winterbadger | unable ... to...process...brain...shutting...down

Bush to cite US's Vietnam War experience as a reason to stay in Iraq (no, it's not the Onion...)

one of what will hopefully be a countless host of explanations why this is the most assinine thing anyone has said since Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick said "I'm ashamed of you, dodging that way. They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance."

Current Mood: angry

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From:

cmlc.livejournal.com

From:

winterbadger

Do you know, I'd forgotten all the controversy and lies surrounding the beginning of the war. It seems so long ago! But yes, you're right, the whole case for war was based on lies from start to finish, and the place shouldn't have been invaded, as Bush senior knew. Bush's team decided to invade more or less before they got elected, I now recall.

Yep. I'm reading a book on the subject just now, so it's bringing it all back to me. Also, according to one book I read, Charles Allen, who is now at DHS, did some side projects before the war collecting human intelligence from Iraqis involved in the former weapons programs, and to a person they asserted that the whole thing had been shut down. This intel was ignored because it didn't fit the neo-con's plans for the war.

Sadly I don't think American foreign policy has often cared about democracy.

I'd agree. It just makes me sick listening tot he hypocrites talk about how much they want to spread democracy...as long as the new 'democratic' governments agree with them. If not, they say well, let's get rid of them.

Do you know, I'd forgotten all the controversy and lies surrounding the beginning of the war. It seems so long ago! But yes, you're right, the whole case for war was based on lies from start to finish, and the place shouldn't have been invaded, as Bush senior knew. Bush's team decided to invade more or less before they got elected, I now recall.

Yep. I'm reading a book on the subject just now, so it's bringing it all back to me. Also, according to one book I read, Charles Allen, who is now at DHS, did some side projects before the war collecting human intelligence from Iraqis involved in the former weapons programs, and to a person they asserted that the whole thing had been shut down. This intel was ignored because it didn't fit the neo-con's plans for the war.

Sadly I don't think American foreign policy has often cared about democracy.

I'd agree. It just makes me sick listening tot he hypocrites talk about how much they want to spread democracy...as long as the new 'democratic' governments agree with them. If not, they say well, let's get rid of them.

I have to say I disagree about Musharraf. I think Pakistan should be given no encouragement or support. A lot of the religious fundamentalism in that part of the world has been a deliberate creation of the Pakistani government as a long term tactic against India. Now it's got out of hand and is threatening not just India but Pakistan itself and the rest of the world, and I think it's about time the pro-fundamentalist policy collapsed under the weight of its own hypocrisy. Hmm, mind you, they do have nuclear weapons now, and Chinese allies if it comes down to it. Nasty problem, that.

I find Pakistan a fascinating place, at least from what I've read about it. Musharraf is an amazing fellow; he's certainly self-interested and self-serving, but he also has been trying to implement a vision for a more rational, Western-oriented, moderate Pakistan. He's caught between the fires of the 'pro-democracy' forces (most of whose leaders, when in power, have themselves been deeply corrupt and antidemocratic), but who are basically pro-Western, and the religious extremists, who are scary and bad in pretty much every sense. As you say, the problem is that the Pakistani military and intelligence services nurtured these militants and helped them form nasty little paramilitary groups as a way of bleeding India over Kashmir. Musharraf has been trying to root them out, but they still have their supporters, both in the military itself and in the Tribal Areas and the Northwest Frontier province, where people are (a) much more aligned to the religious fundamentalists and (b) ethnically a lot more connected to the Afghan Taliban than to the rest of Pakistan.

At the same time, Pakistan has to deal with Iran and China, which are difficult neighbors for a moderate-to-small state, and its own internal divisions that don't relate directly to the democracy or religious fundamentalist issues (things like Balooch separatism, muhajirs vs. everyone else, etc.)

From:

cmlc.livejournal.com

Hmm, well, maybe Musharraf isn't as bad as I'd thought. I'll take your word on that.

When I was in India some years ago I unexpectedly had dinner with the just-retired German ambassador to Pakistan (as you do!) and I rather indiscreetly asked him what he thought of Benazir Bhutto, who was in the news at the time I think. If I interpreted his reply correctly I think he told me that she was a nice woman but that her husband was a monstrous mafia thug, and that she was totally under his control. As you say, deeply corrupt.

It strikes me that the trouble with Pakistan, as with so many other countries, is basically that it's an artificial colonially-created state with arbitrary boundaries. Europe warred for centuries before its national boundaries ended up in roughly the right place, and it's still not entirely finished (Scotland, Catalonia, etc.).

From:

winterbadger

Very interesting about the ambassador! And I see in the news that Sharif is "eyeing" a return to Pakistan. Doubtless he's trying to decide whether the time is ripe for him to some back, lead a popular movement to oust Musharraf, and regain his position of power, which he used in the past to line his pockets and seize extraconstitutional power.

It strikes me that the trouble with Pakistan, as with so many other countries, is basically that it's an artificial colonially-created state with arbitrary boundaries.

I think most of the boundaries are pretty well accepted. Most of its borders were fixed by facts on the ground; the big exception was Kashmir. A majority Muslim area, it got made part of India because the future rulers of India did a deal with the British government and persuaded the princely ruler to join India instead (he then went to live abroad). There was fighting, the UN intervened and insisted that there be a referendum to determine what the *Kashmiris* wanted to do, a referndum India has refused to hold for the past 60 years. In the meanwhile, there's been lots of dirty work on both sides, several wars, and many deaths. The population of the area has been radicalised and brutalised, many of the inhabitants of the area at partition have fled, and one of the most beautiful parts of the subcontinent has become a terrorist battleground. :-(

Of course, the boundaries with China are in dispute, but then China's boundaries with everyone are in dispute, because the Chinese state is a very bad neighbor. There's been some ethnic cleansing attempts by both sides in Kashmir, but they pale in comparison to the havoc that's been wreaked by China in Tibet, Inner Mongolia, and East Turkestan.

From:

cmlc.livejournal.com

Yes, you're right about Kashmir! I was thinking more of the north west frontier zone though. The borders there certainly seem to be heavily disputed by the people who live there, and have been for a long time (my partner went from Scotland to India by bus in the 70s and vividly remembers the murderous hostility which everyone in that area had to the Pakistani government). Why on earth should it be part of Pakistan at all? The only reason as far as I can see is that the border there is Britain's old imperial boundary, the point up to which it happened to have managed to conquer/buy/control the territory. As you say there's no particular ethnic or national or religious reason to have an international border there - the people have more in common with the same people just the other side of the border in Afghanistan (which is another multinational basket case, but I'll leave that aside!).

From:

winterbadger

Well, there you have me. Afghanistan has never really accepted the Durand Line; some Afghans want to incorporate all the Pashtun areas in their country, some (the Pashtuns, mostly) want them to be yet another independent country. Ditto the Baluch areas (which of course, also involves Iran, much in the same way that talk about breaking up Iraq always results in the Turks getting all het up about the idea of a separate Kurdistan).

I would think that Pakistan might almost be willing to give up all the Tribal Areas and the NWFP, for all the trouble they cause and their ungovernability. It would trim Pakistan down to Sindh, the lesser Punjab, and fragments of Kashmir, but it might almost be worth it...

Oh, and the former US Deputy National Security Advisor in charge of US policy in the Mideast and South Asia, Meghan O'Sullivan? Had, according to press reports never *heard* of the Durand Line until a briefer mentioned it in passing. This is one of the high flyers I was bemoaning the other day. See why I think that even without a PhD from Oxford I think I might be able to do a bit better than some of these twits?