any respect and while united state struggle to build Iraq which make terribly hard to help Iraqi they struggled to get every thing in order .
This is the problem that US went through; Iraqis paying very height price for that their blood.
BTW, some survey suggested there are 1 Million Iraqi killed in this war, so let think for a moment why this number of Iraqi killed?
if Iraq in 8 years lost million here we got one million in 5yeras and still the Iraqi bleeding due to his neighbors who do not love to see Iraq free, prosperous country.
>This is the problem that US went through; Iraqis paying very height price for that their blood.
BTW, some survey suggested there are 1 Million Iraqi killed in this war, so let think for a moment why this number of Iraqi killed?
Gee.. maybe because the Arab/Muslim culture is deranged. It isn’t Americans who are killing that many people (not that I accept your outrageous number).. it’s Muslim killing Muslim. Religion of Peace vs Religion of Peace.
Inshallah
Ready Or Not lyrics,
Now that I escape sleep walk away
those who convolate knows the world they hate
Jails bars ain’t golden gates
those who fake they brake when they meet they four hundred pound mate
if i could rule the world, everyone who have a gun
and together of course we’d get the up in our their horse
I kick a rhyme drinking moon shine
I poor sip on the concrete, for the deceased
but no don’t weep, Wyclef in a state of sleep
thinking about the robbe-RY that I did last WEEK
Money in the bag, bank a look like a drag
I wanna play with pelicans from here to Bagdad
Gun blast, think fast I think I’m hit
My girl pinch’s my hips to see if I still exist
I think not, I send a letter to my friends
A born again, hooligan only to be king again
The Culture of Suicide bombing
Suicide operations caught the Arab imagination in 1983, when Lebanese Shi’ite Muslim guerrillas trained by Iran blew up 241 American servicemen and 58 French paratroops in a simultaneous operation in Beirut.
The technique – and the cult of martyrdom characteristic of the Shi’ite branch of Islam – was transferred to the Palestinians, leading to a series of bombs in Israeli buses and market places. Islam condemns suicide as a way to hell and damnation.
Before 1983 there were few suicide bombings. The Koran forbids the taking of one’s own life, and this prohibition was still generally observed. But when the United States stationed Marines in Beirut, the leaders of the Islamic resistance movement Hizbollah began to discuss turning to this ultimate terrorist weapon. Religious authorities in Iran gave it their blessing, and a wave of suicide bombings began, starting with the attacks that killed about sixty U.S. embassy workers in April of 1983 and about 240 people in the Marine compound at the airport in October. The bombings proved so successful at driving the United States and, later, Israel out of Lebanon that most lingering religious concerns were set aside.
Truth,
if, tomorrow, you were sworn in as President of the United States, what policy would you follow in Iraq?
How would your policy help Iraq and the Iraqi people?
How would your policy help America and the American people?
How would your policy help to solve the Jihad problem in the world?
BTW- neo’s blog has looked at claims of numbers of Iraqi dead since the U.S. invasion in March 2003. The accurate number is not 1M. The accurate number is more like a tenth of that false claim – which brings a question to mind – to which everyone has their own, personal answer: is freedom worth fighting and possibly dying for?
I am legitimately interested in learning what you would do if you were suddenly President of the United States.
gcotharn We all are waiting your evidences.
gcotharn look who wasting his time man,
look who promote (fake?) puppy videos. and who waste your time on puppies,
We still waiting answer us, do not hide behind hyperactive NEW questions.
Do not change the suject and answer what I asked gcotharn
Answer us first you will get answers to yours. is that clear gcotharn
What is my evidence that Iran does not control Iraq?
Well, Iran will continue trying to control Iraq for as long as the Mullahs are in power. Iran will have agents trying to gain influence inside the Iraqi government. Iran will be trying to gain influence amongst the clergy, and in the mosques. Iran will be sending snipers and bombers and military agents in to sow chaos, and to financially and logistically support Al Qaeda, as well as to support any insurgents who are willing to try and prevent Iraq’s Democratic government from succeeding. Iran will do what it can to try and discredit the U.S., and to try and discredit the U.S. military. Iran will coordinate with Basher Assad in this effort.
If Iran has the upper hand at this point, their upper hand is invisible, both to me and to you.
What is visible is the U.S. in the Green Zone, coordinating military successes against Al Qaeda and against Iranian agents in Iraq.
What is visible is the U.S. advising the Iraqi Government in how to conduct a democratic process.
What is visible is the U.S. advising the Iraqi Judiciary.
What is visible is the U.S. creating an Iraqi Army and an Iraqi Police Force.
What is visible is the U.S. helping the Iraqi Oil Industry massively increase their production.
What is visible is Iraq making agreements to allow Sunnis back into the governmental process, and Iraq distributing its oil wealth throughout the country.
What is visible is the U.N. coming back into Iraq.
What is visible is other nations beginning to recognize the Iraqi Government as legitimate – including Iran (at least publicly) – when it sends Ahmadinejad to visit Iraq.
What is visible is that violence is lessened; Baghdad is much safer and more under control; other provinces such as Anbar are safer and more under control; Sunni Sheiks in Anbar and other provinces are joined with the U.S. and the Iraqi forces in the “Awakening”.
What is visible is the Iraqi government, and the Sunni sheiks want the U.S. to stay in Iraq a while longer.
What is visible is has called another 6 month ceasefire. This is not the sign of a Mullah who is powerful enough to survive confrontation with the U.S. and Iraqi Forces.
What is visible are Shiite Mullahs issuing fatwas against attacking American forces, and Sunni Sheiks taking oaths that their tribes will work with the American forces.
What is visible are newspapers from London to the the NYT, which once predicted only doom for Iraq, openly noting that Iraq has experienced a shift in favor of peace and stability.
What is invisible is Iranian control of Iraq. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It might exist invisibly. It does mean you cannot make the case that Iran controls Iraq. You would be speculating at every turn. What is visible is U.S. and Iraqi Government control of Iraq, with Iran attempting to gain(as they always will), and Iran currently not succeeding very well in any visible fashion.
btw, Truth, you’ve never answered my original question: what was your point in promoting the puppy video? My question about what you would do, if you were the U.S. President, was an extension of that original question about what your point was in promoting the puppy video(?). What was your point? What would you do? What would you have President Bush do?
You sort of skirted that with misdirection about Iran being in the Iraqi south. Iran is doing their dangdest to gain influence in the Iraqi south, and Iran is succeeding to some extent. But your Iran ranting is effectively an evasion of my original question: what was your point in promoting a video about one (dead?) puppy and one (supposed) marine?
Do propagandists working to further the cause of humanity’s decline have to have a “point” to their actions?
Ymarsakar ,
Can you be more specific in your comment?