When luck runs out

[fpb]

Two years ago I commented on the extraordinary luck of George W.Bush until then. Of course, a man's character is tested when luck begins to run out. Bush had not proved much of a leader until then - he had managed to make a void around himself, not only by his own actions but by the gratuituous rudeness of some of the people around him, and he had placed America in a very risky situation because of his serious overestimate of American strength. (I had something to say once or twice about the ridiculous superstition of the "only remaining superpower".) But everything up to the Iraqi general election had gone well, in spite of the evidence of a troubling lack of foresight, and it was his opponents who had always ended up looking carping and negative.

Now we see him when luck has run out; and frankly it ain't a pretty sight. The announcement that there are going to be talks with Syria and Iran - countries that have fought a proxy war against the USA without even troubling to disguise it very carefully - is a disaster. Nobody seeks talks with one's war enemies unless they are practically admitting defeat; and to seek it in the middle of a long-announced "surge" that was meant to reduce the pressure not only on the US but on the civilian Iraqi population is to send the message that victory against the mass-murdering, child-killing terrorist enemies is no longer expected. Of course, a few days earlier Tony Blair had announced the beginning of British withdrawal, stabbing Bush in the back (and recognizing implicitly the disastrous effect of his own leadership on the British armed forces, now no longer able to maintain two operations in Iraq and Afghanistan both). That had already sent the same message.

I am not a pacifist, and I originally supported both the wars against the Taliban and that against Saddam Hussein. I hated both regimes with a passion, and I wanted to see them gone so badly that I had even hoped in an Iranian invasion: even the Iranian mullahocracy seemed to me preferable to the obscene tyrannies of Mullah Omar and Saddam. But everything but the actual fighting was mismanaged from the beginning. I well remember saying, shortly after the conquest of Iraq (and long before I started this blog) that the invasion will only succeed in the long run if the Americans and their allies leave Iraq as fast as possible, because if they stay they will simply become the biggest set of hostages in the world - pure targets for enemy action. Well, they stayed; and in order to justify their staying - which was largely due to the complete collapse of any authority in Iraq, which in turn was due to the failure of the Americans to plan for after the victory - they came up with the idea of bringing US-style democracy to Iraq. Well, guess what: there was no government in Iraq - and there was none for a long time after - but there was an enemy left, powerful, subtle and ruthless. And as someone who knew a thing or two about war once said, no plan survives first contact with the enemy.

George W.Bush was lucky. He rode his luck for all it was worth. But in the end luck cannot make up for lack of judgment - everything from lowering taxes in wartime to honking off former friends with public insults. And when luck runs out, then we can measure the man.

Comments

[dirigibletrance.livejournal.com]

Well, if nothing else, the United States Military has come out of both of these conflicts with a cadre of hardened, veteran soldiers and with more experience and a better understanding of how modern warfare will be waged (with the advent of Network-centric warfare replacing Air-Land battle as the primary doctrine) as well as having had a chance to test the effectiveness of new technologies (UAVs, GPS-guided PGMs, Strykers) or the ineffectiveness of old ones (Interceptor Vests, the M-16/4 series rifles in general).

Yes, the outcome of this has been unfortunate, but we are coming home from it empty-handed. Woe betide the foe that seeks to confront us on the battlefield, now more than ever.

I was just thinking today that if the country is split up into parts, it wouldn't be so bad. Originally under the Ottomans Iraq was three different provinces, anyway. It was only grouped together by the British after World War 1. But, historically, before the 20th century there was no such thing as Iraq.

[patchworkmind.livejournal.com]

Quite.

splitting Iraq

[dr-dgo.livejournal.com]

The only problem with splitting Iraq is that the Shias have all the oil (or most of it at least) and nobody wants the Kurds to be independent (especially their two neighbors - Turkey and Iran). And as they would be land locked, for us to resupply them would be difficult at the very least. The Sunnis would get the western deserts.
Iraq has become a proxy war 'tween the shia and the sunni (i. e. the House of Saud and the Mullahs of Iran) as well as a killing ground for the infidels (us). The last time "Iraq" was governed and more or less peaceful was under the Ottomans, but the US has no stomach for the means that they used to rule.

Re: splitting Iraq

[starshipcat.livejournal.com]

Of course we wouldn't -- we're the Good Guys!

And that is one of the huge problems at the root of this whole mess. One of the binding, informing narratives at the core of the American mind is the idea that the Good Guys Always Win. There may be ugly set-backs, there may be moments when it appears there's no way to stop the villain's nefarious schemes, but in the end the side of Right and Truth will always prevail.

And given the assumption of our president and the rest of his crowd that Of Course we are the Good Guys in this war, simply because the other side is so shockingly violent, it's a wonder we're not in a worse mess. When you know that you're on the side of the angels, you don't feel the need to examine your actions and assumptions.

There are several fora where I have to severely curb my urge to say, "Hey, yes, we may well be fighting a war for the survival of the very ideas upon which this nation was founded, but are we going about it in the optimal way, or are we squandering our resources in counterproductive strategies that don't hit the real sources of this pestilence and may even actually radicalize moderate Muslims who might well have been our allies?" The people on those fora have already made up their minds, and trying to convince them that we may have made a tremendous mistake meets only with hostility.

Re: splitting Iraq

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I think a clash with Islam, if not with all Muslims, is inevitable; and that it inevitably involves violence. War, as such, does not bother me - bear in mind that Saddam and the Taliban used forms of government that amounted to permanent war against their own people. What bothers me is this: from 1941 on, the Americans had a pretty clear idea of how they intended to deal with conquered enemies once the war was over. In Afghanistan and Iraq, that idea seems to have been absent. In my view, Americans should have planned on the basis that they had to withdraw from Iraq within two years. If this meant leaving in place a modified Baathist regime, so be it. But it is dangerous to walk into a country and dismantle every governing institution there is; especially if the country is a part of the notoriously proud and hostile Arab world.

Re: splitting Iraq

[starshipcat.livejournal.com]

The whole "exit strategy" nonsense is a legacy of Vietnam. We've become so scared of getting stuck in a quagmire that we ended up compromising long-term goals in pursuit of short-term results. We got so focused on getting in and back out that we forgot to keep our eyes on the real way to attain that, namely victory.

And it's quite possible that the entire Western world may ultimately pay the price of our failure.

Re: splitting Iraq

[dirigibletrance.livejournal.com]

Doubt it.

The insanity and wickedness of Islam (not just radical islam, but even parts of supposedly "moderate" Islam) tends to produce cultures that are horrendously corrupt and full of individuals who are self-seeking, only want to advance themselves, and have no loyalty to the state or to any kind of positive ideals. That, in turn, tends to produce pretty pathetic military forces.

One need only look at a comparison of the military forces of the western democracies and the arab dictatorships. In the west: We have disciplined, ordered forces that utilize both advanced technology and also very rigourous, demanding training to create a force that dominates the battlefield both tactically and strategically. The ultimate example today of this is the Iraq War (the actual War, not the occupation) which only lasted three weeks. American and British forces were so well coordinated, trained, and deployed, that the Iraqi Army and Republican Guard was essentially given a choice between death at the hands of precision guided munitions and death at the hands of the US and Royal Marines.

On the other hand, the Iraqi army trained niether long nor hard, instead being mired in a culture of paranoia and ambition in which, at any time, anyone could be denounced as a traitor to the Baath party and then tortured and executed. There was no unit loyalty, no respect or strength of character in the officers (who were chosen because of thier political leanings, not thier competence) and no real warfare doctrine to speak of. Despite thier inferior equipment (Iraq was fielding Vietnam and Korean-war era gear) they could still have put up a terrific resistance against the Coalition forces had they simply been highly trained, good quality men, something which does not require advanced technology to create.

But they were not. As a result, the ground and air war was so lopsided that it was ridiculous. We lost more men and machines to weather conditions and friendly fire than to enemy action.

So, no, I don't think that, militarily, the Arab/Muslim world will ever be a threat to the Western world, not on anywhere near the scale that the Communist world was. To be a threat, they'd have to stop being the Arab world, and become something else.

Re: splitting Iraq

[dr-dgo.livejournal.com]

Do not make the mistake of confusing Islam with Arabs. Most, if not all, Arab armies are worthless. One of the greatest of the expansionist generals was Kurd - Saladeen I believe. Pakistan may or may not have a decent army, it certainly takes care of its weapons on its own, unlike the Saudis and a few other tribes.

Re: splitting Iraq

[dirigibletrance.livejournal.com]

Radical Islam (and Islamic states in general) will be shown to be just like the Communism that came before it: A broken system that doesn't work, and that destroys societies. We might have to bleed it a bit before that happens, of course.

The only really successful societies that we've seen have been the Republics which espouse education, personal liberties, freedom of speech (to some degree) and in general the dignity of man. The Islamic world offers none of these, hence it will fail. The Islamic states which are "succeeding", are barely Islamic anymore. Iran, for example, despite the hardline Islamic stance of it's top tier leadership, is largely a liberal, secular society on the ground level of the average citizen. Tehran has nightclubs and bars and pop-stars. Despite all it's hostility towards America, it's doing it's damndest to become a miniature America in the middle east.

And anyways, we have the Raptor and the Amraam-X. They can't touch us.

Re: splitting Iraq

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

In my view, Americans should have planned on the basis that they had to withdraw from Iraq within two years. If this meant leaving in place a modified Baathist regime, so be it. But it is dangerous to walk into a country and dismantle every governing institution there is; especially if the country is a part of the notoriously proud and hostile Arab world.

I think that America should have gone into Iraq, hunted down and publicly executed anyone guilty of atrocities against Americans, publicly executed the leading Ba'athists (preferably in a humiliating and unpleasant way), and then put into power any regime willing to kiss our rings. Until it showed signs of harming Americans, at which point any officials guilty should have been publicly executed. Again, preferably in a humiliating and unpleasant way.

Our big mistake in dealing with the "proud" Arab world has been truckling to their pride. That only convinces them of our weakness.

Re: splitting Iraq

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

And that is one of the huge problems at the root of this whole mess. One of the binding, informing narratives at the core of the American mind is the idea that the Good Guys Always Win. There may be ugly set-backs, there may be moments when it appears there's no way to stop the villain's nefarious schemes, but in the end the side of Right and Truth will always prevail.

And given the assumption of our president and the rest of his crowd that Of Course we are the Good Guys in this war, simply because the other side is so shockingly violent, it's a wonder we're not in a worse mess. When you know that you're on the side of the angels, you don't feel the need to examine your actions and assumptions.

I'd argue that we are the Good Guys, but it was dangerously naive overconfidence on the part of both President and people that the Good Guys always win. History is full of Good Guys who failed, for a variety of reasons ranging from insufficient resources to poorly chosen strategies.

What's worse, the American assumption that the Good Guys always win has a dark side -- it leads to us assuming that whoever won must have been Good Guys (leading to an inability to understand wars in which both sides are Bad Guys, such as the Russo-German War of 1941-45), and that whoever lost must have been a Bad Guy (leading to our self-flagellation after the fall of South Vietnam).

In the specific case, George W. Bush seems to have selected his military strategies based on the assumption that he had an infinite amount of political support and thus time for this war, so therefore our superior resources would inevitably prevail. I don't think that invading Iraq in 2003 was a mistake; I do think that failing to invade Iran in 2005 was a very serious mistake. By letting America be bogged down in Iraq he dissipated his momentum.

We are now in a situation where the only way we can win is if either (1) Bush is willing to go to strategic bombardment of Iran in response to the Iranian attacks into Iraq, which seems too ruthless for Bush, or (2) Iran makes the monumental era of committing a 9/11 scale atrocity against the American homeland, which means making a big mistake.

The cost of losing this war will be severe. In the short run, it will mean a rise of anti-Semitism and misogyny around the world. In the middle run, it will mean a Second Terrorist War, which will probably be nuclear. And in the long run, it means a greater chance of the decline of the Republic into an Empire, because of the cruel things we shall have to do in the Second war.

So I hope that we win.