Comments on: Ideas made flesh

By: mitch

mitch — Sat, 26 Jun 2004 12:55:47 +0000

But ETA had already been fighting Franco for years. Al Qaeda has no such history of anti-Saddam struggle. In 1990, Osama bin Laden proposed that the mujahideen, rather than Americans, should defend Saudi Arabia; that’s about it.

By: Antoni Jaume

Antoni Jaume — Fri, 25 Jun 2004 19:58:13 +0000

“[...] # ‘The terrorists have proved to be the dictators’ closest allies, especially Saddam. Why didn’t we see attacks from Al-Qaeda or other fanatics on Saddam’s regime? Simply because they were serving each other’s goals. They are not strategic allies (dictators and terrorists) but they have similar tactical goals.’ [...]” In Spain ETA terrorism was stronger after the coming of democracy, do you think that means ETA and Franco were together in it? DSW

By: mitch

mitch — Fri, 25 Jun 2004 00:46:22 +0000

Important post from Iraqi blogger at 'Iraq the Model'.

'The increased severity of [the terrorist] operations indicate that their greatest fear is democracy in the ME and building democracy in Iraq is the seed for it. It’s obviously not only us who believe this, the terrorists seem to get it too!'
'The terrorists have proved to be the dictators’ closest allies, especially Saddam. Why didn’t we see attacks from Al-Qaeda or other fanatics on Saddam’s regime? Simply because they were serving each other’s goals. They are not strategic allies (dictators and terrorists) but they have similar tactical goals.'
'The attacks in the last few days illustrate the spots of the terrorists presence and activity whom foreigners represent a high percentage of their count because of the close proximity of Diyla governorate to Iran and the close proximity of Anbar and Mosul governorates to Syria, the two countries that have the greatest interest in the failure of the democratic process in Iraq.'
'The world should understand that we’re not like what we used to be and we’re not like those around us; a military coup, then an emergency situation imposed for decades to protect the “revolution” that hijacked authority by force against the will of the people... Once again I address those who think that the war on terror was a mistake; take a look at the Iraqi field and you can see how the terrorists have gone crazy proving by themselves that the war is on them. Still they can kill some of us but they can't kill our dreams and they can't kill Iraq. No more martial laws and we're ready to give more sacrifices to achieve our ultimate freedom and build democracy.'

By: gavin

gavin — Thu, 24 Jun 2004 09:32:30 +0000

The flaw with the article, as Chris notes, is that it fails to provide any analytical basis for distinguishing between different ‘popular’ movements other than the personal preferences of the author. The claims of the different groups need to be assessed on the basis of their intentions, which are very difficult to assess. Surely we can’t just label any resistance group as being torchbearers for democracy since many of them do not have that goal. On the terms provided by the article it would be hard to distinguish between the Terror in revolutionary France, the rise of Bolshevism, and (at the risk of invoking Goodwin’s law), the Nazi coup of 1933. Were these all the torchbearers of ‘democratic practice’? I suspect not.

By: Marek

Marek — Thu, 24 Jun 2004 09:05:30 +0000

I wonder, does she also admire Yitzhak Shamir’s Stern Gang and Menchem Begin’s Irgun? And her Polish history is a little shaky. Most of the people involved in the Polish insurrections against the Russians were the nobility. (about ten percent of the pre-partition Polish population, evel larger as a proportion of the ethnic Polish population) Some peasants did join them, but many others were hostile, and most indifferent. In the 1846 insurrection against the Austrians the radical left wing nobles were massacred by the Polish peasants.

By: Marek

Marek — Thu, 24 Jun 2004 09:05:16 +0000

By: Sean

Sean — Thu, 24 Jun 2004 03:45:27 +0000

I don’t see the connection – the ‘defenders’ of Jenin and/or Falluja are LOSERS. We in the West are not…

By: Peggy

Peggy — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 21:30:03 +0000

The winner, or winners, will probably be brutal. The security situation in Iraq – militias, bombings, kidnappings, and assassinations – seems designed to demonstrate the cliche that nice guys finish last. An Islamic theocracy, with its setbacks for women’s rights, also seems likely since the Bush administration made sure that the mosques were one of the only social institutions left intact. Sovereignty will eventually rest with the Iraqi people. Americans do not have the stomach to put up with another ten year colonial war, even for cheap gas. Or maybe another Saddam will pop up in the nick of time.

By: robbo

robbo — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 19:34:05 +0000

Well, Dan, what I mean by “theocratic democracy” is that Israel is considered a Jewish state—despite having citizens of other religions, as well. And it’s a democracy. But you’re probably right that “theocratic democracy” isn’t the best label one could concoct. I disagree with you that Bush’s evangelical mindset “has shown any reluctance to accept full democracy.” After the fraudulent Florida election—where thousands of eligible black voters were prohibited from voting—he has governed as a far-right ideologue, eroding and evading the government’s checks and balances whenever possible. I won’t go into this in any detail, as we’ve all heard it before and it clearly has no effect on you. Believe what you must. Being from a totally different culture than the Middle East, and never having lived over there, I really can’t comment on how I’d feel about being ruled by “governments approved of by” the Sunni or Shia. Unless you’ve walked a mile in their shoes I think it’s odd that you have such a strong and certain opinion about it. From my own perspective as an American who remembers Reagan/Bush’s various Central American death squads, I do find it intriguing that GW Bush has appointed John Negroponte to show Iraq what democracy’s all about. Why doesn’t the resurrection of various prominent Iran/Contra figures in the current Bush Administration ring any warning bells for you about W’s commitment to democracy?

By: Dan Simon

Dan Simon — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 19:07:13 +0000

Well, Robbo, perhaps that’s because neither “Israel’s democratic theocracy” (whatever on earth that means) nor “Bush’s evangelical mindset” has shown any reluctance to accept full democracy, legal equality and basic democratic freedoms in their respective countries. And if you can’t tell the difference between Israel or America and the governments approved of by the Sunni (Afghanistan under the Taliban) or Shia (Iran) terrorists, then all I can say is that you deserve to live under one of the latter.

By: robbo

robbo — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 18:36:34 +0000

It would be interesting to see how our government would react to Iraqi fundamentalist insurgents if they were fighting for Jesus or Yahweh instead of Allah. We seem to have little problem with Israel’s democratic theocracy or Bush’s evangelical mindset.

By: goesh

goesh — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 16:20:28 +0000

a chance for some revenge i would say – it seems some of the shi’ites wanted to storm fallujah after some shia truck drivers were executed there – funny thing about resistance fighters is that they never seem to be able to maintain the infrastructure – they can liberate it but having been tainted by the hands of occupiers, it is best left to rot at its own pace – but what the hell, the iraqis didnt have much under saddam so it will come as no surprise to have nothing upon being liberated either – and it does seem there are alot of syrians and egyptians and lebanese and jordanians liberating the iraqi people – how nice – where were they when saddam was in power?

By: Factory

Factory — Wed, 23 Jun 2004 12:32:05 +0000

It’s worth remembering that in any resistance movement there are going to be those that are in it for themselves and those that are in it for their country, claiming that either motivation is the only one is quite wrong, IMO. The group that is beheading ppl is AlQaida (or at least claim to be), those involved in the fighting in Falluja and Najaf were different groups. “..but the armed resistance groups are likely to bring about not democracy but bloodletting and revenge followed one form of brutal dictatorship or another (religious or secular).” Well after the hand over they be getting something which may very well be brutal. And the democratic credentals of the occupation so far have not been good, elections have been moving further into the future. At some point the Iraqi ppl might decide that the resistance groups might not be a good chance for democracy, but they would at least be a chance.