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Subject: Establishing a military objective in Iraq
jonodavidson    5/16/2008 2:22:35 PM
America invaded Iraq for national security purposes. The military objective was to eliminate the threat that Saddam Hussein presented to America with weapons of mass destruction ties to Al Quad and possible intentions to arm terrorists with these weapons in order to attack America on our own soil. These goals were within the capabilities of the armed forces and have been accomplished. The Bush Administration's attempt to use the military to establish a democratic government in Iraq has failed. It is obvious that the administration has failed in its efforts, or we would be able to leave them in their own capable hands. There are three ways in which democracies have been formed in history. It is necessary to understand the way that democracies have previously been formed in order to understand why our efforts have failed and to discover what efforts we can make in order to establish a democracy in Iraq. Democracies have been established by people who became united in their own defense against a common threat to their whole society. The ancient Greeks established every kind of institution to govern a society in their city-states. The democracies established held requirements for people governed to meet in order to enjoy the full benefits of citizenship. Spartan male children were required to meet certain martial standards to become citizens, and only men could be landowners and citizens in Athens. The threat of genocide to the majority of Greeks and slavery for the survivors presented by the massive force assembled for this purpose by the Persians required all the Greeks to cooperate in their common defense for their survival. The Greeks began to realize the potential power of their mutual cooperation with their efforts to successfully repel the Persian force, and citizenship became opened to more people in their societies. Spartan reliance upon the non-citizens to provide them with their sustenance resulted in the decline of Spartan influence in Greece even though they provided the backbone for the Greeks military defense. Athens allowed any man who owned their own weapons and armor that was willing to fight in their common defense the right to be a citizen and prospered. Democracies have also been established by people who became united in their own defense against a common threat posed by their own governments. America and England each established democracies and united to defend themselves against the abuses of power by the governing authority. The peasants and noblemen in England united to challenge the authority of their king and forced him to share with them the nation's political power. Their successful revolution resulted in the establishment of their personal rights and the formation of a Parliament representing both the peasants and aristocracy in the Houses of Lords and Commons. America reluctantly decided to sever our ties to England after diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict failed and war was being waged against the colonies from several fronts. We established our government as a result of our successful revolution. American and English history shows that the people governed became united together in a common defense before they established democracies in their societies. Democracies have also been established by force in countries after the invaders who conquered them fought wars. The invading power always suppressed any resistance to their own power before allowing the rest of the people to begin establishing democratic institutions to govern over themselves. The Napoleonic code of France, the civil code established in their own country, was imposed over all the nations conquered by Napoleon after he had established by might his own right to the authority to rule over them. We ourselves crushed all resistance in Germany and Japan, who we bombed into submission with nuclear weapons, before we attempted establish democratic institutions among them. Our military faced little organized resistance by the Iraqi military or the Republican Guard. The national forces, which traditionally have defended nations from foreign invasion, appeared to fold under the strength of our attack. Iraqi soldiers threw down their weapons and joined the people, or they dispersed and took cover from our attacks. Saddam Hussein ran for cover and was discovered alone, without guards, and hiding in a hole in the ground. The meek behavior of Hussein from the time he was captured until his death towards his captors is totally out of character for him, and he has always shown himself to be belligerent and prone to violence. The fact that Hussein was discovered in such circumstances implies that he ordered his military forces to disperse and hide throughout the land as well. For the Republican Guard soldiers were personally loyal to Hussein, and he went to his grave setting an example for his soldiers to follow. We turned Hussein over to the authority of the regime we have establis
 
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Green Dragon    Interesting logic   5/16/2008 11:08:44 PM
'We ourselves crushed all resistance in Germany and Japan, who we bombed into submission with nuclear weapons, before we attempted establish democratic institutions among them.'
 
So are you suggesting that the Coalition attempt to establish democracy in Iraq has failed because they didn't kill enough civilians when initially going in?
 
Would nuking a couple of towns in Iraq really have a positive effect on the populations acceptance of democracy as 'imposed' by the Coalition or otherwise?
 
Everyone already wants Coalition forces out of Iraq, when Iraqs security forces are mature enough to effectively carry out the tasks required of them. At present they are not, the Basra and Mosul operations are encouraging first steps however even the most optimistic cannot use this as a justification for fixing a date for withdrawal without being guilty of ignoring the lessons of the Vietnam war.
 
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Jeff_F_F       5/17/2008 3:53:02 AM
A lot of the goals of OIF were publicly obscured because of several factors.
 
1: Osama bin Laden claimed the starvation of Iraqi children as part of his justification for 9/11. Few who support the GWOT are willing to concede anything that would make it appear that there was any justification for the attacks. Few who oppose the GWOT are willing to concede anything that would make it appear that there was any justification for OIF. Thus no one will ever cite this as a reason for OIF.
 
2: Bush isn't going to say "we are invading Iraq because my dad screwed up royally by not finishing the job and instead implementing sanctions that eventually starved half a million Iraqi kids."
 
3: Republicans hate to admit that the US screws up, even when a lot of the blame for that screwing up can be layed at the feet of Democrat presidents. It is an open question if the humanitarian disaster under Bush killed more Iraqi civilians than the humanitarian disaster under Clinton. The number for the Clinton admin is about half a million children starved before the oil for food program was implemented. It is also an open question how effective the oil for food program was. Note that 2 heads of the program quit in protest, so it might not have been as effective at stemming the tide of civilian starvation as some would like to assume.
 
4: Democrats hate to admit anything that would tarnish the reputation of the Clinton admin. So again no one will ever cite this.
 
Other military objectives that were significantly effective are best not trumpeted to the world. Consider that after OIF, by the end of the year both of the major ME nations antagonistic to the US who were running advanced WMD programs shut them down. Libya turned over its stockpiles of chemical weapons, shut down an advanced factory built under a mountain which was specifically designed to be impossible to destroy except by invasion or nuclear attack, and signed onto the CWC. Iran shut their uranium enrichment operations down. Those are pretty significant military objectives which diplomacy had failed to achieve.
 
It is extremely early to call the efforts to establish democratic government in Iraq a failure. First of all, you have to really look at what is required of a democracy. Is a democracy as relatively egalatarian as the US uses needed? Or is it simply necessary that the government be less autocratic than a dictatorship and moderately responsive to the needs of its people. When the US was first formed, its efforts at democracy would have been judged an utter failure by our modern standards.
 
Your view of the situation on the ground in Iraq differs sharply from mine. Neither of us will convince the other. We will both have to wait and see what the situation looks like in 10 years. The sad thing is, that I'm betting that even if you are wrong you won't even think to question your assumptions about the way the world works. You'll just move on to the next horrible miscarriage of policy that you just know is broken and forget the times you were wrong in the past. But looking for truth requires checking your assumptions against reality to see if they are correct, and then modifying your model of how the world works based on those results.
 
Too few liberals do this. For example, I know so many people on the left who were absolutely convinced that if Bush won in 2004 he would reinstitute the draft. That this didn't happen prompted no challenging of basic assumptions however. How many times will your sources of information be proven wrong by objective evidence before you question them? How long must you toil in the darkness of political delusion before you start to create a world view that is based on reality rather than theory?
 
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xylene       5/19/2008 1:56:14 PM
The US remains in Iraq at it's own peril and expense. While the USA continues to sink hundreds of billions of dollars into this fiasco, other potential rivals are moving forward developing their own economies and military capabilities. Under the best case scenerio Iraq will emerge as a republic but under Sharia Law. They will not be supportive of Isreal nor can we even count on diplomatic support or even commercial deals. Basically, George W Bush has decided to spend American money to resolve a UN mess that the UN and other members have been given a pass on to the detriment of our economy and the value of the dollar. 
 
If you support this then vote for John McCain, he'll ensure we spend hundreds of billions of dollars more on the Iraqis and he will ensure our soldiers will remain there untill the end of his term.
 
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SGTObvious       5/19/2008 2:21:38 PM

If you support this then vote for John McCain, he'll ensure we spend hundreds of billions of dollars more on the Iraqis and he will ensure our soldiers will remain there untill the end of his term.



And one of them is John McCain's son.
John McCain has more to lose in Iraq than any other prez hopeful, he can be trusted to make the wiser choices.
 
As for the allegation that George Bush has somehow "failed" to bring Democracy to Iraq- feh.  Little more than a brain fart.  Iraq is the most successful Arab democracy in history.  Criticizing it is easy- but actually providing better is impossible.  The parties  hate each other and undermine each other, limiting the power of the government to actually get much accomplished.  Just like us. 
 
And the idea that Iraqi society is terminally unreformable is absolutely racist.  Societies- healthy ones, at least- are always in a state of change, and all the healthy ones were at one time unhealthy ones.  If modern day Scandinavia can arise from a culture of raiders and pirates, Iraq is forever unfixable why?  Because they don't have blue eyes?  It's still far from a done deal, but two centuries from now, when people think about the transition between dysfunctional tribal despotism and democracy in Iraq, they will name Mr. Bush as the person who caused it.
 
SGTObvious
 
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FJV       5/19/2008 2:27:44 PM
Eventually the US will might wanna switch to a lower costing strategy. There is nothing wrong however with stacking the deck in your (the US's) favor before doing so in my opinion. That other strategy can also lead to victory.




 
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xylene       5/19/2008 4:47:20 PM




If you support this then vote for John McCain, he'll ensure we spend hundreds of billions of dollars more on the Iraqis and he will ensure our soldiers will remain there untill the end of his term.





And one of them is John McCain's son.

John McCain has more to lose in Iraq than any other prez hopeful, he can be trusted to make the wiser choices.

 

As for the allegation that George Bush has somehow "failed" to bring Democracy to Iraq- feh.  Little more than a brain fart.  Iraq is the most successful Arab democracy in history.  Criticizing it is easy- but actually providing better is impossible.  The parties  hate each other and undermine each other, limiting the power of the government to actually get much accomplished.  Just like us. 

 

And the idea that Iraqi society is terminally unreformable is absolutely racist.  Societies- healthy ones, at least- are always in a state of change, and all the healthy ones were at one time unhealthy ones.  If modern day Scandinavia can arise from a culture of raiders and pirates, Iraq is forever unfixable why?  Because they don't have blue eyes?  It's still far from a done deal, but two centuries from now, when people think about the transition between dysfunctional tribal despotism and democracy in Iraq, they will name Mr. Bush as the person who caused it.

 

SGTObvious


But why should we alone be responsible to bankroll Iraq's reform? More power to them if they can get their act together and if they have the power and ability to do it. We are flushing money down a toilet in Iraq. That same amount of money given to willing allies in Latin America and Asia would garner much more of a dividend than an eventual republic under Sharia law.
I just hope that 2 centuries from now people are not able to see this as the apex of American power. When it reached it's hieght and began a decline. People will see this as a point the US abandoned the 2 war strategy, that the Euro eclipsed the Dollar, it began torturing people, and running secret prisons around the world, financial crisis after another, and the last of US heavy industry is up for firesale to foriegn ownership. To top it all off it launched a unnecissary war exacerbating it's finanial woes and eroding it's global standing.
 
Iraq will be seen as sort of like Trajan's ill fated adventure in the Middle East.
 
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tigertony    X-Man?   5/19/2008 7:35:32 PM
But why should we alone be responsible to bankroll Iraq's reform?
 
 
  1} WW2
 
  
  2} The Marshall Plan
 
 
  3} The United Nations
 
  
  4} Korea,well a few Brits earned some respect,but i wonder who paid the bill?
   
 
   5} USSR,well they are not in Berlin,nor sitting in Kabul! And again,who paid the real bill?
 
  
   6} Vietnam,well a bunch of surrounded and surrendered Frenchmen got is in it,and a few Aussies helped us out and went home a loser,without ever losing a battle!. And again,who paid the real bill? 
 
 
   7} NATO, well now they are sitting in Kabul,and who still pays the real bill?
 
 
                                                                              tigertony
 
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xylene    Tigertony   5/20/2008 12:05:32 PM
Tigertony,
I don't see your point. In most if not all of the examples you gave we were not alone.
 
Patriotism aside we must coldly look at the cost benefit analysis. Surely 500 - 800 billion dollars can buy us something better than a a place where people can vote for sham political figures and a non-functioning parliment. Sounds like we are dumping money on this hoping at best it turns into a sad mirror image of Egypt.  
 
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Softwar    Isolationist   5/20/2008 1:21:55 PM

Tigertony,

I don't see your point. In most if not all of the examples you gave we were not alone.

 

Patriotism aside we must coldly look at the cost benefit analysis. Surely 500 - 800 billion dollars can buy us something better than a a place where people can vote for sham political figures and a non-functioning parliment. Sounds like we are dumping money on this hoping at best it turns into a sad mirror image of Egypt.  


I clearly see his point - the US has been leading the free world for over 60 years - in short - without our efforts we would have suffered a WWIII and WWIV.  Isolationism is not a realistic policy - either in 1941 or 2008.
$500 to $800 billion is cheap compared to the alternatives.  While loads of libs point to the lack of WMD stockpiles - they seem to forget the real WMD was Saddam and his willing cohorts who were in the process of breaking out from under the UN arms embargo - so frequently violated by UN members such as France and China.  It was not a matter of if but how long before we saw Saddam bone up again.
 
As for Iraqi democracy - leave that to the Iraqis - we can help but it is not something we can create for them.
Finally, your portrait of a McCain vs. (Obama or Clinton) White House is almost laughable.  Of the three, the one with the most military experience and the least amount of patience for mucking around is McCain.  Thus, the reason why he is more likely to lead us out of Iraq rather than running away and sticking our collective heads in the sand, pretending that there is no threat. 
 
Isolationism is not a realistic or viable policy and that is the only policy that the Big O and Hill are spouting.
 
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xylene       5/20/2008 1:53:22 PM
Far from advocating isolationism, maybe we should stop trying to run roughshod over the world and try something called cooperation and diplomacy. We do those things when the target country has potential to give us a bloody nose , but for nations that do not have nuclear weapons we move into a phase of dictating terms. The subtle message we are giving every tin pot dictator on the planet is that the only way of getting the US boot off your neck is by aquiring atomic weapons. North Korea has done it, and Iran is trying. If we bomb Iran it will only strengthen that rationale and more countries will earnestly push forward with nuclear programs.
 
Some of you guys border on paranoid seeing threats behind every corner. Muslim Fundamentalism and terrorism existed before the Iraq War and it will exist long after our troops leave Iraq. Invading Iraq did not take any threats off the table, did not get us any closer to finding Bin Laden, and did not weaken Al Qaeda. Fictional hypothetical fantasies that Saddam may work with Al Qaeda only makes this war justifiable to people that either simply wanted Saddam out of power or people that saw this as an opportunity to make lots and lots of money.  Others complain that Saddam shot at our planes. Well China forced one of our planes down tore it apart and held US servicemen hostage. What did we do, we sent Colin Powell begging bowl in hand to apoligize.  Once again proves my point that this administartion will back off if the adversary shows strength but will attack when the adversary is weak. The rest of the world watches and studies our actions. We are not hoodwinking or fooling anyone. 
 
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