Saddam and Iraq: The Hyenas Gather

It really bothers me how the history of the US's involvement in Iraq has been falsified. A whole lot of people are lying who say George Bush was lying. As usual, with the devil's work; what they are saying is the very opposite of the truth.

First, everyone thought Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. Not just Bush. Second, they may well have been right; where did Assad's chemical weapons come from? Why does no one ask? Third, the US did not invade because Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. It was because he had repeatedly violated the ceasefire. Fourth, nobody notices that Saddam, besides invading two neighbouring countries, was killing his own people. He had already killed an estimated million. How many more would have died if Bush had not gone in? Does it not matter, since they were Iraqis? Fifth, Bush won the war. By 2008, when Bush left office, Iraq was doing fine. The current destabilization, contrary to what many are saying, is not Bush's doing, or the fault of intervening in Iraq. It is Obama's baby, and the predictable result of pulling out all troops. Throwing away everything that the US military had accomplished.

What really burns me is that all these people who supported the war and then opposed the surge, and then pulled all the troops, are blaming Bush. That is stomach-turningly dishonest.

Victor Davis Hanson remembers.

Three Options for the Americans in Iraq

A fascinating article, for two reasons. First, because it lays out well some of the problems with the three options it cites. Second, because it omits one obvious option.

In case you missed it, the obvious but unmentioned option is to send in troops. The proverbial "boots on the ground."

This is of course what it would take, and it would be far easier and less legally problematic to do so now than it was back in '03 or so.

Why do you suppose this is not even mentioned?

I presume it is politically impossible. But it is a bit sinister to not even mention it.

There are also other unmentioned options...

The Best Thing for the Middle East

A case might be made here for a larger crown.

The Middle East is mess. A lot of people are upset with the US and NATO for not going in and helping the poor people of Syria. It's such a mess. A lot of the same people are upset with the US and NATO for going in and getting rid of Ghaddafi. Leaving such a mess. Not to mention with Bush going in and taking out Saddam, leaving the mess of ISIS there now.

Wait a minute, though. What would you have the US and NATO do?

The problem with nasty dictatorships is that they destroy all elements of civil society. They do this, because any separate organizations could become rival power centres and challenge their rule. They want an absolutely free hand, or what's a totalitarian supposed to do? It's in the job description.

That means that, when they fall, there is nobody and nothing in a position to replace them. And you have a mess.

So, the rest of us have three options here, and only three options, when they start to shoot their own people:

1. Go in, take out the dictator, and try to set up a civil society before we leave. That's Iraq.
2. Go in, take out the dictator, and leave, letting the chips fall where they may. That's Libya.
3. Do nothing, and leave matters to work themselves out. That's Syria.

The West is catching all kinds of criticism for each of these. In other words, they are being blamed no matter what they do.

For my money, number 2 is the best option available. All three end in a mess, but in 1, the West gets blamed for the chaos, while in 3, the West gets blamed for the dictator. The West still gets blamed for the chaos in 2, but it is less convincing, and certainly costs less.

The one institution that dictators in the Middle East do not dare to shut down, because it is too culturally ingrained, is the mosque. As a result, all organized opposition must develop a quasi-religious character, or at least a religious disguise. So, when a dictator goes, almost the only option to replace him ends up being the so-called “religious extremists” (a serious misnomer—these guys aren't very religious at all). This is why democracy doesn't work here. There are only two organized groups: the army, and the mosque. Neither is democratic in nature.

So how do you get to a healthy civil society in the Middle East?

History tells us that there is really only one way: monarchy.

The matter is partially obscured, because many nations have chucked the monarchy since achieving democracy, but it has almost always been necessary to have a monarchy in order to get a democracy in the first place. This is of course true of Canada, Britain, Australia, and the rest of the Commonwealth. It is true, recently, of Spain. It is also true, despite the national mythology, of the US: they got their democratic institutions when they were still colonies. It is true of Japan—under Hirohito; and of Italy. Germany achieved it without a king, but under long foreign military occupation. It is also true of France. Despite the revolution and all that, stable democracy came under Napoleon III, the hereditary Emperor.

With rare exceptions like Henry VIII, monarchies are not totalitarian. One reason is because you do not become the leader in a monarchy through personal ambition. On average, the average monarch will have only the average drive for personal power. Accordingly, there is so desire in the typical monarch to destroy civil society. Or, should suitable institutions arise, to hang on to power for the sake of power.

Like other citizens, they are mostly inclined to do whatever seems best for the nation. Nor do they have the same incentive as a dictator to loot the country's treasury: given the hereditary principle, they have every reason to want to leave the country in the best possible condition for the sake of their children.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE have oil. Iraq and Iran have oil. Which governments have made better use of the resource?

Fortunately for the Middle East, it does include some monarchies.

What to Do about Iraq

Current map of the military situation in Iraq. Good guys shown in blue.

It seems to many that the US has no good choices now in Iraq. That the sacrifices of the last ten years by the US military are in vain. Many say it was a mistake to go in in the first place; things are now worse than if the US had stayed out back in '03. When Dick Cheney went on Fox News to say Obama had gotten it all wrong, Megan Kelly countered that he too, seemed to have gotten it all wrong. Even the right, in other words, sees no good options now.

A pro-Iranian Iraqi government is fighting an Al Qaeda affiliate, who is in turn fighting the military dictatorship of Hafez Assad, accused of crimes against humanity. So whom does the US want to win? Why? Go flip a coin. If, on the other hand, the US stays out, won't Iran move in? Or Turkey? How will the Kurds feel about that?

I disagree. There are good guys in this fight, and they ought to be defended. And not just the Kurds.

I believed at the time that it was right for the US to go in to Iraq, and I still think it so. They had to go in; Saddam was flouting the ceasefire terms. (The Weapons of Mass Destruction were not the crucial issue,) They screwed up in trying at the same time to turn Iraq into a liberal democracy. In my defense, I thought this second bit was a bad, naïve, idea at the time. You cannot impose a democracy on a people, any more than you can square a circle.

I also believe it is not too late to save the situation. The US really does have allies on the ground in Iraq and the Levant. They are less aware of this than they should be, because of the same blind spot about democracy that led to their mistken attempt at nation-building in Iraq. Their allies are Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the rest of the Gulf Cooperation Council. All have all been staunch allies, moderate voices, responsible influences in the region, and models of stability in the midst of chaos. They are involved: Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait all have borders with Iraq. Jordan is practically surrounded by the conflict, swamped with refugees.

The US has a responsibility to them, ought to listen to them in this crisis, and, moreover, ought to look to them as models for what might work in Iraq. The US should still be funnelling their military and financial help to them, and seeking their counsel, to ensure that their allies in the region remain strong, and to ensure that said US assets are used wisely.

Which brings me to what I thought the US should have done in Iraq in the first place: restore the Iraqi monarchy, then get out. When you have a nation of many factions, like Iraq, you almost need a monarch as a unifying symbol, as there is no national self-consciousness to do this. Consider Jordan: like Iraq, a very mixed country, but stable. Monarchies are demonstrably more responsible and less corrupt than republics, short of a fully functioning liberal democracy. It is in the vested interest of the ruling family to foster growth and development, for the sake of their own children and grandchildren, instead of pillaging the treasury, as a dictator will, while he can. And Iraq had a legitimate, still-existing ruling house that could have been tapped.

Is it too late? I don't see why.

Iraq

Does anyone else find this incredible? Just over the wire from the Daily Telegraph in the UK:

"12.10 Iraq's parliament has failed to reach a quorum, officials told AFP, preventing it from voting on a request to announce a state of emergency to deal with the major jihadist offensive.

A senior government official told AFP only 128 of 325 MPs attended, and another official confirmed a quorum was not reached."

I begin to believe ISIS is simply filling a vacuum, that Iraq has no effective government. The insurgents took both Mosul and Tikrit within 24 hours, didn't they? 

At this rate, soldiers are just throwing their weapons away and blending in to the crowd as soon as the ISIS units appear. And they are moving almost as fast as the highways can carry them. And it looks as if the politicians in Baghdad, too, do not want to be easy to find when this is over.

What will the result look like? I assume the Kurds can hold their territory. I expect the Shia in southern Iraq may choose to rely on Iranian intervention to defend them from the Sunni ISIS.

This will not, for the US, be a happy conclusion to their adventure in Iraq.

Letters for Iraq

You can send letters of encouragement to the persecuted Catholics of Iraq. The Papal Nuncio to the UN has offered to deliver all letters by diplomatic pouch.


Please address your emails to the families to His Beatitude Emmanuel Delli, Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Baghdad at tonuncio@gmail.com. He will print out the emails and put them in the pouch.

Say It--Just Say the Word: It Was a _Catholic_ Church

Why does the NY Times seem to consciously avoid the fact that the church recently attacked in Baghdad was Catholic?

http://www.getreligion.org/2010/11/massacre-in-a-generic-iraqi-church/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+getreligion/DmXm+(GetReligion)

Democracy and Culture

Especially since Vietnam, many believe that democracy may not work in non-European cultures. A friend recently even limited that to Northern European cultures. His thought was that other parts of the world were too “tribal.” This is very much the rap against America’s plans in Iraq.

I strongly disagree. Democracy already works pretty well in a lot of nations outside Northern Europe: India, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan; not to mention Italy, Spain, Greece, and so forth. The advantages of democracy are pretty obvious, to people in the Third World as much as in the First. Polls show the average Arab in the street, for example, certainly wants it.

The great advantage of democracy is not that the people get to choose their own government. Who cares? The point is to get the best government, and there is no reason to suppose the popular majority have any special insight in that regard.

No; the great advantage of democracy is that it offers a peaceful way to change governments when one is plainly not working. An undemocratic society must either struggle indefinitely under an incompetent, corrupt, or oppressive government, or accept the chaos of civil war. Indeed, it must often accept the periodic chaos of civil war anyway, as autocratic leaders die without clear successors. The advantage of a hereditary monarchy, the best government system other than democracy, is that it at least ensures at most times a peaceful succession. Nevertheless, unlike democracy, it does not allow a bad ruler to be replaced.

Even for the rulers, democracy is the best deal. Yes, it might be good to be king. Yes, democracy unpleasantly allows them to be replaced. But it also allows them to die in their beds, a luxury autocratic rulers cannot anticipate. The attraction of this does not depend on culture.

But, regardless of culture, it is very difficult to establish a democracy. It requires a responsible and moral ruling class; and one that is responsible and moral almost to a woman and a man. For democracy requires a gentleman's agreement in which those in power do not crush opposition when they have a chance, but allow themselves to be peacefully replaced, in confidence that the next group will behave the same way and will not crush them. It's very tough to build up that trust. It's very easy to lose it.

The most important thing George Washington ever did for the United States was to serve two terms as president, and then voluntarily leave power, even though he could have been re-elected--or probably, could even have had himself named king. That is the entire difference between the American Revolution, and the French, or English, or Russian one.

And that is the miracle America needs in Iraq.