Republican, Democrat or Bi-Partisan all are in varying degrees of fantasy land
Reader comment on item: James Baker's Terrible Iraq Report

Submitted by rick (United States), Dec 12, 2006 at 16:00

We watched the 'shock and awe' spectacular and no Baathists were killed. Just infrastrure destroyed- an infrastructure we later needed. Bush expected Iraqis to cheer US soldiers upon Saddam's downfall. there was no cheering. Bush's yuppie man on the ground, Paul Bremer, made wrong decision after wrong decision. Democrats during the early years said nothoing because they knew even less about Iraq and the Middle East than did Bush advisers. Now we have another group of incompetents, the so called panel of inquiry led by Baker and Hamilton.

In truth we lost the war in Iraq before it started because no one has any idea who Arabs are and what makes them tick. They are not Germans or Japanese. What is important to them may seem absurd to Westerners. They are clanish and tribal and religion is key. Democracy is interesting but not as interesting as other philosophies, such as jihad. The universal enemy is Israel and Zionism. What Sunnis and Shi'ites in Iraq are doing to each other they dream of doing to Jews. Iraq, Algeria, Sudan, Somaila, Yemen, Lebanon, these places are very different but the cultures have great similarities.

People are killed, bodies mutialted and left in public places from Algeria to Iraq. If one can't kill the person who should be killed, a family memeber will do. A society where a brother can kill his sister in an "honor killing". A friendly invitation can very be an opportunity to kill an unsuspecting person. Think of Saddam's "gracious" invitation to his in-laws to return to Iraq from Jordan and all is forgiven or a brother asking his sister to meet and discuss the future and upon her showing up - brutally knifed her to death for her crime which cannot be forgiven. DO you know that gang rape in Pakstian is a popular activity. The clan is averaged by the gang rape. One occurs every 8 minutes according to women's human rights groups. These are disfunctional, brutal societies and no place for a humanistic Westerner to enter. Human RIghts has no meaning unless it is used to accuse an enemy of something. The UN is directed to attack Israel but better stay out of Sudan.

From President Reagan's fiasco in Lebanon to today,it is part of one quilt of US ignorance. The US doesn't believe in "setting examples". Arabs live by setting examples. Americans believe in tolerance, shaking hands, smiling and meaning it. Arabs believe in mistrust, are intolerant of those different from them. You are defined by what you are- Christian, Jew not an individual. Americans are looked upon as occupiers, fools and people to be taken advantage of.

Until there is a President who understands Arabs, all US Middle East initiatives will end in varying degrees of failure.

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