borwnie, the Iraqis want us gone soon. Meanwhile we’re building the largest most fortified embassy compound in the world and a series of huge military bases. The USG is positioning us for a long stay against the will of the Iraqi people

a) I don’t think that’s true and b) if it is true, the way in which it is true means that it cannot imply that you’ve done anything wrong by committing treason. For one thing, occupying armies can be there with the permission of the relevant state, so it wouldn’t be treasonous to collaborate with, let alone provide political neutral services like translation to, them. For another thing, because an occupying army can be the de facto state, there’s a question about what features are necessary to generate the duties to an authority which treason violates. Anyway, even if it is true, then it’s true by definition, because there are obviously large classes of cases where the right thing to do is to collaborate with an occupying army and so it can’t be true once significant moral weight gets attached to the idea of treason.

Of course, you’re right to say that this is hardly the best thing that could have happened; obviously that would have invovled not invading Iraq and totally f*cking it up. But DD points out, we have invaded Iraq and totally f*cked it up, so we need to get what we can out of this. That’s not pragmatic in the sense of realpolitik: it’s a moral reaction to the situation as it stands.

But s/he knows this already. Sssshhhhhh…..

But what about the views of the Iraqi people? Do they count at all? Anyone who looks into what Iraqi’s think will find from numerous polls overwhelming support for a withdrawal of the US troops. For me, that’s the case closed – we have to withdraw.

Then allow me to expand on my point. The solution you propose is only a solution if you define the problem in such a way that your solution solves it. Otherwise the problem as you state it is nonsensical.

Against all expectations (well, my expectation anyway) the ‘surge’ seems to be having a significant positive effect on the security in Iraq and, more to the point, on those hundreds of thousands or millions of persons put at risk for their relationships with the coalition/puppets. I’m forced to admit that I don’t know enough about the situation in Iraq, the insurgency and the military and political capabilities of coalition forces to be able to predict the outcome of any particular action, and that someone in the coalition apparently does (finally).

I propose that if your goal is to deal fairly and responsibly with all those Iraqis who have cooperated with the coalition, the proper course of action to take at this time is not to withdraw and turn your backs on those who who don’t fit your solution, but to remain and continue to try to create an environment in Iraq where those persons will no longer be at risk.

And I don’t think anyone here is opposed to helping the Iraqi employees. For me, and for others I… assume?… hope?, it was more a matter of framing. But framing is important.
“you do what you can.”
yes.

Well yes. I regard this as being clearly better than “We are responsible for the deaths of one million Iraqis and we didn’t even look after our servants”. And since, absent a time machine “We aren’t responsible for the deaths of one million Iraqis” is not an option, you do what you can.

I give more credit to DD since I remember all the shit he
had to wade through while defending the Lancet study. He knows the numbers. But your response shows that the “stooges” have a point. And as a matter of logic:
“it’s not obvious that providing basically politically neutral services[sic] to an occupying army is an injustice.”
That level of context free logic is beyond absurdity. Providing services to an occupying army, justifiable or not, is called “treason.”
It’s important to recognize that things are rarely black and white, and it’s important to be able to simplify, out of necessity. Just don’t mistake practical necessity for truth.

Employees, and employees of civilian contractors, is what the campaign is about (including people like those laundry workers who got murdered). But I take your larger point.

The US would have to consider at risk everyone who had any cooperative relationship with coalition entities or any entity that might be perceived as a ‘puppet’ of the coalition, including persons in government, members of the Iraqi army and police forces, tribal and other local leaders, persons who accepted contracts for reconstruction or other work or worked on those contracts, anyone who fought against or provided information about any group opposed by the coalition/puppets.

Where does one begin? With translators I suppose.

there are lots of excellent reasons for someone to want to leave iraq. ideally, the governments of all nations responsible for this war should be helping people leave the country for something better if they want to, especially if they fleeing persecution. pragmatically, this is something western governments are unlikely to support on a wide scale but this campaign seems like a (modest) step in that general direction so it gets my (cleary morally very rigorous) support.

To some extent, the “help ‘em out” position amounts to realizing that if we don’t, we may find it hard the next time we want to launch a war of aggression.

if the goal is to make launching a war of aggression as difficult as possible the next time, establishing the principle that we owe a special obligation to interpreters and the like when it all goes to shit might actually help. no, really.

the sort of authoritarian right-winger who likes aggressive war also has somewhat retrograde views about immigrants, refugees, muslims and so forth, so if aggressive war means thousands more towelheads will soon call britain home, maybe they’d be more circumspect about the likely consequences next time.

I also think that if a leftist like Dsquared is of the non-radical-pacifist view, then they have to accept that armies are valid instruments of state and have public morals for which they need to be held accountable, and which it is the responsibility of individuals of that nation to remind them of (armies being what armies are, and all). Dsquared and others seem to be trying to do that, and the effort is admirable whether the public morality in question is “serving healthy food to the troops” or “rescuing local employees who the army wants to leave for dead”.

Also, it’s appropriate I guess that this should come up during the “stop snitching” discussion at TPM Starbucks

I agree with katherine, and even more with badger.
But this argument should be the strategy of those who want to help the Iraqi employees. “We” are supposed to be better than “they” are. They being the enemy. So “we” should put up or shut up.
I’m of two minds about this but that’s fine. I think we all should be. You can be opposed to the war and not be opposed to trying to make the schmucks who run it live up to their pretensions.