Saddam's Death May Bring Reprisals?

sogood

Who knows? Maybe another strongman (?Shite) that can control the internal rivalries.

I read in a news report (?BBC) that some Iraqi are lamenting for SH's time, for his ability to keep the country together for so many years.

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slovakguy

although i am strongly against state sponsored executions (specifically because it is killing done in my name as a citizen of the state) and therefore should have no opinion on how the iraqis conducted themselves in this affair. of course i realise this was not so simple, as we, the u.s, had our little fingers all over this spectacle. what troubles me is that the white house has again effed up a one car funeral. according to reports from the new york times and times of london, the boys in the white house still can't figure out how to spin this.

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"To Hell with poverty, we'll get drunk on cheap wine."
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wolfix

You should never accuse anyone of spin when you use the NY Times as a reference.

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slovakguy

...and as for the independent reportage of the times of london? what, hasn't bill o' added the times to the list of enemies in your little culture war?

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"To Hell with poverty, we'll get drunk on cheap wine."
--Gang of Four, To Hell With Poverty

Carrera

I guess I'm a pessimist but I don't see any way the Sunni Moslems will accept an American imposed Shia Government. They made that clear on the streets of Baghdad yesterday. The killing of Saddam Hussein has made this even more a reality. This execution has implications throughout the Arab World, I believe. Especially since many Arabs took the execution as a personal insult - it dampened the festivities on a Moslem pilgrim holiday.
Then, of course, you have Saddam's daughters in exile, vowing to even the score against against Bush Junior. Likewise, the Saudis are considering arming the Sunni insurgents who seem pretty determined to intensify the guerilla war. The Iranians will continue to arm the Shia militias in Iraq while Pakistan (a Sunni regime) is a nuclear power and may not be too happy over Shia death squads killing Sunnis in Iraq.
Therefore, what conclusion can you draw? It looks as if Iraq will become a battle ground between Sunnis and Shia throughout the Arab World while Turkey stands to lose out if the Kurds over there seek to form a new Kurdistan.
All of this will go way beyond the control of American troops within Iraq. If Bush does send 30,000 more troops, I guess they'll be stuck in between Shia militias, Al Quaida, Sunni insurgents and an even bigger nightmare - the union of Iraqi and Iranian Shias. The current trickle of 8 or so U.S. deaths a week will increase to maybe 20 or 30 and how long will the electorate tolerate that scale of casualties?
All of this, in the final analysis, will dwarf the scale of Vietnam and may even be a worse scenario than WW1.

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"Everybody has a philosophy. However, what philosophy you have is a matter of choice, and most people don't make a conscious choice with regard to what philosophy they accept."

limerickman

I don't agree with your WW1 analogy - the casualty numbers from WW1 were huge.

But I do agree with your analysis about the death of SH, it's ramifications and the further polarisation of the Sunni/Shia divide not only in Iraq but throughout the Middle East.

You're correct to refer to Saudi's support of the Sunni minority in Iraq.
You're also correct to refer to the Shia support from Iran and Syria.
None of this, of course, was calculated by the Americans in March 2003 as they were beating the wardrums.

The Americans were never in control of Iraq from the beginning of their invasion and slowly but surely whatever minute control they may have had has evaporated since.
There is civil war in Iraq right now.
Although it's reported that the American media have been asked not to use the phrase civil war.

The dangers of this now becoming a regional dispute - makes the current situation infinitely more dnagerous.
Saudi, Iran, Syria, Turkey, the Kurds - all have a vested interest in the outcome of Iraq and will support the various factions vying for control.
In the meantime, the average Iraqi continues to suffer.

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.."But finally the last thing I’ll say to the people who don’t believe in cycling, the cynics and the sceptics. I'm sorry for you. I’m sorry that you can’t dream big. [I]I'm sorry you don't believe in miracles. You should believe in these athletes, and you should believe in these people. I'll be a fan of the Tour de France for as long as I live. And there are no secrets" - this is a hard sporting event and hard work wins it - Armstrong 2005 TDF
morelike hypocrisy.

jhuskey

You can kill Saddam and his followers and the hate will remain and as long as hate remains you will have reprisals and killing.
Lets hope someone finds the answer that which has been sought for the last 10,000 year or so.

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CDAKIAHONDA

I agree with you that the potential is there for a "worse scenario than WWI" if you mean that the past and current situations will lead to a bigger part two... Germany marched into Austria to re-unite the Holy Roman Empire (fobidden after WWI) "almost" as heros and then began their conquest. The same types of underlining forces are working now, are they not? Who gets to be the leaders of the "resurging" Persian Empire?

The Ottoman Turks? The Arabs? The Persians? The "Greco-Roman" west?

Carrera

"Ethnic groups exist together all over the world in sometimes "uneasy" but relative peace none-the-less."

After some years studying the implications of this view, I concluded multiethnic societies really don't function well. Democracy normally takes a backseat under such circumstances.
For instance, if you compare, say, the Palestinian/Jewish conflict with that of the Ingush and Ossetians in the Caucasus - it's the same scenario. The Ingush were displaced by Stalin and then the Ossetians took their place. However, the Ingush returned to their former land recently after the fall of the USSR which is how the whole Chechnyan War became inflamed - Ingush vs Ossetians.
Therefore, Palestine and Ossetia are about as bad as it gets. Add to that lesser conflicts such as the Basque/Spanish, Serbs and Croats, Sunni and Shia and there's a recipe for conflict everywhere - one negative implication from the fall of the USSR.
America's misconception it can simply go into Iraq and impose U.S. style democracy with so many ethnic divisions in that country is as absurd as the current President himself is clueless.
"It's an economic issue with them as well, and I'm defining "economic" in its broadest sense."
I guess I half agree. In multiracial societies, prosperity often covers up deeper ethnic divisions but these inevitably surface when the said society suffers stress (war, unemployment e.t.c.). I'm pretty sure the same thing will happen in the U.S. when times get harder and we can even see this today emerging. Need I mention the tensions over Hispanic migration and some towns and States already imposing restrictions on Spanish language?
"No one should believe that the survival of the Iraqi ethnicity is in question. The Iraqis just don't yet have "enough" distributed economic equity to form inter-ethnic or religeous co-existance."
Hmmm, more like they were doing reasonably O.K. under Saddam till Bush came in and hit them with a hammer. I wonder when (if ever!!) the U.S. is going to understand that characters such as Saddam and Stalin (bad as they were) had the task of creating some kind of stability in the face of ethnic, religious divisions around large stretches of territory. I mean, look at the USSR today after the periods of Stalin and Krushchev: Ukraine has broken away, there's war in the Caucasus, Georgia seems unstable and there are rising tensions in the Baltics.
Therefore, what would you or I prefer as an Iraqi? Being able to walk the streets in safety so long as you kept a low profile in politics (under Saddam) or your country being torn apart by terrorists, fanatics and religious crackpots with machine guns?
"The similiarities between Shia and Sunni far overwhelm their differences but yet the emotional differences are magnified to the absurd by leaders on both sides to whip the populace into acting violently."
Sadly, I believe militaristic regimes tend to restrain these differences breaking out before democracy might stand any chance.. Saddam had a way of uniting Shias and Sunnis so most people viewed themselves just as "Iraqi". It was the same in the USSR. Most people viewed themselves as Soviet citizens, even the Moslems.
It's not that I don't support democracy where it's practical but you can't simply try and impose democracy where there are these kinds of ethnic/religious divisions. This is where the U.S. keeps screwing up.
"Saddam didn't "force" Shia and Sunni to co-exist, they did it because it was economically beneficial to do so given the alternatives."
Hmmm, but what economy? Iraq has been economically crippled for decades. Ethnic tensions only surfaced after the U.S. invasion. Iraqis somehow got by under the Bathist regime even if it fell a long way short of democracy.
"That's how it works here in the melting pot of the west, we don't all agree, and we don't all like each other after all...."
Yes, but it's still early days. My argument all along has been too many countries have concluded the U.S. is a huge success story and we should all copy America. However, the problem with that view is the U.S. has only been a global power for less than 100 years, which is peanuts in historical terms. The Romans were on top for 600 years, for instance. The ancient Egyptians lasted for hundreds of years. Neither has the U.S. ever been tested as the USSR was during Germany's invasion. Would the U.S. have held together under such circumstances or would it have fragmented under pressure?
My guess is without Russia and the Bolsheviks, the U.S. would have failed to defeat Hitler which would have left all of us in a pretty poor situation under Arian fascist rule.

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"Everybody has a philosophy. However, what philosophy you have is a matter of choice, and most people don't make a conscious choice with regard to what philosophy they accept."

CDAKIAHONDA

Ah, where you see differences in our opinions, I see much the same one! I believe it comes down to the fact that this cycle is inevitable. Our differences seem to be semantic in some cases, as with "economic" and "economy." I refer to economics in its simple, broadest sense, resources of ANY type (even ideas) at the individual as well as societal level, not just their sum. There are those "with" and "without" no matter what the overall "economic sum" is. It's the idividual distribution that affects the individual and his alliances from his survival toward his fulfillment.

Democracy is irrelevant as you note. The co-existance that I have extolled is indeed fleeting (especially in historical terms as you also note), it can only exist within a "window" of societal evolution where it's temporarily "economically" self-beneficial enough to do so. It can be forced to some extent, but I believe it is achieved only by consent, and again, only until the balance shifts too far.

Joe grabs Larry to help him catch a rabbit, build a fire and find a cave. They catch rabbits and work together for a while. Catching Rabbits is easier with two. When Mary comes along, Larry is smarter and bigger than Joe...(and Larry will find a way to not only press his advantage, but also to rationalize what he does next.) Then what does Joe do....?

It is our "tragic flaw." Throughout history and culture. It's why Icaris flew too high, why Babel was toppled, why Adam and Eve were thrown out of paradise, and Satan was cast out. We can't even allow God to have an "economic" advantage!

limerickman

I don't believe, for one second, that the US "rationale" for the invasion of Iraq had anything whatsoever to do with "democracy".
It was an act of imperialistic expansion - pure and simple.






The Iraq economy under Saddam during the 1980's was highly productive economically.
The Iraqi economy approached first world performance levels.
In addition investment in infrastructure and investment in higher education would have left many first world country's in the ha'penny place.






Professor Niall Ferguson has stated that throughout history, there have been 68 empires or dynasties which had imperialistic ambitions and which sought to impose their regimes upon other sovereign entities.
From the ancient times such as the Celts through to the Romans through to the British : from Genghis Khan to Leonid Breshnev : are all accounted for within Ferguson's 68 dynasties.
All 67 of those dynasties have disappeared or have retracted to their generic territorial locations.
Ferguson argues that the USA is the 68 empire/dynasty - and that this dynasty/empire will fail to assert it's imperialistic tendencies.

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.."But finally the last thing I’ll say to the people who don’t believe in cycling, the cynics and the sceptics. I'm sorry for you. I’m sorry that you can’t dream big. [I]I'm sorry you don't believe in miracles. You should believe in these athletes, and you should believe in these people. I'll be a fan of the Tour de France for as long as I live. And there are no secrets" - this is a hard sporting event and hard work wins it - Armstrong 2005 TDF
morelike hypocrisy.

CDAKIAHONDA

Yes! And are we watching the genesis of the next?

limerickman

I don't know to be honest.

Professor Ferguson did a fascinating three part documentary on the concept of empire/dynasty on Channel 4 last year and he wrote his best selling book on this topic.
According to Ferguson, most empires/dynasties imploded due to complacency from within the ruling empire/dynasty - and not from any external threat.

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.."But finally the last thing I’ll say to the people who don’t believe in cycling, the cynics and the sceptics. I'm sorry for you. I’m sorry that you can’t dream big. [I]I'm sorry you don't believe in miracles. You should believe in these athletes, and you should believe in these people. I'll be a fan of the Tour de France for as long as I live. And there are no secrets" - this is a hard sporting event and hard work wins it - Armstrong 2005 TDF
morelike hypocrisy.

Carrera

I'd say the Romans didn't do too badly. The difference between the Romans and the U.S. was that the Romans were far far better at dealing with the so-called subject nations. They fully understood the cultures they were dealing with and observed norms of respect usually.
I mean, take Britain: The invasion and occupation of this island wasn't specifically accomplished militarily. Julius Caesar was, in fact, fairly accomplished at talking to the indigenous population, winning them over and granting Roman Citizenship - which was held in high esteem.
I believe that had the Romans decided to "invade" Iraq they'd have had water and electricity running in a matter of weeks. The lack of respect shown to Saddam probably wouldn't have happened. In those rare cases where there were abuses, history shows the islanders rose up and caused all sorts of problems.
However, I agree with you that imperialism did come back to haunt even the Romans which is why I prefer the non-imperialistic societies such as Sparta, maybe. Spartans never invaded anyone unless they were attacked first and when they did take to arms they were pretty awesome.

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"Everybody has a philosophy. However, what philosophy you have is a matter of choice, and most people don't make a conscious choice with regard to what philosophy they accept."