What is Left When You Leave a War Unfinished
November 25th, 2007 at 07:33pm Mark Noonan
I’m in the process of reading two books, 1967: Israel, the War, and the Year That Transformed the Middle East and The Fight for Jerusalem: Radical Islam, the West, and the Future of the Holy City. I’m about half way through the latter, two thirds done with the former. Both are fascinating books providing me with new information and new insights into the Arab/Israeli War - and War it is, and it has been ongoing since the proclamation of the State of Israel in 1948. And it will go on until the war ends. Unstated by either author so far, but clear to me is that the reason we’re still engaged over the issue of Israel, Jerusalem and the threat of radical Islam is because we’ve never allowed the Arab/Israeli war to be fought to a conclusion.
In 1967, one of the pre-battle acts was Irael’s internal debate over whether or not they could go to war without approval from the western powers, especially the United States and whether these same powers would allow Israel to go all out. Neither issue was settled - at the start of the battle, all concerned were laboring under various misconceptions over the position of everyone else involved. And, as we all know, the world community came to the rescue of a completely defeated Arab coalition after a mere six days of battle in 1967 - a completely defeated Arab coalition, but a coalition which was spared having to surrender and accept peace terms from the victor. Just a few more days of military action, and the war would really have been over with Israeli forces in Cairo, Damascus and Amman and able to force a peace as the price for withdrawing not from properly Israeli territories in the West Bank and Gaza, but from the heartland of the enemy coalition.
In The Fight for Jerusalem, the author details, among other things, the way Moslem have desecrated non-Moslem holy sites under their control but more central has been the Moslem campaign to deny a historic Jewish connection to Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. Aided by western academics with a vested interest in denying the truth of the Bible, some radical Moslems have been attempting to convince the world that David and Solomon never had a capitol city in Jerusalem, and that the Temple never existed on the Temple Mount. All of this is in service of the Moslem desire to have the entirey of the Old City of Jerusalem in their hands in any future peace deal. Ultimately, the reason we’ve got a Palestinian Authority which has, among other things, permitted the desecration of the Tomb of Joseph and the Church of the Nativity and which is making an attempt at forcing the Jews of Israel to give up their historic and religious capitol city is because of the unfinished war of 1967 - failure to force an end to the war and a peace deal 40 years ago has left us in the quandry of a continuing war, and yet another attempt by the defeated to reverse their overwhelming, and justly deserved, defeat. There is a lesson to be learned here.
Over at Captain’s Quarters, Captain Ed takes note of former Clinton Administration official Richard Holbrooke’s hand wringing over the deteriorating situation in Kosovo. You remember Kosovo, don’t you? The one unqualified triumph of the Clinton Administration? The template for American intervention? The proof that GW’s program is wrong? Well, it seems that things are falling apart a bit in Kosovo with a renewed threat of war - with the Serbs unwilling to surrender forever their claim to this historic piece of Serb territory and the Europeans unable to force a settlement. Naturally, Holbrooke figures this is all President Bush’s fault - you know, in a post-9/11 world, our highest priority should have been Kosovo, right? The real fault of this, however, is that the war against Serbia over Kosovo wasn’t finished.
Bill Clinton’s purpose, as far as I can determine, in the Kosovo War was to do something - but there wasn’t a clear idea of what was to be done; meaning, there wasn’t any clear idea of what result was desired from the war. I recall from that war that Clinton’s statement announcing the commencement of hostilities had some absurd references to two world wars starting in the Balkans…of course, only one did, and if Clinton really thought that the conflict over Kosovo was going to lead to World War III, then he is either an idiot or, more likely, that he just figured the American people would buy one more whopper from him. (As an aside, I’d like to find that speech, but I wasn’t able to find it in the archives over at the Clinton Foundation; I can find just about everything but what I exactly heard over the radio that day while driving in my car). Be all that as it may, there was no clearly defined goal other than a nebulous lack of war on the agenda - and so we bombed and bombed and bombed and, eventually, the Serbs got tired of it and called it quits…except, of course, that they didn’t. They did want very much for the bombing to stop, and it did stop - but there was no signed peace agreement where Serbia surrendered sovereignty over Kosovo…their claim to it, thus, was - and is - very much alive. And now there’s a Serbian government willing to press for Kosovo, backed by a Russia willing to throw its weight around behind the Serbs. The war of 1999 over Kosovo isn’t over.
Once peace is broken, the only way to restore it is to bring a war to a conclusion - a hard-and-fast decision which is inescapable and inarguable. When Lee surrendered, that ended the Civil War - Southerns could argue all they want that we won it unfairly, but regardless of how we did it, it was done; there was no arguing over the facts of defeat for the South. When Jodel surrendered for Germany in 1945, there was also no question about it - even the most died-in-the-wool Nazi couldn’t say other than that Germany was utterly crushed. Both of these defeats led to peace - even though plenty of people on the losing side didn’t like the result of it and wished it had come out differently and even, at times, nursed some hopes of a re-match at a latter date. Regardless - the wars were over. Peace had been established because a conclusion had been reached. In Kosovo, no such decision was reached…Serbia was forced out, but no agreement was made about the finality of it all. That would have taken ground forces and a march on Belgrade and the eventual dictation of peace terms to the Serbs. They wouldn’t have liked it, but they would have had to accept it. Of course, that would have required the United States to lose some lives - and while Bill Clinton was desperate to avert WW III, he wasn’t so desperate that he was willing to risk high casualties, and the possibility of lower public opinion ratings.
But what does he care? His loyalists in the Democratic party and the MSM will forever call Kosovo an unqualified success - and he doesn’t have to ever deal with it again. But in this small lesson in Kosovo we see illustrated the larger lesson of the Arab/Israeli war - that a war will go on until it is finished. And this lesson we must lay to heart as we carry on in the War on Terrorism. We can’t just “end” it - it has to be fought out. One side has to win, the other side has to lose - and the winning and losing must be of such an unmistakable character that even the most ardent Islamo-fascist will have to admit his side lost. It is either fight this war, now, to a conclusion or just allow it to go on, perhaps to flare up heavily at a time and place where America is ill-prepared to engage in major hostilities. The enemy is patient - he doesn’t want peace; he wants victory. And he’s sure he’ll attain it simply because he knows he’ll keep fighting to the end - and he’s convinced that we won’t.
Think about that, as the debates over the war go forward.
Entry Filed under: Foreign Affairs, War on Terror
45 Comments
1. Retired Spook | November 25th, 2007 at 7:54 pm
Mark,
As you know, I like your style of writing and I admire the way you tackle controversial subjects. I wouldn’t have continued to come here for nearly 4 years if I didn’t. Every once in a while you hit a home run, as you’ve done with this post. There are a number of basic differences between Conservatives and Liberals, but what you’ve highlighted here is the one that has the most dangerous consequences to the survival of the human race. Well done.
2. What is Left When You Lea&hellip | November 25th, 2007 at 7:59 pm
[...] Blogs For Victory created an interesting post today on What is Left When You Leave a War Unfinished [...]
3. Mark Noonan | November 25th, 2007 at 8:15 pm
Spook,
Thanks much - it is nice to be appreciated. It is an issue very close to the center of my being…war, and peace, and just what is meant by both. Call it what you will, but I’ve always had a deep interest in why wars happen, and what causes them to end, and what happens in the aftermath. An unfinished war is like a cancer on the body politic - and no cost of finishing a war is likely to exceed the cost of trying to paper over the cracks and pretend that one has peace.
4. What is Left When You Lea&hellip | November 25th, 2007 at 8:25 pm
[...] IanVisitsâ?¦ created an interesting post today on What is Left When You Leave a War Unfinished [...]
5. What is Left When You Lea&hellip | November 25th, 2007 at 8:27 pm
[...] post by Mark Noonan This was written by . Posted on Sunday, November 25, 2007, at 6:33 pm. Filed under [...]
6. Boink Blogs&hellip | November 25th, 2007 at 8:31 pm
[...] is Left When You Leave a War Unfinished Mark Noonan placed an observative post today on What is Left When You Leave a War UnfinishedHere’s a [...]
7. Brian Gregory | November 25th, 2007 at 8:59 pm
I actually picked up both of those books in Barnes & Noble the other day, but didn’t buy either. You’re absolutely right in saying that broken peace can only be fixed by bringing war to an invulnerable conclusion. That’s key to our philosophy. Even if some (like myself) don’t fully support the Iraq War, we understand that an early exit would only motivate our enemies and further catalyze Iraqi chaos.
8. Mark Noonan | November 25th, 2007 at 9:08 pm
Brian,
That is about it - and I do recall that in my support for President Clinton over Kosovo (thought it was a bad idea, but once the guns go off, patriotism required my unstinting support of the Commander in Chief as he sought victory for American arms), I was dismayed that he was unwilling to commit ground forces…I was worried on a lot of levels about the half-heartedness of our effort.
9. Bigfoot | November 25th, 2007 at 9:23 pm
Mark,
Looking back at President Clinton’s times, I recall that twice he tried to help muslims in the Balkans against non-muslim Serb oppressors. First there was Bosnia, whose muslims were often under attack from Bosnian Serbs, and into which Clinton sent our troops to be part of a UN peacekeeping force. Later came the bombing of Serbia over their mistreatment of muslim Kosovars, as you’ve mentioned.
Meanwhile, terrorist muslims were attacking American interests. The Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, the bombings of our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, and the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole all occured on Clinton’s watch, as did much of the planning for the 9/11. On the other hand, does anyone recall any Al Qaeda attacks on Serbia, Serbian interests, or Bosnian Serbs? Neither can I.
While President Clinton sent Americans into harm’s way to protect muslims, certain muslims were attacking, not the Serbs who were trying to harm their fellow muslims, but the very country that was trying to protect muslims from being harmed by Serbs. So much for trying to “win their hearts and minds”.
As for Kosovo today, I’d point out that the continued fighting isn’t just by the Serbs, but by the Kosovars (who are ethnically Albanian) as well, some of whom have taken to desecrating churches, often while the UN peacekeepers look the other way.
Speaking of Albanians, I wonder if by saying that both World Wars were started in the Balkans, Mr. Bill was thinking of the Italian takeover of Albania, a few years before Germany invaded Poland. But considering his penchant for whoppers (like saying at Rosa Parks’ funeral that as a child, he was inspired by her to sit in the “colored” section of buses, which cannot be true because neither Hope nor Hot Springs had such buses during his childhood), I realize that I granting him this benefit of the doubt might be a bit too charitable.
10. plainjane | November 25th, 2007 at 10:03 pm
Peace be damned, perpetual war is the neocon battle cry. Let us march forward to Armageddon. Abortion must be stopped we need all children in the final conflict.
11. JPL | November 25th, 2007 at 10:37 pm
I’m 100% with Spook — outstanding, thoughtful, and thought-provking post, Mark.
Makes me wonder, why has the West feared the consequences of complete military victory since the end of WWII? Are we so afraid of eventual nuclear retaliation that we prefer perpetual low-grade warfare over decisive victory? Have we simply so thoroughly “fallen away” from our principles (as theorized by historian Jacques Barzun, whom I salute as he turns 100 on November 30, 2007), that we aren’t willing to fight any fight to the finish any more? Or, when it comes to the Middle East, do we simply fear sudden cut-off of oil?
To the extent it’s the latter, let’s hold out hope for LS9 and other biotechs that are currently bio-engineering microbes to create synthetic petroleum as a waste product from sugar. I understand the first product may be on the market in a couple years. If they’re successful, it will go a long way to neuter (sorry, I meant “neutralize”) the Saudis, Iran, and Hugo Chavez.
12. Casper | November 25th, 2007 at 11:16 pm
Mark,
So your premise is that unless you totally defeat an enemy, you are domed to fight him over and over again. The problem with this premise is that it doesn’t hold up in real life.
We beat the British in the American Revolution (with a lot of help from the French), which led to the War of 1812, which resulted in a tie. By your logic we should have continued fighting the British until one side was totally defeated. In reality, we eventually became friends and allies without a major war.
Then, there is WWII which resulted in the defeat of Germany and Japan but led to The Cold War, which resulted in the Korean War and the Viet Nam War.
Then there is WWI resulted in the complete defeat of the Ottoman Empire and the creation of Iraq, Saudia Arabia and most of the other countries of the Middle East.
The point is, totally defeating an enemy is no guarantee there will be peace.
13. liberalT | November 25th, 2007 at 11:33 pm
Mark - you have truly lost it. The fact that so many here support you here is truly very scary. Casper has it absolutely correct. Your ideology is so flawed its unbelievable. Its not even new. In fact - many made this argument before WWI. It was suppose to be “the war to end all wars” - that we would have one final war that would be between good and evil and then there would be no point in any future war. Guess what - after millions and millions dead in WWI and WWII there were still many many more wars.
What you are basically subscribing to is hastening Armageddon. Well all that has happened in the past is that it has lead to more war, more death, and absolutely nothing else. No mark - “fighting it out to the end” is a moronic concept that only works in comic books. Unfortunately - your understanding of human nature and the world is not much more complex than a comic book. The world is not that simple as history has proven time and time again. If you would bother to even think or research anything before posting your drivel you would know this
14. Mark Noonan | November 25th, 2007 at 11:48 pm
Bigfoot,
When dealing with Bill Clinton, the one certainty we have is that anything he says has to be taken with a grain of salt until verified by at least two other sources. I don’t think he even realises when he’s lying anymore - which is actually rather sad, and I hope he gets past it before he arrives before the Judge.
But the fact that Moslems were attacking Americans who were fighting to defend Moslems is no great surprise - we didn’t finish in Iraq in 1991, or Somalia in 1993…neither did we finish in Beirut in 1983, or Iran in 1979 (which, by the way, puts all the four Presidents previous to the current President Bush on the hook for where we found ourselves on 9/11). In fact, our rushing to defend Moslems was probably views in Islamist circles as another bit of evidence of our weakness…especially when we eschewed ground forces for fear of losing lives.
15. Mark Noonan | November 25th, 2007 at 11:50 pm
JPL,
The one commonality between all the wars since 1945 - the United States has not been allied with a socialist power, thus we’ve had the various stripes of leftwing thinking automatically opposed to our victory, and this has jumbled the political process to prevent victory from occuring…until we got, in President Bush, a man with the courage to stare down the left and keep on fighting until victory is won.
16. Mark Noonan | November 26th, 2007 at 12:05 am
Casper,
Perhaps it would help if we defined our terms better? Here’s a quote from Winston Churchill’s The World Crisis:
If you aren’t seeking a battle, then you are not seeking a decision…and if you prevent a battle from being fought out to a conclusion, you are preventing a decision. What happens when everything is undecided? People keep trying to make the decision eventually come their way. Once a decision has been irrevocably made, it can’t be unmade…there might be attempts to do all manner of things in the future, but the decision being disputed is now complete. We know where we stand.
The War of 1812 wasn’t a replay of the Revolutionary War. The issues were different - it was not an attempt by Britain to reverse the permanent decision reached by battle in 1781. The issues of the War of 1812 were also resolved permanently by battle - after all the fighting was done, the United States permanently understood that it could not conquer Canada, and Britain understood that it could not conquer the American west. Issue solved.
Fighting a war doesn’t mean you’ll never have to fight another war - but if a war is fought to a conclusion, you won’t have to fight that war again. Do you think we’ll ever fight another war with Japan for control of east Asia and the Pacific? Fight a war with Germany over the domination of Europe? Fight a war with Mexico over ownership of California? No, we won’t - those issues are settled, and they were settled because the wars over them were fought to a conclusion.
17. Mark Noonan | November 26th, 2007 at 12:08 am
liberalT,
I refer you to the response I just made to Casper - and I also refer you to War Through the Ages, Carnage and Culture and A Military History of the Western World…it is clear that your grasp of history is even worse than Casper’s.
18. Mark Noonan | November 26th, 2007 at 12:11 am
plainjane,
You know, we are having a serious, adult discussion here - even LiberalT did a lot better than you.
Would you prefer I delete your comment so you can try again, or do you want it to remain there for everyone to see?
19. Ricorun | November 26th, 2007 at 1:28 am
Mark, by your own definition (actually Churchill’s), and with respect to the 6 Day War, how would Israel’s overrunning the capitals of Egypt, Jordan, and Syria led to a “permanent decision”? Do you really think they could have occupied all three countries? Or even one? Or do you have some other scenario in mind? And by the way, whatever specific scenario you envision, was it even contemplated by the Israelis at the time, much less considered reasonably practical?
I know one thing many rather hoped would happen: the Palestinians would voluntarily leave all of the occupied territories. But it didn’t work out that way. So if they really wanted to go that route they would have had to do so forcefully — in other words, engage in ethnic cleansing. And for obvious reasons, that was a bit of a tough sell in Israel at the time. In fact, it still is. So what do you propose in order to have achieved the elusive “permanent decision”?
20. Mark Noonan | November 26th, 2007 at 1:46 am
Ricorun,
Within 45 minutes of the start of the 6 Day War, Israel had won - by destroying the Egyptian Air Force on the ground, the IDF had rendered useless the Arab’s very large numerical superiority on the ground, and this was quickly demonstrated when the IDF launched its ground attack in the Sinai - undefended in the air, the Egyptian forces were destroyed as a military force within hours - and there was nothing left in the Egyptian order of battle to contest an Israeli crossing of the Suez and occupation of Cairo and Alexandria. It went similarily vis a vis the IDF and the Syrian and Jordanian forces (Jordan, indeed, was seeking a cease fire within hours of the start of hostilities, so hopeless was its situation).
What stopped the IDF? The world, led by the United States (stongly seconded by the USSR, of course, which didn’t want its clients in Syria and Egypt to be destroyed). But by stopping the IDF and putting place a cease fire, all the world did was allow the Arab/Moslem world to construct a fantasy about how they weren’t really defeated by the Israelis (early on it was current at least in Egypt that the destruction of the Egyptian air force was accomplished with direct American aid - so desperate were the Egyptians to believe that the despised Jews hadn’t beaten them in a stand up fight) - and this lack of a final decision led to the Yom Kippur War, the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, the rise of Hezbollah, increasing international terrorism…etc, etc, etc until we find an American army in Baghdad trying to stop something which could have been stopped 40 years previously, had a decision been reached.
Look, no one likes to get beaten in a war - but the concept of a war of revenge is actually very rare. France supposedly burned with a desire to have a re-match with the Germans over their 1870 defeat…but more level headed Frenchmen knew the risks of a rematch and, in the event, the French would have stood aside in 1914 (they were not required to come to Russia’s aid after Russia decided to intervene in the Austro-Serbian War) had the Germans not determined to strike at them, come what may.
Wars decide things, when they are fought out to a decision. You might not like the decision, but you won’t be able to argue that a decision wasn’t reached.
21. tippeecanoe | November 26th, 2007 at 3:46 am
Trouble is, Mark can’t describe what that oh so sweet “victory” in Iraq will actually look like when it gets here. Heck, Bush can’t do that. He says it’s a reduction in violence, with a few car bombs here and there. Where will the saber be handed over from the defeated enemies? Tikrit? Kabul? Who are the enemy’s generals? Who is al Qaida in Iraq’s Jodl? Keitel? Who will sign the surrender documents? Saudi King Abdullah? Did you see THIS STORY:
“Saudi Arabia and Libya, both considered allies by the United States in its fight against terrorism, were the source of about 60 percent of the foreign fighters who came to Iraq in the past year to serve as suicide bombers or to facilitate other attacks, according to senior American military officials.”
When do we nuke Saudi Arabia? Not to mention they provided most of the 9-11 hijackers, they are providing thousands of militants to al Qaida in Iraq according to documents found by the US military. The Iranians? Half a dozen or so. That’s it.
Mark’s hidden “victory” is simple: every living soul in the Middle East converts to Christianity or dies. When you invade a hornet’s nest, as we have done in Iraq, the hornets defend their nest. No matter how long you occupy that nest, they keep attacking you, until you either leave, or kill every last one of them.
Mark thinks we can’t leave until someone surrenders like Lee or Keitel, and all those uppity Muslims just accept the fact that his god is better than their god. Problem is, they’re more religious than the Mark-types and will die for what they believe in. Mark-types: not so much.
Even Perle is now calling it a botched occupation, not a war. There is only one “victorious” ending to a botched occupation: end it. Get out. But Bush is such a yellow-bellied coward that he’s gonna leave it for the next guy to figure out.
At least Bush has an exit strategy for himself.
22. 1H8L1B5 | November 26th, 2007 at 6:03 am
Mark, why reason with libT? She’s retarded, a reincarnation of kblack.
And tripovercanoe, can you provide proof that those Saudi and Libyan insurgents were sent into Iraq by their respective governments? You can’t? What a surprise!
By your stupid, yes, stupid logic, we should’ve retaliated when McVeigh and Nichols blew up the Murrow Bldg., by invading ourselves. Also, we should’ve invaded Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt for 9/11
Your rhetoric is old and worn out, trippy. Go peddle it in a blog where you’ll be embraced–try americablog.com, a bastion of kookery. You’ll fit right in…
23. Casper | November 26th, 2007 at 9:38 am
Mark,
I noticed you didn’t address the defeat of the Ottoman Empire. While the Ottoman Empire no longer exists, the countries that it was broken into (most of the Middle East and parts of the Balkins), has been a major source of problems ever since.
“Do you think we’ll ever fight another war with Japan for control of east Asia and the Pacific? Fight a war with Germany over the domination of Europe? Fight a war with Mexico over ownership of California?”
Probably not in our lifetimes, but history isn’t always about the short term. The Celts defeated Rome in 390 BC and dominated it for the next forty years. Four hundred years later the Romans defeated the Celts and controlled all Celtic territories except Ireland. Who knows who we will be fighting a hundred years from now.
24. Ricorun | November 26th, 2007 at 10:12 am
Mark, I didn’t deny that Israel probably could have overrun the capitals of Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. The question I asked is… what then? It seems to me that you’re assuming one of many possilbe outcomes: that no other nations would have gotten involved and that they could have achieved unconditional surrender from the authorities at the time. How are you sure that would have happened? And what if it didn’t? Libya and Iraq were also involved in the fight, too remember.
Here’s something else to consider… Back in 1956, when Israel invaded the Suez Canal, the USSR threatened nuclear escalation if they didn’t back off. What makes you think they weren’t prepared to do the same thing in 1967?
You mentioned in a previous post that “The one commonality between all the wars since 1945 - the United States has not been allied with a socialist power.” Actually, there was another commonality — that every foe since (until Iraq and Afghanistan) has been allied with a country that possessed nuclear weapons. If you push them to the point where they feel justified in using them, the “permanent decision” gets pretty permanent indeed.
25. Aztec | November 26th, 2007 at 10:21 am
How does this apply to our present situation? Who is going to sit down at the table and sign the surrender papers? Certainly not OBL, he is nowhere near Iraq. Saddam has been captured and killed. I know you love to trash Clinton to try and make this mess of a presidency look better, but this makes no sense in our present situatin that I can tell. Please explain.
26. OhioOrrin | November 26th, 2007 at 10:22 am
not that I’m a big clinton fan but please remember he helped broker the ceasefire in northern ireland which eventually lead to a peace treaty.
27. Retired Spook | November 26th, 2007 at 11:43 am
My favorite retired military spook, Ralph Peters, had an excellent oped in the New York Post the day before Thanksgiving that dovetails with this post. My favorite line in the piece:
28. kientifikoloko » Wh&hellip | November 26th, 2007 at 12:21 pm
[...] Check it out! While looking through the blogosphere we stumbled on an interesting post today.Here’s a quick excerptAll of this is in service of the Moslem desire to have the entirey of the Old City of Jerusalem in their hands in any future peace deal. Ultimately, the reason we’ve got a Palestinian Authority which has, among other things, … [...]
29. plainjane | November 26th, 2007 at 2:17 pm
18. Mark Noonan | November 26th, 2007 at 12:11 am
plainjane,
You know, we are having a serious, adult discussion here - even LiberalT did a lot better than you.
No, I stand by statements. You’re nuts. Kill every Al Qaeda member over the age of 21 and you still will not have peace unless you solve some of the underlying causes of their hate. Their children will simply find a way to revenge the loss.
30. phnx | November 26th, 2007 at 4:54 pm
“not that I’m a big clinton fan but please remember he helped broker the ceasefire in northern ireland which eventually lead to a peace treaty.” Ohio Orrin
Whatever you do don’t tell George Mitchell that, he is under the impression that he actually brokered the deal.
Other than fly in for the photo op, please tell us what Clinton did.
31. Ricorun | November 26th, 2007 at 5:32 pm
phnx: Other than fly in for the photo op, please tell us what Clinton did.
Come on now, give the guy a little credit.
32. neocon | November 26th, 2007 at 5:53 pm
……you still will not have peace unless you solve some of the underlying causes of their hate. - plainjane
Jane,
Please tell us what is the underlying cause for their hate.
I am anxious to hear your answer.
33. Mark Noonan | November 26th, 2007 at 6:00 pm
plainjane,
Yeah, no kidding…but I guess you haven’t been paying attention because that is PRECISELY WHAT WE’RE DOING. To quote myself from a long while back ago, “it doesn’t matter if we kill every terrorist alive today, if we don’t change the socio-political dynamic in the Arab/Moslem world, the war will continue”.
Dancing around the war, making it a think about bin Laden and/or saying that if we could just broker a peace deal between the Arabs and Israel or saying that if we would just withdraw are all the statements of people ignorant of war, and ignorant of the situation in the middle east. Stay or go, make a deal with Israel or not, kill bin Laden or leave him alive - until we get in there and change things, the war won’t end. So, we’re there - and we’re changing things…from now on, the Arab/Moslem world will not be the same.
Do you know why President Bush is calling that peace conference in Maryland? Have you given it any thought at all? Its because we’ve won in Iraq - and the Arab/Moslem world is now aware that there will be a functioning Arab/Moslem democracy right in the heart of the middle east…a part of the enemy coaltion knows that it is beaten, and is now willing to hear proposals for ending the fighting of a war they’ve lost. Not all of them have been convinced, but enough have to start working out the final disposition of this war.
Like talking to a brick wall, dealing with you on the left - you’re so wrapped up in unreasonable hatred of President Bush that you won’t even pay attention to what is going on.
34. Mark Noonan | November 26th, 2007 at 6:03 pm
Aztec,
The people we war against are two types - terrorists, and their State sponsors. Right now, the State sponsors are starting to realise that they’ve lost. The terrorists - having less to lose on a personal level - will take a bit more time, but even some of them are calling it quits (mostly by taking to their heels and leaving Iraq). There won’t be a single signing of a peace treaty - but if we keep at it, we’ll eventually get the State sponsors to surrender their terrorism, and that will leave the terrorist out on a limb, to be easily mopped up as time goes on.
35. CallMeTeach | November 26th, 2007 at 8:02 pm
First of all, if there was some semblance of “victory” in Iraq it would be all over the news and coming from everyone from the President to Mr. Noonan. So far, Mr. Noonan is the only one to say such an absurdity. Two countries and a territory that wants to be a country are meeting in Annapolis… that sounds like a victory march to me. Come on now, get real. We are having this peace conference because the U.S. is arrogant enough to believe that we can help solve 2000 years worth of fighting and bring peace to the Gaza strip. The Palestinian’s want a true Palestinian state and they want at least some of their land back. Israel wants to force Palestine to admit that they are a country which they are not. And Syria has its own agenda whatever that may be. I’m not going to waste my time looking up all of the “facts” nor do I need too to know that this is a horse and pony show. We are not going to be the ones the relegate peace to the Middle East. As long as we support regimes like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Egypt and occupy the Middle East we will NEVER escape the horrors of terrorism. We can stay there as long as we like and while it may simmer and there may be spats of peace we will ALWAYS be targets.
So I just read the most ignorant quote ever: “Contrary to the myths of the left, peace can only be built over the corpses of evil men” posted by retired spook. All men have a different idea of evil men and it is always from some sort of idealized moral perception. We perceive factions of Islam to be evil, they see us as evil, the Chinese see the Japanese as evil, the Somalian’s see the Ethiopians as evil, etc… All of these judgments are made from ignorant and limited points of views without any real knowledge of circumstance, beliefs, ideas, and so on and so forth nor is there any care to. Killing is evil. The vainness to say one human life is more valuable or important than another is evil. The audacity to say my way is better than yours is evil. I realize there are evil people in this world and that when they rear their ugly heads they must be put down. The point is, pious idiotic comments like this are nothing but rally cries to the weak so they can justify killing people - and that is evil.
36. Mark Noonan | November 26th, 2007 at 10:53 pm
Teach,
I did mention something about a brick wall…
37. Tractatus | November 26th, 2007 at 11:48 pm
Its because we’ve won in Iraq - and the Arab/Moslem world is now aware that there will be a functioning Arab/Moslem democracy right in the heart of the middle east…a part of the enemy coaltion knows that it is beaten, and is now willing to hear proposals for ending the fighting of a war they’ve lost.
If this were written by anybody else, I would assume that it’s a joke, or I would at least ask them, “You’re not serious, are you?”
But you are just nutty enough to not only say this, but to believe that it’s true. Of course, you’ve shown time and time again that you will believe absolutely anything as long as it is in service to your narrative, which you are so wrapped up in that you simply refuse to be educated about, you know, reality.
38. liberalT | November 27th, 2007 at 12:12 am
no Mark - sadly it is your sick dead ideology which you view the world through which destroys any thought, reason, or basic analysis skill you might have had
39. Mark Noonan | November 27th, 2007 at 1:58 am
Casper,
The war between Britain and the Ottoman Empire during the First World War was resolved permanently - it was determined by the fighting in that war that the Turks could not maintain their imperial domains. That this was a permanent result was demonstrated in 1940-41 when the Germans would have liked very much to have the Turks help knock Britain out of the middle east, but the Turks wanted none of it…they knew that even if they beat the Brits, they couldn’t hold their lost imperial territories.
The problems we’ve had with the successor States to the Ottoman Empire are a different set of issues - and they are wrapped up in all manner of sub-issues; Islam, nationalism, colonialism, etc, etc, etc. They have absolutely nothing to do with the demise of the Ottoman Empire. Its good to keep in mind that when the French and British carved up the Ottoman Empire in 1919, they never dreamed that a mere 30 years later they would be withdrawing. “Dear bought and clear, a thousand year our father’s title runs”, sang the Brits of their Empire…they thought, in 1919, that it would go on forever. They didn’t carve it up for the benefit of the peoples of the area, but for the benefit of their respective imperial ambitions.
Now, the issues which particularly concern us with the successor States are their form of government, and their position vis a vis the State of Israel.
Israel is the non-negotiable point; there must be a homeland for the Jews to ensure that a second Holocaust never happens, and the only place this homeland can be is in the Jews’ ancestral home which they never voluntarily relinquished. The Arab/Moslem world doesn’t like this, and our fundamental attitude towards this dislike has to be, “sucks to be you”.
As we have found to our cost and sorrow over the past 60 years, the various tyrannies of the Arab/Moslem world will not accomodate the existence of the State of Israel - given their manifest failures to build functioning States, the tyrants desperately need an outside enemy to project their people’s grievances upon. As long as the dynamic in our dealings with the middle east continued to be support for Israel and “blind eye” to the way the Arab/Moslem tryants were misruling, we were never going to get to a solution to the problems of the middle east.
As I’ve stated, we can’t abandon Israel - Israel must be maintained as a Jewish State for all time to come, regardless of what else happens. So, we can’t change one end of the equation to make peace, and that means we’ll have to change the other end - the form of government ruling the Arab/Moslem world. That is what we’re doing in Iraq and Afghanistan, and our persistence in this project is what is bringing at least some of the Arab/Moslem world ’round to accepting defeat in their stated desire to destroy Israel, and their willingness to negotiate a peace treaty to end the war.
40. Mark Noonan | November 27th, 2007 at 1:59 am
LiberalT,
Just go read those books - they’ll be quite an eye-opener for you.
41. Aztec | November 27th, 2007 at 10:07 am
Mark, after 5 years, you’re still trying to equate Iraq and Al Qaeda? I would say that State sponsors of terrorism are of much less consequence than private and religious sponsors.
42. Casper | November 27th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
“The problems we’ve had with the successor States to the Ottoman Empire are a different set of issues - and they are wrapped up in all manner of sub-issues; Islam, nationalism, colonialism, etc, etc, etc. They have absolutely nothing to do with the demise of the Ottoman Empire.”
That’s like saying the fall of the Roman Empire had nothing to do with the Dark Ages, or the break up of Yugoslavia had nothing to do with the current events in the Balkans. If current day Iraq would have been broken up along different lines, the whole history of the area would have been different. Actions have consequences some positive some negative. Do you really think that if the Ottoman Empire would have stayed in one piece, that the Middle East would be the same as it is today?
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