Iraq after Saddam?

I would imagine that the Iraqis themselves would be highly unlikely to elect a pro-American government having just had the living shit bombed out them by the US. We could see a rise in populist and very dangerous fundamentalist regimes, for example, or even a relatively benign government still unwilling to let the US get its fingers into the oil pie.

What will probably happen is that Saddam himself will be removed, and the US will replace one dictator with another.

My suspicion is that Kurdish forces in the North of Iraq will have played a part in the overthrow of Hussein, and they will now start getting all bolshy and demanding an autonomous area or independent state up there. This will alarm the Turkish government, and probably the Americans too, so the forces of the new Iraqi stooge leadership - essentially Hussein's army in new uniforms - will be deployed against the Kurds, assisted by American airpower and special forces. The Kurdish militants will have magically transformed into "terrorists" so no one will mind.

After a year or so most US forces will have withdrawn from Iraq leaving their stoogeleader presiding over a ramshackle pro-Western authoritarian regime.

lol

Do u really think he cares, do you really think it affects his decision-making? Like he really cares about the UN resolutions regarding Iraq? Yeah, he rilly RILLY cares about those resolutions...

That is an insult to the 500,000 Iraqi civilians who have died as a result of "our" sanctions.

He cares about those UN resolutions almost as much as he does about the UN resolutions saying Israel should get out of the occupied territories, said resolutions having been in place for, like, 30 years.

WAKE UP MY FRIENDS. WE ARE NOT IN FUCKING KANSAS.

Re "democracy" - is there a lot of difference between voting between two very similar parties i.e. labour/tories/dems/reps and having no choice at all?

Not much i would say. The US and the UK are war criminals and i can prove it. We (the brits) were the first to gas the kurds i.e. in the 30's - but that was ages ago when everyone was uncivilised right?

The US killed hundreds of thousands before invading Cambodia and demonising Pol Pot in their media.

Fucking hypocrites.

The only time you will see me standing shoulder to sholder with Blair is with a bomb on my motherfucking back.

IT'S ABOUT OIL AND NOTHING ELSE AND YET STILL YOU BELIEVE THE SHIT THEY'RE FORCING DOWN YOUR NECK DON'T U? 'WAR ON TERRORISM' MY FUCKING ARSE

KISSINGER, BLAIR, CLINTON, BUSHES SR AND JR - HANG THE FUCKERS.

That is all. :)

Work it out for yourselves.

Totally unrelated of course.

They are nonetheless DESPICABLE hypocrites.

More and more -- and especially as I talk about such issues with a particular acquaintance -- it starts to seem like there are a lot of reasonably-informed people who imagine heads of state as if they're villains from Bruce Willis movies, all selfish malice and somehow able to personally command every aspect of national policy. The obvious question is: if Bush thought like screamy-guy up there thinks he thinks, why wouldn't we be in Iraq already? Why wouldn't the first Bush have done it? They don't have screamy-guy fooled: they only care about oil and don't care one way or another about the international community, so ... so ... so why exactly didn't the U.S. just roll in and annex Iraq during the 90s? Screamy-guy?

Can we bury this stupid idea that Kuwait somehow isn't a proper country and ought somehow to be part of Iraq? Kuwait has an existence as a political entity going back to around the 18th century. that's a good bit further than Iraq which only came into being after the second world war.

When was Kuwait part of Pesia, and where is this mysterious country?

James, the actions mentioned in Screamy Guy's post prove pretty comprehensively that the US/UK government are war criminals and terrorists by their own definitions.

Mao looked better in a thong.

The current world order benefits you (and me too duh), so you start stamping your feet and squealing at anyone who tells you it is unjust and that those with the most power are the source of the injustice.

Fuckin conservatives, I shit em.

And yes, casting the leaders of western democracies as hangably evil leaves you with pretty much no one left to admire. Hence the anarcho-syndicalist vogue: if you don't really believe in leaders you're free to criticize them all.

Just like OBL and Saddo H.

Similarly, the sky is blue, but I assume you'd object if I said the sky was blue because Henry Kissinger painted it blue to deprive the 12-foot lizards of the particular light wavelength necessary for them to properly metabolize Earth-foods.

Also, as a general proposition, I think that you and I differ over "possibilism" -- i.e. for me just because it's never been (it being nearly anything) doesn't mean it can't be.

I will maintain that "using a computer" does not contradict classical Marxist edicts, however. :)

And if we really do want to pretend that the U.S. somehow brainwashed, shaped, or molded these folks like so many golems, surely that would give an equally free pass to the U.S. itself: if they can program Pol Pot they can program their own children.

DO YOU SEE!!

I argue this only to try and put a damper on the "west oppresses" view of the world: the fact is that there are plenty of non-western leaders and plenty of non-western citizens who are perfectly ready to brutalize their people and one another without our entering into it. It's both egocentric and a meaningless stretch at symbolism to pretend that it's always and completely our influence that does it.

James: my fears about a regime change in Iraq revolve around precisely that point -- it's a bit meaningless for us to speculate about what sort of government would work out nicely for Iraq if there's no such cadre waiting to move into place. Even leaving alone "ideal" I have problems seeing any line of development that would be particularly "workable" -- and since Iraq is more modern and politicized than Afghanistan, I don't see the mass-consensus tribalist approach working quite as well either.

Allowing the US to go around setting up govts in whatever country it chooses for either military or economic (or..ahem...corporate) reasons is not something the international community should tolerate.

Yes, I do believe that people in Afghanistan and Iraq are capable, intelligent humans. That's why I oppose the idea that they should be turned into unlamented cannon fodder. I dunno, if someone was threatening to come and bomb yr state, I think you might have one or two misgivings about it.

The US is not planning to bomb Iraq to liberate the Iraqi people. It will do so for economic reasons (o-i-l). The US govt, who have supported Saddam in the past when he was committing hideous atrocities within his own borders, could not give a FUCK about the Iraqi people. This is hardly ever discussed on any television I have seen.

I do not defend despots of any shade, but then again I won't defend those who bolster them and at the same time claim to be "freedom-loving" and "democratic". As the most powerful nation in the world the United States (or the military and corporate interests it represents) has to shoulder the greatest responsibility.

(*I don't completely. I think supporting regime change is an acceptable part of a state's foreign policy and broadly speaking I think the way you bring about regime change should be in line with the internal conditions of that state, i.e. in a democracy you market or fund the opposition; in a despotism you use covert operations to assassinate, perhaps, or fund terrorist opposition. War should not be an option though.)

Firstly I think the regional instablilty argument is all hot air from the Arab nations- they need foreign exchange from oil as much as we need the black goey shit. While you can make a link to Palestine clearly far more important is going to be the continued political/millitary/economic support of Israel by the US.

Why are people so concerned with possible hidden motives?

Who really gives a fuck about why the US is doing what it is doing? I mean freedom, friends, Israel, oil, nukes, humanitarian reasons- what gives? Callous and selfish sounding but I guess my social conscience musnt be all that well developed. I mean its kind of interesting to discuss but...

Surely more important is the result or outcome of the removal of Saddam for:
a)The people of Iraq(could it get any worse for them?)
b) The future security of the world( ( will letting Saddam hide terrorist oragisations and lob nukes at Israel be a better option?)

You might agree that this is more important than a nations sovereignty and international law?

Tom says "war should not be an option". I reckon it should not be the only option but must remain an option.

All this talk about the inner beauty of the Iraqi people is highly amusing. Im pretty fucking happy the US is the most powerful country in the world and not say...

VENGA: The west is responsible for 99% of everything bad.
NABISCO: You're exaggerating, other people do plenty of bad things.
VENGA: So you're saying we should, too?
NABISCO: No.

Please don't assume that anyone who points out that you're exaggerating your point automatically disagrees with every single other thing you believe.

whether or not it's true that US and UK leaders care much about the iraqi people under saddam, they have to use the rhetoric that they do to bring the US and UK people on board with their plans: this rhetoric gains substance as soon as it becomes part of the western politicians' contract with the people they purport to serve =>what's been called the "anarcho-syndicalist" tendency here is of course profoundly reactionary and defeatist, in that it basically argues that the contract cannot be called on or enforced IN ANY WAY EVER (ie that we have to *completely* leave the planet of existing political institutions before we are even slightly going to have a presence): actually the fact that our leaders need recourse to this rhetoric (whether or not they believe it) proves the opposite. I don't think democracy is dead and buried (though some of its formal frameworks are collapsing). Democracy in One Territory — like Socialism in One Country long ago — is increasingly a contradictory and unstable option: this is a conundrum that every species of politics, far left to far right, has to face one way or another (most of them aren't yet).

I continue to be amazed and — in a weird way — comforted by the degree to which the pro-war forces are so incredibly divided and confused about their aims, short and long term. I continue to be depressed and confounded by how tactically incompetent and morally parochial the anti-war movements spasm into being all the time: like I said elsewhere, Harold Pinter might as well be an MI6 agent for all the use he is to the side he stands with.

the ayn rand quote is throughly unhelpful (surprise surprise) since *every* course outlined on these boards and elsewhere is a compromise with evil: we can't magic ourselves onto a new planet of political institutions free from the crimes of the deep past, let alone the immediate past

Ive fallen even shorter...the sobs have increased to wailing.

This seems like potentially the worst move made so far.

We need to find a new model for exposing bad policies, lies, and treachery. Just tacking "-gate" onto the end of something presumes we all agree about the broad outlines but that there was fibbing along the way. I don't agree with the broad outlines.

Saying "[something]-gate" replicates this topology of scandal: it tacitly legitimizes the overarching goals. Invade Iraq and be sole arbiter of their natural resources and political future? Intimidate the rest of the Middle East into keeping their suitcase bombs at home? Ixnay and ixnay. Fuck those goals. I don't care about the justifications; I assume these guys are going to lie to me. My concern is: what the hell are they up to? Am I for it or agin it?