Comments on: A look at the next phase of the Iraq War: 2009-2012

By: Fabius Maximus

Fabius Maximus — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 04:28:14 +0000

“Obama May Consider Slowing Iraq Withdrawal“, Washington Post (4 July 2008) — “Candidate Says He Remains Committed to Ending War.” Yes, just as is McCain. Only the naive should be surprise. Excerpt:

Sen. Barack Obama raised the possibility of slowing a promised gradual, 16-month withdrawal from Iraq if he is elected president, saying that Thursday he will consult with military commanders on an upcoming trip to the region and “continue to refine” his proposals.

“My 16-month timeline, if you examine everything I’ve said, was always premised on making sure our troops were safe,” Obama told reporters as his campaign plane landed in North Dakota, a state no Democratic presidential candidate has carried since 1964. “And my guiding approach continues to be that we’ve got to make sure that our troops are safe, and that Iraq is stable. And I’m going to continue to gather information to find out whether those conditions still hold.”

In a second, hastily convened news conference, Obama insisted that his policies have not changed, and that he has “not equivocated” or is not “searching for maneuvering room” on Iraq.

… “Let me be as clear as I can be: I intend to end this war,” he said. “My first day in office, I will bring the Joint Chiefs of Staff in, and I will give them a new mission. That is to end this war, responsibly, deliberately but decisively.”

Thus far, he added, he has seen nothing to contradict his belief that one to two combat brigades could be pulled out each month over 16 months.

By: Fabius Maximus

Fabius Maximus — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 05:12:19 +0000

I have posted an update with a comment about Senator Obama’s speech about the Iraq War, and link to the text. Please read the speech.

By: Fabius Maximus

Fabius Maximus — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 03:18:41 +0000

The Book of Jeremiah, chapter 51 — about Babylon:

“I will make her officials and wise men drunk, her governors, officers and warriors as well … the peoples exhaust themselves for nothing, the nations labor is only fuel for the flames.”

By: Mikyo

Mikyo — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 00:58:01 +0000

They all look prettier at closing time.
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Fabius Maximus replies: One of the great truths of life, a rebuttal to our pretensions of rationality.

By: mikyo

mikyo — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 22:57:50 +0000

Of course deMause is way over the top. His work is interesting nevertheless. It does attempt to explain the “collectively bonkers” theory.
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Fabius Maximus replies: Agreed. So does the theory that we are like the guy (or gal) who goes on a bender and wakes up married to some trash picked up along the way at a seedy dive. In both cases pleading insanity to the judge is the best bet.

By: Joseph Moroco

Joseph Moroco — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 02:18:29 +0000

“Our government might not do foreign occupations well, but they have mastered one aspect of 4GW: infowar. Unfortunately they are wielding it against us.”

You said a mouthful.

By: TulsaTime

TulsaTime — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 01:43:39 +0000

‘Twill be illuminating indeed to see how the next phase is impacted by a certain gap in the petroleum supply and demand curves. The defeat mentioned by Mr Lind may play a part, as may the unwinding of several exotic credit instruments and subsequent evaporation of a few Trillion. If the poor wretch that has the misfortune to be designated president can exert more than passing influence on Iraq, it will not be to the betterment of this nation. The curse of interesting times is upon us!

By: Greg Lehmann

Greg Lehmann — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 21:03:53 +0000

I think it was William Lind that made the comment saying the longer we leave our people in Iraq, the more likely it is they will be defeated in the field. We have never had an army defeated in the field. I think it was he also that compared our Iraq adventure to the Opium war against the Chinese empire with US being the Chinese. It took them a century to recover. That is the part that really bothers me.

I live in Dupage county in Illinois. No one really talks about the war here. As long as the gas stations have gas and the malls are open, no one seems to care. To me, this is tragic.

By: Duncan Kinder

Duncan Kinder — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 16:31:58 +0000

Ozymandias
Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said — “two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert … near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lips, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings,
Look on my Works ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.” –
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Fabius Maximus replies: thank you for posting this. Food for thought…

By: Mikyo

Mikyo — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 08:56:25 +0000

Now for something completely different. Or is this really as far off topic as it seems? War as a Sacrificial Ritual — chapter four of the forthcoming book, The Origins of War in Child Abuse, by Lloyd deMause (no date).

“…Wars are in fact prosperity-reducing, sacrificial rituals. Group behavior guaranteed to provoke revenge is not “aggressive”-it is self-destructive…”
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Fabius Maximus: worth reading. The book should be interesting. I wonder if he overstates the case. Rather than psychosis, the rush to war has much (even by deMause’s own description) with marriage. While that too is often crazy… At some level of rational analysis, life itself is irrational. As Shaw saws in his play “You Never Can Tell”:
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“It is unwise to be born; it is unwise to be married; it is unwise to live; and it is wise to die.”