Another Iraq Post

(In response to an email)

Hi hi...

Well...the division of India/Pakistan seemed to work out reasonably well for the peoples involved (the Brits , the Paki's, and the Indians) in the sense that it at least got the various folks that despised each other off onto their own little turfs where they didn't have to interact quite so frequently, and thus bloodshed was reduced to the occasional border war and nasty diplomatic note. Not ideal, but as the song goes, "making the best of a bad situation."

I would suggest that paradigm applies far more accurately to the Iraqi situation than the Cold War era paradigms you suggest. I readily grant a gross similarity, but the reasoning behind those definitions was entirely different - i.e., the India/Pakistan division was motivated by a desire to separate mutually hostile parties, where the ones you cite were motivated primarily by victors dividing up the spoils.

In the case of Iraq, we are faced with an artificial nation created of mutually hostile peoples created at the stroke of a rather doltish British cartographers pen in the aftermath of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in the post-WWI era. A ticking time bomb from square one, held together only by force and brutality, three disparate peoples should not be compelled to union against their rather violently expressed will.

I don't see saving face as an issue - I do see moral responsibility. We went in, made a mess, and like the proverbial good camper...we are obligated to clean up our mess, or at minimum, do what we can before we depart the scene. An India/Pakistan style of division (separating combatants) would be one way to achieve this...

Somalia? A shameful event. The right minimum response to an assault upon our service men and women at minimum is to exact a rather thorough response, sufficient to give long pause to anyone thinking of a "repeat performance", before pulling out...it can be argued that the Somali response, not unlike the policies of the Carter presidency, led directly to greater violence against US persons and interests by creating the impression that there would be no or minimal response.

It would be lovely if the folks we put in power during either the Cold War era or under "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" policy decisions would just pack their bags and go home when asked nicely. And in fact, on occasion, they have (Marcos in the Philipines, Duvalier in Haiti, Pinochet in Chile)...but that is not the common response of a satisfied and comfortable tyrant, and especially not of someone who's feeling frisky towards the U.S. in the first place...buying them off (with cash, refuge, or other benefits) is a lovely solution, but you need someone willing to be bought in order for it to work.

In terms of economy, I would say that a rifle bullet is more efficient than an infantry division, and that some of the wild west antics of the old OSS and their lesser successors on through the early '70's kept us out of war on numerous occasions while still preserving American interests and persons.

I don't want a legacy for my nieces where worldwide loons figure that it's safe/ok to kill Americans abroad or on our home soil, that all that is required to change American policy is sufficiently vigorous atrocities, or that you can do pretty much whatever you want to America if you can just hold out two years for public opinion to turn.