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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
Hiatt has always been good at thinkspeak.
Somalia is a cautionary example for those who, like Barack Obama, favor rapidly withdrawing U.S. forces from Iraq and managing any threat from al-Qaeda with an "over the horizon" strike force. Such forces indeed have the ability to target and kill leaders. They do nothing, however, to change the conditions under which al-Qaeda finds refuge and recruits.
Yeah, Hiatt, Obama has got it all wrong concerning Iraq. Lets pretend the majority (if not vast majority) of Americans agree with Obama's stance on Iraq.
I guess that's why he is leading in the Democratic primary race & will probably get elected president once he secures the Democratic nomination.
They only "cautionary example" I see here is how foolish discredited neocons appear when they refuse to shut the f*ck up.
I've seen Victor Davis Hanson argue that the "Clintonite" policy of firing cruise missiles at countries and the civilian deaths it caused somehow justifiesd the Bushist strategy of long, drawn-out occupations.
"....it changed into a nation-building mission, and that's where the mission went wrong. The mission was changed. And as a result, our nation paid a price. And so I don't think our troops ought to be used for what's called nation-building."
--George W. Bush
Second Gore-Bush Presidential Debate
October 11, 2000
One of the real dangers of "nation-building" is the increased motivation to continue. The boundary has been breached so the inhibition is reduced.
I fear we will hear more and more of these types of arguments. They go hand in hand with the now prevalent notion among many neocons that the Iraq invasion was a good idea badly executed (everyone prefers to forget the abject failure of Afghanistan).
We have learned from our mistakes, they posit, so next time we will do it much better.
Let's ask the Roman Empire how that worked out.
We have been pounding Sadr City by air for two weeks now - and Fred Hiatt writes this tripe ? People should take a look at Gorillasguides.com (mostly arabic, some english) or Aljazeera English to see some of the carnage. Fred Hiatt must not pay much attention to what's going on - and I suspect that's a feature, not a bug.
If you are a politician then whether you're for staying in Iraq or for withdrawing, you simply cannot state that American policy is destroying at least one country and is not good (let alone any of Wright or Jefferson's trembling at God's Wrath). Americans - in general - simply will not tolerate such talk.
Arthur Silber writes of the "Shocking Immorality of Our Constricted Thought".
http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/2007/11/regrettable-misjudgments-shocking.html
As a nation, we are resolute in our refusal to identify the true nature of our actions, and in our refusal to acknowledge the consequences of what we do.
and quotes Massing
How can such a critical feature of the U.S. occupation remain so hidden from view? Because most Americans don't want to know about it. The books by Iraqi vets are filled with expressions of disbelief and rage at the lack of interest ordinary Americans show for what they've had to endure on the battlefield. In "Operation Homecoming," one returning Marine, who takes to drinking heavily in an effort to cope with the crushing guilt and revulsion he feels over how many people he's seen killed, fumes about how "you can't talk to them [ordinary Americans] about the horror of a dead child's lifeless mutilated body staring back at you from the void, knowing you took part in that end."
Because GG and many commenters are not silent, I keep returning here.
I think you overlooked the obvious flaw in Fred's thinking. The flaw was that there were no "good guys" to aid and abet like we have in Somalia. A robust presence isn't always a bad idea. Invading Iraq was.
A government that uses air power on a civilian population that it controls has gone beyond the limit and needs to be abolished.
Mr. Greenwald,
As always, great article.
Salon.com takes money from the Airforce. The same Airforce that is dropping the bombs your article mentions.
Do you find it somewhat odd or hypocritical to be continuously writing brilliant articles about the failures of our war mongering leaders, only to then take advertising dollars from the Pentagon?
Where do you stand? I look forward to a reply.
"... -- acts which, if intentional, are war crimes by any objective measure -- and why stopping those activities and withdrawing from that country would be really terrible." (GG)
These acts must be war crimes. There was no military objective, as there is no army. We hit civilians to send a message and that is always a war crime. No?
I would like to rise in defense of Fred Hiatt and his imperialistic warmongering (which incorporates war-cheerleading) cohort, and commend them for their ability to learn from egregious mistakes and misjudgements, and to improve, refine, and otherwise evolve their intellectual and ethical understanding of foreign policy issues.
But I'll never be able to do that if Hiatt keeps publishing this vile and absurd dreck.
His editorial views dribble forth like maggots from the orifices of decaying monsters. Even after All We Now Know, Hiatt remains righteously wedded to the precept that "we had to destroy this village in order to save it", mixed with the ruthless and genocidal hypocrisy practiced by the government and military authorities of the Reich of Zion which rules the state and people of Israel: the systematic and intentional commission of terroristic atrocities by state military forces, beneath the brittle and crumbling rhetorical fig leaves justifying such acts as legitimate defense to unprovoked violent aggression, or simply Merry Mixups worthy of a perfunctory and vacuous "apology", or insidious pretense of "regret".
The Ugly Amerikans are still in charge, political misfeasors and sycophantic apologists alike.
More than once during this campaign Obama has spoken of the need “to end the mindset that got us into war”. Not that some Americans are thick (far from it - all Americans are amazingly brilliant by natural selection), but I don’t think everyone follows what he’s saying. That it is imperative that we stop allowing the military industrial complex to drive our foreign policy.
If we lose 50,000 Americans in Iraq, that will do nothing to change the mindset of the Fred Hiatt’s, Joe Lieberman’s, Jonah Goldberg’s, Charles Krauthammer’s, etc., of the world. They still will have lost nothing, and their need to live vicariously through war will remain insatiated.
It’s a crucial point that Obama is making. To change the horrific direction that this country has been headed in for the past several decades, which was exacerbated by the collapse of the Soviet Union which ended our need for a ridiculously bloated military.
Maybe Obama doesn’t want to expound on the issue due to the forces that ensure that US presidents not deviate from the Glorious Never-Ending-War mindset. But it’s an essential argument that needs to be repeated and understood so that this country doesn't collapse because of a being endlessly forced into war after war after war to justify our insanely disproportionate military spending.
Dwight Eisenhower said it much better than I have. And Obama should reiterate his words – citing them as the words of a “great Republican president” – and educate Americans on what “ending the mindset that got us into this war” truly means
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Once seen as a lunatic fringe, reactionary anti-women groups are courting respectability
Salon headlines in your mailbox
