Question about Lessons Not Learned

I have to ask myself, with regards to the population-winning tactic cited here and here:

• If the same tactics were used on the generals, presidents and prime ministers who green light this kind of strategy, would they buckle and turn their backs on their battered armies?
• Would Americans become despondent and plead for mercy from Osama Bin Laden if he managed to destroy a major landmark or government building?
• Did none of these men and women ever watch Red Dawn?

The only explanation I can think of is that they view their adversaries with such contempt that Cheney and those like him have convinced themselves that Palestinians and Iraqis are subhuman, incapable of the kind of masculine resolve that would allow them to withstand our Shock-and-Awe (tm). The sad thing is, they are invariably wrong.

March on folly.

Relics?

I don't know if my thoughts are completely formed or even cogent on this but I am struck by something.

On the one hand you have John McCain demanding that American troops stay in Iraq until they can return home victorious. For one thing, I didn't know people used the word "victorious" anymore. I must be an "in victory" kinda guy. Anyway, I can't shake the impression that McCain is trying to redeem the Vietnam War here. I expect him to slip up one of these days and utter the implicit "this time" at the end of his speech. It would not be unprecedented for a politician to seek to defeat the Vietnam syndrome once and for all. Secretary Rumsfeld's Iraq plan sought to prove that wars could be won with out bogging down a la Vietnam.

The parallel case is Dick Cheney trying to prove that we overreacted to Watergate and that concentration of power in the Oval Office is natural and desirable.

What is it with these guys? Are all of us spending our lives waiting for the opportunity to vindicate a past failure or can we just avoid these guys? What about Obama - is he seeking to redress the failure of the Black Star Line? Haight Ashbury? The breakup of the Beatles?

Sadaam's Lunch Money

Here is President Bush revealing the real reason we invaded Iraq - to look tough. Apparently Cheney has been making the same must-not-look-weak argument around the country recently, too. I addressed the problem of looking weak by failing to successfully do the tough thing, here.

Now it occurs to me that the choice of victims against whom we would demonstrate our toughness is quite revealing as well. It is now common knowledge that there was no thought given to actually rebuilding Iraq or the possibility that some Iraqis might actually fight back. The conclusion one must draw is that Cheney and his minions thought Iraq was an easy mark. We would have no trouble subjugating this country and all the toughies in the neighborhood would look on us with a new respect.

At my daughter's school they have a word for someone who picks on kids smaller than themselves in order scare the other children in to "respecting" them: a Bully.

Don't you just know that Dr Phil would have a field day with this bunch of losers.

Update: Corrected some typos and bad grammar

Enemies, Foreign and Domestic.

From Vice President Cheney's statement concerning the I Lewis Libby sentencing.:

I have always considered him to be ... a man fully committed to protecting the vital security interests of the United States and its citizens.

Notice there is no mention of upholding and protecting the laws or Constitution of the United States.

See also Cheney's weird paraphrase of the Oath taken by military officers:

On your first day of Army life, each one of you raised your right hand and took an oath. And you will swear again today to defend the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. That is your vow, that is the business you're in. [emphasis added]

No, Dick, they pledge to "defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic". I am beginning to think that you might be one of the later.

Have your Godwin Card Ready

Recent reports are that Vice President Cheney is planning a behind-the-scenes coup to undermine President Bush's decision to employ diplomacy in dealing with Iran. Considered along side this review of Vietnam revisionism, suggests to me a slender thread connecting post-WWI Germany and modern day neoconservatives like Mr Cheney.

Play your Godwin's Law card here!

It's as if the need to avenge the loss of the previous war forces emerging leaders to view every situation as an opportunity to find redemption. One is left to wonder if a later successful application of total war purges these men and women of the need to prove themselves so that the can mellow in their old age.

In any case, I am becoming convinced that National Humiliation is too often left out of consideration when examining the consequences and reactions to foreign policy.

Headline Game

MSNBC.com headline:

"Cheney's plane hits bird; craft lands safely"

missing subhead:

"Democratic congress issues subpoenas"

I may be slow but ...

I have not bought into the whole "Oil War" theory of the Iraq War. I have been willing to grant that oil is a factor in our Middle East policies but the idea that oil would explicitly drive us to attack another country just smelled too much like conspiracy theory.

Then I saw this quote from the 2007 State of the Union speech in a Michael Klare piece.

.. A contagion of violence could spill out across the country -- and in time, the entire region could be drawn into the conflict.

For America, this is a nightmare scenario...

The invocation of "a nightmare scenario" caused by instability of some desert kingdoms, many thousands of miles away, can only be about oil. The President is explicitly stating here that our decisions about whether or not to start a war with Iran will be based on mainly our access to oil.

Now whether the Iraq war was intended by Dick Cheney to prevent China from winning access to the region's energy supply is highly speculative (and smells of conspiracy theory.) Whether an attack on Iran has already been ordered is also only one interpretation of events among many. All those ideas, wild or merely feral, will be left for another day. Sure, its nice to support Israel, with the holocaust and all, but would we grant Tel Aviv carte blanche if we weren't desperate for allies in that part of the world. It is at last clear (belatedly to me), that the only serious consideration about war and peace with Iran is the oil. Period.

I am reminded of the "hidden" cost of gasoline - the billions sunk into maintaining access to the Middle East. If only Bush took seriously our "addiction to foreign oil" he would see that the cost of changing our gas-guzzling ways would pale next to the benefits in money and American lives saved.

On Timelines

President Bush is fond of saying that issuing any sort of timeline in Iraq would only encourage the insurgents. It must seem obvious to him that if you say, "US troops will pull out in six months," then the insurgents will just lie low for six months and attack when the US is gone. Let us ignore the assumption that US troops are not a primary target here. The real problem with this argument is that in order to be true to its main principle you are left with only one course of action, namely staying in Iraq indefinitely.

Now, If you believe that Cheney intends to turn Iraq in to another Okinawa, we will refrain from calling you a conspiracy nut - it just isn't quite crazy enough to qualify you. Discounting this disastrous idea, however, every jihadi in Iraq can comfortably assume that the US will pull out the majority of its troops someday. He may not be able to mark his calendar but he knows that patience will one day pay off. That's the problem with Bush/Cheney's ominous timeline warnings. If a timeline is a capitulation to the insurgents then so is a military deployment that is so obviously non-permanent.

Maybe your average American cannot imagine holding on to a plan for more than six months without abandoning it and going to the mall. Given a society where grudges are a matter of family and personal honor, it is dangerous foolishness to believe that the Iraqi insurgents and aggrieved Shi'a are going to just chill out. Or that by August they will have forgotten all that stuff about decades of persecution, religious fervor, tribal humiliation, fear of reprisal, oil money and desire to return to power and prestige. No, those employing violence to forward their goals will hunker down and wait for the day in six months, a year, five years when they operate free from American interference. It isn't the date-setting that emboldens the terrorists, its the certain knowledge that their day will eventually come.

Counter Argument 1 - It is America's lack of resolve to "win" that emboldens the insurgents. If this is the case then you have to convince the public that we will indeed be in Iraq for 10-15 more years. Good luck!

Counter Argument 2 - The Iraqi army will be able to handle the insurgency after an additional {random period of time} of being propped up. Well, The only competent military force in Iraq is busy ethnically cleansing Kirkuk in preparation for a vote on Kurdish independence. The Iraqi military has none of the helicopters or high-tech gear the US seems dependent upon to fight the insurgents. When we eventually leave, the bad guys will have exactly the same armaments as the good guys. By the way, who are the good guys? Is it the guys not infiltrated by death squads. The only military solution to Iraq will come in the form of a civil war. Preventing this will require a 100% Iraqi political solution. We can neither win this for them nor choose outcomes.