More reality statements on Iraq--not clouded by Political BS

Do you have facts to support such? Let's review the facts, since you seem interested:

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/US/09/30/sproject.irq.regime.change/

The US supports many countries. As for the rest of your speculation, you've presented no facts at all. Just allegations. Oddly enough, I don't recall anyone saying "these same people one day looked at the map and said poor people in Iraq that are suffering Saddam regime, let's go to Iraq and make it a beacon of democracy." Only you. Seems like some things never change, eh, gworld? Never a word about terrorists, but always a word about America. Have you figured out why, yet?

I bolded your contradictions. Maybe it will shed some light.

 

Just because Bush and Kennedy fight for political power, it doesn't mean that there is Catholic-Protestant cleavage in Washington and it is a religious war.

I have actually been to these countries many years ago but if you live in California, don't take my word for it since there are many people from Iraq, Iran, Jordan, Saudi arabia,.... living in California. Just go out and ask them if they know anything about this horrible Shia-Sunni cleavage in their home country and if there was any problem among them before this terrible religious cleavage was discovered by American "intellectuals".

 

I'm - oh well; utterly at a loss for words.

 

Hahahah. Missed that.

 

Is that the best analogy you could come up with? Unca Ted has a little more "cleavage" than Bush, but Pelosi beats them both out

 

gworld has that effect on people. I had to scramble myself to come up with something humorous, because it just didn't make any sense!

 

That's something horrendous to picture in your mind....no, don't do it!

 

What part of it is difficult for you to understand?

Look at the reality on the ground. This civil war is supposedly caused by the differences between Shia and Sunni sects according to American "intellectuals". Can you explain for me if this is all about religion then why Kurds who are 3/5 are Sunni are supporting the Shia government and Iraq Kurdistan is probably the safest area in Iraq?
Are you saying that some Sunni have no problem with some Shia but some Sunni have problem with other Shia groups?
This is not about a religion. This is a bout political power and different people who try to take as much as they can for themselves in a vacuum that is caused by removal of Saddam.

 

Now we are getting somewhere. Your analogy to Bush and Kennedy was ridiculous, not difficult to understand; hence my shoulder shrug. But your above post is an apt observation. However, I long ago dealt with this: cross-cutting cleavages:

http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showpost.php?p=720531&postcount=293

The sunni-shia conflict is perhaps the most salient, but not the only cleavage coming out; and as you see from my post of many months ago, the religious attachments of what it means to be sunni or shia don't mean a damn thing, in my mind. It is the power struggle inherent in these attachments that is what came to the fore on the fall of Hussein. And the rising expectations of a promised parliamentary democracy made patent what was formerly latent. As I've said from the beginning.

You see, Gworld, I have found most people on this forum are honorable people, who are sincere in their beliefs. I have met few morons, few people "brainwashed," and even fewer people deliberately, mendaciously misanthropes. I have also found in my life that the moment I mouth that someone is flatly "wrong," more often than not, I betray I haven't thought deeply enough on my own thoughts, or considered openly enough the possibility I may be wrong.

 

I am sorry but your assessment about the so called "revolution" in Iran is not correct either. The events in Iran had more to do with lesson learned from south America, losing the guerrilla warfare, the theory of a Islamic green belt in front of soviet and Shah dying of cancer and no will to fight than anything to do with Iranian Internal politic. If fact if you look at the documents, in the time of the change; the Iranian opposition was wiped out and both Islamic and Marxist groups did not have more than a handful active members. Isn't strange that the so called revolution happened when the opposition was in it's weakest point and the many of the so called opposition that moved from outside of the country to take the power were living previously in USA and were agents of the Iranian secret service and by proxy CIA?
Think of Islamic revolution as preemptive strike against the leftist group possibility to succeed in starting a guerrilla warfare in that country which Iranian Army and the shah were not prepared for.

 

Gworld, this appears to me to be someone's writing other than your own. Your other posts seemed at least cohesively written and this is clearly in another voice altogether. Did you have someone else write this, and you just cut and paste their thoughts?

Although I am having somewhat of a hard time following the line of thought in this latest entry ("events in Iran had more to do with lesson learned from south America, losing the guerrilla warfare, the theory of a Islamic green belt in front of soviet and...Think of Islamic revolution as preemptive strike against the leftist group possibility to succeed in starting a guerrilla warfare in that country which Iranian Army and the shah were not prepared for", etc....I'm sorry. I have no idea what you, or your colleague, are trying to say here). If this is the case, I'd ask you ask you to be honest about that which you have no knowledge, and we can discuss accordingly.

At any rate, none of what I can make out of what you (or someone else) are writing in this last post squares with anything I know of the time and place.

Very briefly, as it is a complex subject requiring more than is possible here: From my reading of it, it comes down to an argument rooted quite rigorously in Iranian social structure current at the time. Aside from economically adverse conditions (both exogenous and endogenous in origin) besetting the country during the latter stages of his reign, the Shah did everything he could to alienate Shia leadership; it was a stupid and fatal move. Against this, Khomeini tapped and coalesced the natural power bases surrounding the local mosques and ulamic centers in forming his (eventual) komitehs, and by doing so, formed the seed for his eventual cooptation of that same religious leadership. These local hubs of power were natural conduits to the mass of Iranian society extant at the time, and, like Lenin before him, an intensively mobilized, rigorously cohesive vanguard rose to take the nation by storm - to the surprise of most of the western world.

Very roughly, these were the structures Khomeini upon which built the ascendancy of the Ayatollahs and the Islamic Revolution.

 

I break it down for you, so it will be easier to understand:

1) Lesson form South America, what happened in fifties, sixties and seventies with puppet governments in those countries. Did USA manage to win any of the guerrilla warfares in those countries?

2) Think about the cold war, which country was the main opponent of USA in world stage, do you remember soviet? The need for the soviets to reach the warm waters of Persian gulf for their navy and also the danger to the oil fields.

3) Think of Kissinger plan to make a green Islamic belt in front of soviet (Pakistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia) and the military alliance.

4) Think of the intellectuals who were opposing the Shah government and already tried to start a Guerrilla warfare in style with Cuba.

5) Think of a head of government that is a weak as person and combine it with the fact that he is dying of cancer and ask yourself how much stomach has has for blood and killing if he believes that he is soon going to meet his maker.

6) Consider all above facts and try to make a plan that stops a take over by leftist groups in Iran and Stops a future the Guerrilla warfare.

The rest is history, it is called Iranian "revolution".

 

Let me know when you wish to return, Gworld. Then again, please don't. I don't enjoy playing games. I'm guessing, by the naked contrast in language, much less writing style, you have a pal now writing (I'm sorry, but wholly incoherent, in my opinion) thoughts here. I don't know. All the best.

 

Forget about your books, if you still live in California, just go out and talk with any Iranian who is in late 40, 50s or 60s age group and ask them if any of them can recognize your description of the situation in Iran as the reality in late 1970s. I can promise you that your description of what happened only exists in the books.

 

Well there's a solution if I ever saw one. Fly to California, seek out the smallest of possible demographics of people in an even smaller age group and ask them personally.

Yeah, let's get right on that, because gworld said so

 

If you look at the cost benefit analysis, taking down Sadaam was a gamble that didn't pay off for America.

And the potential pay off was worth it in purely economic terms. If (big if) it came off, economically it made sense. But the execution was poor. Rumsfeld should have listened to the Generals.

Of course there were and are peoples lives at stake from both sides. So you can't just look at it purely from an economic standpoint.