There’s a lot of talk about how the war in Iraq is illegal. Any ideas on what we could do to end it? I think there needs to be some kind of focussed effort to take the wind out of the sails of the US military-industrial complex, but I have no idea how that type of thing is accomplished.
Discuss.
Find an Islamic state(s) willing to send in troops to replace the Americans and who are committed to Iraqi multi-cultural nationhood. If one exists.
Find some AMERICAN troops who are commited to multi-culturalism! If that’s their motivation, what on earth are they doing there?
Edit: on second thought, the idea of turning over Iraq to Iraqis is a really good one.
What I mean is, if America is interested in multi-culturalism, why have they invaded another culture for the purpose of imposing an American styled capitalist democracy? That’s not very multi-cultural. That’s all. No need to be baffled.
You would have to diminish the economic returns of being there in the first place. That would mean moving away from gas and oil as our prime energy sources. We are going to run out in the next few decades anyways, but instead of really working on finding alternatives now, vast amounts of money, time, energy and lives are being spent trying to procure the last remaining sources.
A number I have heard bandied about on news shows, but which I have no way of verifying, is that something like 1% of the money being spent on petroleum exploration and development is being spent on searching for alternative energy sources. In this type of environment, there is no way you will drag US miltary forces out of the middle east. It is just too profitable to let it slip into someone else’s control, someone who potentially bears ill will towards the west.
djm
Yeah, djm, you could be right. It just seems unfathomable that with 7 billion people on the earth (or 6 or 8 or whatever), virtually unanimously opposed to US military aggression, we can’t figure out any way to get them to tone it down.
I think that djm’s take on American involvement is more pertinent than the US trying to impose cultural values. It is true that a political cultural value is being sought (representative democracy). What I MEANT by multicultural is WITHIN Iraq, is a government that represents the various cultures within Iraq (Shia, Sunni, Kurds, Assyrians, etc). The US is seeking a multi-cultural government there even though its looking more and more like it will fail.
Another idea, pertaining to your original question, is to break the place up into three republics of some sort, Southern Shia, Kurds, Sunni. I have heard that bandied about though it seems too late now..
Hey, you asked for some ideas.
Weeks has the right idea, but it is far too late for splitting the east up into zones according to the feudal state mindset of the various peoples living there. For example, Turkey would not allow a Kurdish state to be formed, as the Kurdish people are spread over parts of both Turkey and Iraq. The Kurds have been trying for years to have their whole region recognized as a unified state encompassing lands from both existing countries.
The Sunnis live in parts of Iraq but also Iran … or was it the Shiites … I get lost with all the tribes … Anyways, the thing is that the Arab countries are some of the richest in the world. If they wanted to support Palestine, redivide territories as Weeks suggests into a structure that would promote peace amongst all the Arab tribes, raise general standards of living, promote peace, education, yada yada they can afford to do it more than anyone else. But that’s really not what they care to do. If it wasn’t for the real horror that these peoples would inflict on each other, and the fallout that would affect the rest of the world, I would be tempted to just stand back and let them all have at it with each other.
djm
I think we’d be better off just standing back and letting them have at each other, seeing as US efforts to manipulate the region in the past are what has given them leaders like Saddam and bin Laden.
Hey this seems like a good place for me to ask my original rhetorical question. That Saudi king who just died, is he the first one in decades to die of natural causes? Nyuk.
Hey this seems like a good place for me to ask my original rhetorical question. That Saudi king who just died, is he the first one in decades to die of natural causes? Nyuk
I think all those pilots were only princes…
Naw, those guys are always knifing and shooting each other or they used to, anyway. It blows your mind when you read the history of that family. One died of “thirst” 20 miles out of town (he was the one whose cell phone showed he was calling an Al Quaeda guy after he was given a trip out of the U.S post-9/11, I think).