Cobb

� Economic Horses, Political Carts | Main | Gangsta Gangsta �

January 10, 2005

Sounds Like War

At various places in the blogosphere, folks are airing frustrations and bad news. Now the question of death squads has arisen. This from P6:

NEGROPONTE'S NEFARIOUS NEGLIGENCE: John Negroponte, the current U.S. Ambassador in Baghdad, is no stranger to death squads. In the 1980s, Negroponte served as the U.S. Ambassador to Honduras. At the time, he was "cozy" with the chief of the Honduran national police force, Gen. Gustavo Alvarez Martinez, who also ran the infamous Battalion 316 death squad. Battalion 316 "kidnapped, tortured and murdered more than 100 people between 1981 and 1984." According to Kenneth Roth, the executive director of Human Rights Watch, "Negroponte publicly adopted a see-no-evil attitude to this army death squad."

Entitled 'Losing in Iraq' Umansky shows what the rebel side is doing:

...the war [in Iraq] has degenerated to the extent that the construction sites have become nothing more than symbols of the despised American presence. For the resistance they also serve as convenient collection points for identifiable collaborators—usually laborers—who can easily be hunted down and killed as a lesson for others. There is a lot of that sort of teaching going on these days. At just one sewage project in Baghdad, for example, as many as thirty Iraqi workers were shot in only three months late last year. It is an unusual record only because someone kept count. The assassination campaign is systematic. It is decimating American projects throughout central Iraq, and has taken a particularly heavy toll among Green Zone workers. So pervasive is the threat that Iraqis still working with the occupation do not dare speak English on the phone, even at home in front of only their children, lest word leak out. When I call the Iraqis who work for me, a driver and a guard, my first question is whether they can talk. As often as not they answer by hanging up.

There are always more than two sides to a country's situation, and I find it difficult to believe that Iraqis have satisfied themselves that all manner of law and order in their country are tainted beyond redemption with the stink of American support. So putting aside the question of death squads for a moment, there is ultimately the question of how many martyrs the rebellion can afford. Let us assume for the sake of argument that it will continue to be 500 a month indefinitely - this is something that can and will be sustained. The rest of the nation must function at some level, and if it is merely anti-American rhetoric that will satisfy rebels and unite the country then surely there will be enough of that to go around. Whether or not it satisfies war critics is a separate issue, but that is immaterial to the progress of the war on the ground. There is more than rhetoric going on here, and no matter what your criticism, the war isn't lost until Americans sue for peace.

In the meantime, I'm not sure by what measure our sponsorship of death squads is considered a loss. If we are to kill 100 collaborators over the course of several years, as is suggested by P6, then what real difference does that make? It's fighting fire with fire at the matchstick and aerosol can level, a geopolitical negligbility. And yet it could be the right little bit that keeps the rebels understanding that their impugnity has costs.

If I sound an extra bit hawkish today, it is because I have just returned from seeing 'Hotel Rwanda', and for what it's worth, I have had about my fill of irregulars and militias. Yet as much as I'd prefer regular army to smash rebellion, I understand that you can't always work that way, and again, for the sake of 'democracy' I am having my doubts that Iraqis and their anti-war American butt buddies are worth it.

I continue to admire our lack of a scorched earth policy, and the tenderness with which we have conducted our investigations into monster work at Abu Ghraib. But I cannot abide the perception that there are certain wars we cannot fight or certain fights we cannot win, it only invites opportunists and forces us to 'make examples' the next time. We should be meeting the assassinations of the rebels with commensurate craftiness, nothing much more and nothing much less. If it's going to be death squads, then sobeit.

In the mid term, the third side will emerge, which is that side of the duly elected government of national unity. Whether or not anyone cares or likes how it came to be, it will be the Iraqi government - the people with a right to sit at the table, the people with the right to Iraqi oil, the people with whom the nations of the world will ultimately meet at embassies. They will not be the rebels.

So far, the Axis of Weasels have determined that America and Great Britain should singly take the blame for all of the chaos and destruction this low level nastiness continues to reap. I, for one, don't think John Kerry's international asslicking would have made any difference. So we're stuck with the bad rap. GW will tough it out. But one day the 'international community' is going to have to decide whether or not to open embassies in Iraq or continue mouthing off through the media. And I say that day is not going to be determined by the schedule of the rebels, but by the leaders of the new Iraq. In other words, one day The Iraqi government is going to say "We're here, we're for real, get used to it." And immediately thereafter, they are going to ask for assistance. Let's see how soon the new Iraqi flag is flying in European capitals.

In any case, I cannot see how that government could possibly be anything but an ally to the US, because we will have been there all the way through. My recommendation to GW and the Neocons is to play both sides. We have proven our mettle for democracy. The other side is going to be some ultranationalists, and they won't blink at death squads.

Posted by mbowen at January 10, 2005 03:23 PM

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.visioncircle.org/mt/mt-tb.cgi/3083

Comments

Posted by: Anonymous at January 10, 2005 11:05 PM