a very strong visual ...

Iraq Before and After Liberation

I think it might have been Richard Meyers - we didn't go into Iraq for oil, but we will probably have to stay there because of oil.

It's the same argument you are making about elite thinking; there is only one track to be on, we just need to find the right management talent to make the effort a success. And so we get opinion pieces like those of Shelby Steele in the WSJ, arguing that we need to shed white-man's guilt and use all of the military power at our disposal to subjugate the Iraqis. This presumably will allow for the peaceable extraction of oil for years to come, and maybe as an added bonus the implantation of liberal democracy in Iraq.

The trouble with the Shelby Steele argument, aside from its moral destitution, is that we have already tried Shock and Awe, Abu Graib torture tactics, wholesale devasation of cities like Fallujah, and endless night patrols bashing down doors and rounding up suspected terrorists. What other violence, short of even more destruction of urban centers, can be inflicted that will be productive and bring about subjugation?

There are two ways to impose order on a society fractured by civil war and the collapse of social order: take the Vietnamese and Syrian route (with Cambodia and Lebanon, respectively), and move in your troops after the country is exhausted with war and willing to accept an imposed order; or turn into Saddam Hussein and create a police state.

With the Iraq civil war just underway, the time is not ripe for imposing order; in fact our troops today are struggling not to impose order, but to avoid taking sides overtly in the current situation. As to creating a police state, we don't speak the language and we don't live there. In the long and short run, that is the great weakness of American pacification and subjugation efforts. This is one thing where Bush and Rumsfeld were originally correct: our military is not designed for nation-building. Bush has changed his mind about this (though Rumsfeld never has), but even Bush may be forced to flip-flop and concede we cannot create a Saddam lite regime.

That means the civil war has to play out until a local strong man emerges (out of the many war lords that will contend for power).

One other thing Iraq has shown the world is that war in a country rich with oil is devastating to that country's oil industry. It is so easy to sabotage the pipelines, production wells, refineries and shipping ports. This new type of warfare has to be taken into account when discussing long term solutions for Iraq, or the potential for the conflict to spread to Iran or Saudi Arabia. It is essential in oil producing countries to have a working civil order and a strong governmental ability to protect the oil industry.

This is another reason why the strong man solution, while perhaps the only answer for those seeking a unified Iraq, will take a long time to play out. Just grabbing on to a few oil wells does not guarantee that someone else won't extract from that same field, or that the oil can be brought to market. The strong man has to provide security over a vast area and many different nodes of oil production require protection. To the extent no one person can pacify and control the whole country, each war-lord dominated sector with oil will have to construct an entire vertical industry of oil production, refining, and distribution within their own territory. This is much less efficient that what Iraq had under Saddam, and implies a built-in cost to any oil coming out of Iraq in the future.

That means the civil war has to play out until a local strong man emerges (out of the many war lords that will contend for power).

It is the fault of the United States policy Iraq is now headed into civil war. You can't possibly stand back and let thousands of innocent lives be sacrificed until a strong man emerges? Seems to me there is strong American protest over the genocide in Dafur ...

that after Saddam's trial, that we whack him with a stick and then put him back in power in Iraq???

If your President follows his present plan for Iran, he'll soon have Iraqis 'and' Iranians after American throats, followed closely by the entire Middle east who'll be after your heads.

The genie is out of the bottle and it isn't about to be stuffed back in.

Democracy doesn't work in countries that haven't had any, especially ones that are attracted to theocracies. Someone should have told the neocons that.

If you don't wish to lose more troops, get them out now. Defeat won't wear well in America, but the loss of the troops will be a complete disaster. It really is coming down to taking your lumps now or later.

That hopelessness of it gives me no pleasure. More than 2,000 American troops have already given their lives in this mad pursuit.

The alternative, of course, is to accept that Iraq and Iran have elected a theocratic governments and work with them slowly to bring changes. I'd start with the women--educate them because they have an influence on the children in the home. Through education, attitudes will change, but it will take at least a generation before you see any differences in attitudes. Mostly Iraqis need jobs. Put them to work building schools instead of dropping bombs on them. Fulfill your promises to bring services to them.

Try to help them with their ban on militias. You won't be successful with the Kurds, but they're relatively secular.

Iran's biggest beef is you won't let them have nuclear power to generate electricity is because they are 'Islams'. America in their hypocrisy rewards Pakistan, India, and Israel and leaves them out in the cold. You could work with them too and bring about change, but it will be gradual. There are many persians who would like a more secular government, but they are deeply suspicious of American motives.

answer me this.

How is it possible to build a gigantic new embassy with all the comforts of home? Power and water to spare while Iraqi's don't have consistent power and water. Surely you realize they notice it?

Nothing is ever completely hopeless.

You have to bring consistency to your foreign policies in the Middle east and have respect for the people who live there. If they choose to elect theocracies, you can't change them overnight to electing secular governments.

Great changes were done in Japan and Germany in one generation, but enormous resources were poured in. And Japanese and Germans aren't Islamics.

Much is unknown to western civilizations, but Islam is proving to be highly resistant to secularization.

May I suggest a first step would be to develop a policy in Israel that doesn't always fail to see that Palestinians are victims too. If Islamic countries saw movement toward equality, they would be less resentful.

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You might not be able to get the Genie back into the bottle, but you could decrease its presence in size.

Sure as hell, you aren't going to win hearts and minds in Iraq by carving their country into three pieces as Biden suggests. The militias will still be there and they will grow and attack each piece when they have enough strength. And Biden's plan is totally unworkable in Baghdad...how does he plan to slice that city up?

Especially what you say about Israel. It would improve things a lot in the Middle East if the U.S. were even-handed with Israel and recognized exactly what you said: Palestinians are victims of unjust and illegal land grabs by Israel. A U.S. president who said that the borders of Israel are those set by the UN in 1947 would cause an uproar and do a lot to redress the bias in U.S. policy against Palestinians.

Instead what we see is no reaction yesterday in the U.S. to Olmert's statement that Israel hasn't decided yet where its new borders will be. In fact I didn't see any reaction anywhere to what is really an outrageous statement by a world leader asserting that his country alone can decide sovereign borders. At least in the U.S., few people question Israeli statements or policies, many ignore what is going on there, and Congress is terrified of offending AIPAC and other extreme elements of the Israel lobby. The controversy over AIPAC's role as described in the Harvard/UofC report published in London has been relegated to academic circles or in Juan Cole's Informed Comment. The average American knows nothing about the Israel lobby or its influence.

One of the odd developments in the Bush administration has been watching him try to find this balance towards Israel with this four power talks, only to see him reined in each time by Sharon. And here we are with Olmert taking on the same role, lecturing the U.S. that something needs to be done about Iran's nuclear program now. The only public cracks in this wall of silence about Israel have been an occasional column by Thomas Friedman, and one recent one by Molly Ivins.

So at the moment I have to despair of any change to a sensible and balanced policy towards Israel. Quite the contrary: the Bush administration may well be planning to address Olmert's complaints about Iran, and thereby widen the whole Iraqi mess into a Middle East mess.

It must be horrible in Canada watching this all unfold and being powerless to affect the outcome, but increasingly this is what many of us here feel as well.

what is happening south of our borders, but believe we'll deteriorate at the same rate if Harper gets a majority. So if misery loves company, we'll probably be joining you shortly.

We have great friends in North Carolina and their lives appear unaffected by partisan politics. I do believe they voted twice for the republican party and now regret it. Whether their dissatisfaction will translate into voting for the democrats, I don't know and it's not my business to enquire unless they volunteer this information. The topic of politics very seldom comes up when we come to the States. We do have to turn off the AM channel to escape the non-stop blather of talk radio.

It's only on boards like this, that I speak my mind freely. Politics aren't even discussed in our household. My family and I aren't exceptional in that regard.