Where are the U.S.-trained Iraqi forces?

[RS Davis]

[glow=red,2,300]Jeff Taylor Wrote:[/glow] An Iraqi battalion last week refused to go into battle in Fallujah and a third battalion of U.S. Marines was sent in instead. That is the crux of the awful problem facing the Bush administration one year into its optional war in Iraq.

The ultimate goal of the U.S. invasion and occupation was pedagogical: America would teach the Iraqis, and by extension the entire Middle East, how a liberal civil society works. It turns out even the most basic police functions of the new Iraqi state remain in shambles.

- Rick

[whatever]

Heavy sigh. I've been saying this would be a problem since the day we "won". I remember later on May 20, they started searching houses and confiscating weapons. That's when I knew it would start going bad.

Rick, maybe you or someone else can explain this to me, because I don't get it. How can so many people buy off on the idea of a country being "given" it's freedom? I don't understand how that can sound right, to anyone. With this idea accpeted, it's, like, impossible to even talk to some people. What do you say? Ah, yeah, sure, that's what America's all about. Aren't we so brave though, so send our soldiers out to slaughter like that? I am hateful about this.

Here's another question, that the babbling tv just gave me. Why are we in Iraq to "help with security", when we seem to be a prime target ourselves? How are we helping? What are we helping? It seems they've progressed to the point they hate us more than anyone else; things should be approached another way, no matter what one thinks about our reasons for waging the war.

[RS Davis]

whatever said:

Heavy sigh. I've been saying this would be a problem since the day we "won". I remember later on May 20, they started searching houses and confiscating weapons. That's when I knew it would start going bad.

Rick, maybe you or someone else can explain this to me, because I don't get it. How can so many people buy off on the idea of a country being "given" it's freedom? I don't understand how that can sound right, to anyone. With this idea accpeted, it's, like, impossible to even talk to some people. What do you say? Ah, yeah, sure, that's what America's all about. Aren't we so brave though, so send our soldiers out to slaughter like that? I am hateful about this.

Here's another question, that the babbling tv just gave me. Why are we in Iraq to "help with security", when we seem to be a prime target ourselves? How are we helping? What are we helping? It seems they've progressed to the point they hate us more than anyone else; things should be approached another way, no matter what one thinks about our reasons for waging the war.

You can't force a love of self-government on anyone - it must be something chosen. That's about it.

- Rick

[whatever]

RS said:

You can't force a love of self-government on anyone - it must be something chosen. That's about it.

- Rick

We're doomed

[penguin]

whatever said:

Rick, maybe you or someone else can explain this to me, because I don't get it. How can so many people buy off on the idea of a country being "given" it's freedom?.

Oh, you can "give" it to them, but it's ultimately up to them whether to take it or leave it. And, in a place that's never really known what it even is, that may prove to be a too-tall order. I think we feel obliged to try to help effect that, but I hope we won't take it beyond the point of futility.

[whatever]

penguin said:

Oh, you can "give" it to them, but it's ultimately up to them whether to take it or leave it. And, in a place that's never really known what it even is, that may prove to be a too-tall order. I think we feel obliged to try to help effect that, but I hope we won't take it beyond the point of futility.

Yes, but it's the very idea of "giving" it that stops me. When has that ever worked, that didn't involve occupation and assumption of power?
Past futility? Naw, I say it is now. We're losing multiple soldiers every day now. Two last night. One this morning. That Bush bastard.

[penguin]

whatever said:

Yes, but it's the very idea of "giving" it that stops me. When has that ever worked, that didn't involve occupation and assumption of power?

I think it worked OK in Germany, circa 1945.

[whatever]

penguin said:

I think it worked OK in Germany, circa 1945.

I don't follow Pen. How was anything in Germany during that time about bringing a nation it's (brand new and shiny!) freedom?

[RS Davis]

whatever said:

I don't follow Pen. How was anything in Germany during that time about bringing a nation it's (brand new and shiny!) freedom?

He's talking about the Marshall Plan, but one result of that plan is we still have troops stationed all over Europe.

- Rick

[penguin]

RS said:

He's talking about the Marshall Plan, but one result of that plan is we still have troops stationed all over Europe.

- Rick

We do, but we don't have to.

She asked for an example of giving a country its freedom where it worked out without the US assuming power. I think the ousting of the Third Reich is an example of that.

[RS Davis]

penguin said:

We do, but we don't have to.

She asked for an example of giving a country its freedom where it worked out without the US assuming power. I think the ousting of the Third Reich is an example of that.

That's true. But the Germans were free before Hitler declared himself Fuhrer, so they were just put back to the natural order. Japan, on the other hand, I think is a better example of what you are talking about because they went from years of bondage to freedom and Keynsian economics, haha...

- Rick