Muslims in America

truthoo:

I'm very well aware of Buchanan's image in the popular imagination-- that of a rightwing bigot. Chalk that down to the stupid liberals who wouldn't know a a true patriot from a neo-con just because they both happen to be Republican.

Trust me, I have actually READ Buchanan, and see much merit in much of what he says. If you'd like to, I'd be happy to send you some links.

In any event, I didn't suggest the he was an economist; Craig is. I kinda knew that that sentence would be misread, even though I used a crucial comma. :-)

"truth is, it is Iraqis being killed by Iraqis in the name of insurgency day in day out; I am yet to see any condemnation of this here by anyone!...."

Yes, Iraqis are being killed Iraqis. Let's pretend now that this has nothing to do with jostling for power in a vacuum created, even orchestrated, by the occupation forces, which takes --and switches-- sides.

Let's also conveniently forget the case of the British soldiers caught red-handed PLANTING bombs, and the disgraceful action by the occupiers in attacking and destroying the prison in which they were held in order to free them. Sure, that was just a one-off thing, right??

PM,

Pat Buchanan is not an economist. He is conservative white supremist. Just google supremist buchanan. Desi white wannabes (MAJ was #1) foolishly fall to their propaganda. Churchill and Jinnah need to be tried for genocide just as Pol Pot was.
"http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE2D71338F937A3575 1C0A961948260

Churchill came to San Francisco in the early 1900s and spoke at the Commonwealth Club about the dominance of the Anglo-Saxon race and the key to it being India for next five hundred years. Apparently Atlantic Weekly has a transcript in its archives. Jinah had similar views about Muslims being ruling race. Jinah and Maulvis are one and the same thing for non-muslims. He and feudal Muslims wanted to be Junior partner to the British.

More:

During the 1991 Gulf War, thirteen Iraqi museums were attacked by looters, so there was every reason to believe that poverty, anger at the old regime, and the general atmosphere of chaos would soon prompt Iraqis to respond in the same way (especially given that Saddam had emptied the prisons several months earlier). the Pentagon had been warned by leading archaeologists what it needed to have and airtight strategy to protect museums and libraries before any attack, and a March 26 Pentagon memo to coalition command listed "in order of importance, 16 sites that were crucial to protect in Baghdad." Second on the list was the museum. Other warnings had urged Rumsfeld to send an international police contingent in with the troops to maintain public order -- another suggestion that was ignored.

even without the police, however, there were enough of U.S. Soldiers in Baghdad for a few to be dispatched to the key cultural sites, but they weren't sent. There are numerous accounts of US soldiers hanging out by their armored vehicles and watching as trucks loaded with loot passed by -- a reflection of the "stuff happens" influence coming straight from Rumsfeld. Some units took it upon themselves to stop the looting, but in other instances, soldiers joined in. The Baghdad International Airport was completely thrashed by soldiers who, according to TIME, smashed furniture and then moved to the commercial jets on the runway: "U.S. soldiers looking for comfortable seats and souvenirs ripped out many of the planes' fittings, slashed seats, damaged cockpit equipment and popped out every windshield." The result was an estimated loss of $100 million worth of damage to Iraq's national airline -- which was one the first assets to be put on the auction block in an early and contensious partial privatization.

Tahmed sahib,

the US population was attacked by Al Qaeda in Afghanistan.

So what was the motive for invasion of Iraq?

WMD was spurious wasn't it, an official publicly admited that the report was "sexed-up".

Saddam alone was not the issue- tyrants are dime a dozen in the Third World.

That leaves us with one motive- Oil.

And at the end of the day, oil has only become dearer and the AQ has got a (potential) safe haven in a country where it had not much of a presence.

And so it was a strategic mistake from day 1.

But I believe you supported this invasion, didn't you?

Regards

Re: # 138; tahmed sahib

basically what you wrote makes sense....yes the invasion may have been a mistake...but in all this "bitterness", if Iraqis choose to continue to self-destruct, there is no force in the world that can stop that

unfortunately from the failure of this venture the Iraqis have a lot more to loose than the US or any of its allies. I am yet to see anyone here speak of a viable alternative?

one has to present a substantial alternative rather than rhetoric; ....oh they invaded our brothers....oh how bad...oh...oh....then the emotive pictures to go with that rubbish

truth is, it is Iraqis being killed by Iraqis in the name of insurgency day in day out; I am yet to see any condemnation of this here by anyone!....

....maybe it is to the advantage of these lunatics to have all these pictures available for their own warped purposes

Regards

Passages from The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Captilalism by Naomi Klein.

WHen the war began, the residents of baghdad wer esubjected to sensory deprivation on a mass scale. One by one, the city's sensory inputs were cut off; the ears were the first to go.
On the night of March 28, 2003, as U.S. troops drew nearer to Baghdad, the ministry of Communications was bombed and set ablaze, as were four Baghdad telephone exchanges, with massive Bunker-busters, cutiing off millions of phones across the city. The targetting of phon exchanges continued - twelve in total - until, by April 2, there was barely a phone working in all of Baghdad.* During the same assault, television and radio transmitters were also hit, making it impossible for families in Baghdad, huddled in their homes, to pick up even a weak signal carrying news of what was going on outside their doors.
Many Iraqis say that the shredding of their phone system was the most psychologically wrenching part of the air attack. The combination of hearing and feeling bombs going off everywhere while being able to call a few blocks away to find out if loved ones were alive, or to reassure terrified relatives living abroad, was pure torment...."

* the author explains why the 'logic' of the annihilation of the phone system to sever Saddam's ability to communicate was completely bogus. Will reproduce if anyone's interested.

More later, on clues to the actual intent of the occupation...

PM: sadly, we cant all be geniuses like you.

majumdar #136 From the point of view of the US population, it was obviously the wrong country - the US population was attacked by Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. And so it was a strategic mistake from day 1.

From the point of view of the Iraqi population, if the result had been the removal of Saddam and the restoration of a democratic constitution and the rule of law, then it would have given the Iraqi people what any sane people would like.

OK?

Tahmed sahib,

Re; 132/Others

So basically there was nothing inherently wrong in the American invasion of Iraq, it was basically a noble and disinterested project. But went wrong because of tactical mistakes made by Bush's incompetent team. Is that what you are arguing?

Regards

re. tahmed #131:
#127 dm: How the hell was I supposed to know that Bush would turn out to be so totally incompetent? So that was a cheap shot, if I may respectfully say so.

The "failure" in Iraq has everything to do with Mr Bush & Co.'s competence in milking wars for personal gain. You'd have to be a complete idiot not to see that by NOW.

Maybe you could not have foreseen the way things would turn out in Iraq. That's because you (and I admit myself) are/ were ignoramuses who thought you could enter one of the oldest, proudest civilizations in the world, lay bare it's institutions, get control of its vital assets (this was clear from Day One of the occupation, btw, so claims of ignorance won't wash) deprive its citizens of electricity (even to this day!), water, respect (at home and in prison) and the right to live without the fear of a bomb going off any given hour in their neighbourhood -- all completely forseeable and predicted outcomes to the occupation -- and install a democracy in its place (with the spoils of the war of course by now firmly in you-know-who's hands ??

that should be "sectarian hostilities", not "sectoral hostilities", btw.

BJ2 #132: I must regretfully differ with you on this, guruji. These "sectoral hostilities" are a convenient excuse used the republicans to put responsibility on Iraqis for the mess, rather than in the Bush incompetence.

The basic mistake Bush admin. made was to sack the entire Iraqi military (rather than using it to supplement its own forces after the fall of Saddam); sack the entire Baathist membership (which meant sacking civil servants down to schoolteachers. This basic weakness gave rise to further problems (e.g. the insurgency, which combined with lack of discipline, led to Abu Ghraib) that fed on one another.

Re: # 131

There is no way GWB (or any prominent Western leader) could ever have imagined the depth of sectoral hostilities in Iraq (and elsewhere) which have queered the pitch everywhere and ruined the efforts to bring about peace and prosperity to that region.

#127 dm: How the hell was I supposed to know that Bush would turn out to be so totally incompetent? So that was a cheap shot, if I may respectfully say so.

dost mittar #126 You are right that during the Cold War the US saw right wing religious parties as being natural allies against a Godless Communism. And you are right that Nasser (allied with communists) fought "maudoodi's chehlas", primarily Syed Qutb who read arab translations of maudoodi's ideology while jailed by Nasser. To what extent this translated into US help in the growth of maudoodism in Pakistan is anybody's guess though. While jamaatiya student groups tended to be well organized in the 1960's and also well equipped with jeeps, I dont recall any evidence of funding (let alone US support) to these groups. The US dealt with Ayub Khan in the 1960's, and any funding to religious parties would have been with Ayubs agreement.

So: While you are right on Cold War alignments, I think you go too far in assuming that it was because of the US that Maudoodism flourished.

So, what caused Maudoodism (in Pakistan, and its offshoot the Islamic Brotherhood which gave rise to Al Qaeda) to flourish? Any objective look at middle east history will tell you that it was the failure of these societies to modernize.

Example: in Egypt as far back as the early 19th century the royal family was trying to be "western" in the superficial sense of clothings, mannerisms, and spendthrift ways. But it failed to develop a significant middle class that "westernized" in a deeper sense of education - as happened in Meiji Japan, e.g., or in the education among hindus in India (as opposed to the muslims who failed here due to opposition by the echobooms of the 19th/20th century to western education).

Bottom line: Dont blame the US for religious extremists. The failure rests squarely on the elite (both the corrupt sheikhs and rulers, and the regressive theocracy). And thus, the US cannot fix what muslims can only fix themselves - by giving the boot to the "superficial westerns" of the hamidm kind, as well as to the "regressive islamists" of the echoboom kind as well as the "clueless marxists" of the masadi kind. And learning something that progressive people have done throught history - namely, have the humility to learn from others.