Fallujah: Marine Eye-Witness Report

[Steve Thompson]

 --- "James A. Donald" <jamesd at echeque.com> wrote: 
>     --
> James A. Donald:
> > > > And the problem with a civil war in Iraq is?
> 
> On 24 Nov 2004 at 2:42, Bill Stewart wrote:
> > Well, once you get past the invalid and dishonest parts of 
> > Bush's 57 reasons We Need to Invade Iraq Right Now (WMDs,
> > Al-Qaeda, Tried to kill Bush's Daddy, etc.) you're pretty
> > much left with "Saddam tried to kill Bush's Daddy" and
> > "Replacing the EEEVil dictator Saddam with a Democracy to
> > protect the Iraqi people".
> 
> Seems to me that permanent civil war in Iraq provides Americans
> with the same benefits as democracy in Iraq, though
> considerably more reliably.

You might be more accurate to say that a permanent [civil] war in Iraq
benefits miltiary leaders and civilian contractors with a variety of
benefits.  Of course, I am quite stupid about a great many subjects and
consequently I may not be able to fully appreciate the benefits that
trickle down to the American public from being `part' of a
theocratic-military pseudo-oligarchy.  Perhaps such an arrangement makes
the best of the human condition and I am merely too inferior to appreciate
the fact.
 
> Chances are that after fair and free election, the majority
> will vote to screw the minority - literally screw them, as in
> rape being unofficially OK when members of the majority do it
> to members of the minority.

Well this is to be expected if one studies the field of game theory.  And
given that reality, there is really no point in using psychology and
legislation to mitigate against the dictatorship of the proletariat. 
Vulnerable minorities might as well lie back and enjoy the inevitable
loving attentions of the majority, eh?
 
> Nothing like a long holy war with no clear winner to teach
> people the virtues of religious tolerance.  That is, after all,
> how Europeans learnt that lesson.

You're dreaming.  People simply do not learn from history.  Never mind the
fact that the historical record is largely incomplete and of course
written by the victors; what does survive in the history of the species
entirely fails to teach individuals and cultures the errors of primitive
and barbaric ways.

Of course this may change in the future.  The Christian crusaders, to use
but one trivial example, did not have television and the History Channel
at the time when they were working themselves into a frenzy in preparation
for war.
 
> And the worst comes to the worst - well today the Taliban are
> busy kiling Afghans instead of Americans.  Wouldn't it be nice
> if Al Quaeda was killing Iraqis instead of Americans - well
> actually they are killing Iraqis instead of americans, but
> wouldn't it be nice if they were killing *more* Iraqis?

Many things would be nice if [group A] were busy killing [enemy B] instead
of [group C].  Sadly, this is not a perfect world and the people who need
the most killing do not, generally speaking, get it.
 
Perhaps it is a bit of a shame that the kind of broken person who ends up
becoming a suicide bomber, a Ted Kaczynski, a Timothy McVeigh, or even a
Jim Sikorski, cannot be identified early on by some sort of DNA screening
technology and then channeled into an appropriate military program in
which they might be trained to use their special talents against truly
worthy enemies of the state.


Regards,

Steve


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