It is the British say what we all know. Its over. We lost. If they thought otherwise the troops no longer needed in the south would be deployed north where they are needed.

Back in the day, j-school profs would pretty much fail a student who used too many adjectives in a story, claiming that qualifying all those nouns was adding subjectivity to the piece.

Today, it’s rare to find a story that doesn’t end with some sort of unattributed conclusion that comes from nowhere other than the “reporter’s” opinions, i.e. the “Yet as more countries draw down or pull out, it could create a security vacuum if radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr stirs up trouble” quote Neo cites.

Couple this with the spin TV anchors invariably put on their “reporting”, and it’s a wonder any of us can hope to be well-informed. Thank goodness for the blogosphere, where at least comment sections allow for fact-checking and corrections.

He wishes. And hopes and prays. But what he fears is — that it’s not over yet. And we — but not WR — may win. And then how will he ever get his war crimes kangaroo courts going?

Who’s ‘we’?

Btw Neo, this is a great example of the influence that the US has. There is no need to coerce, simply because nations naturally see an advantage with a relationship with the US. The US should use that, forget about the UN and talking with Europe/Iran. Use the respect people have for the US, and negotiate with them face to face. Don’t go into interlocutions and middle men. Bad idea.

The world’s 7 largest navies in tonnage all together would not equal the weight of the US military. Just the weight, don’t even calculate the tech and training. They cannot contribute in any conventional military way, but they can do so politically and with special forces, which are always small in number.

No wonder we make other nations nervous. The downside of this is that other Western Nations get to bad-mouth us in public while depending on help in private.

We only lose if we say we lose. We’re still basically fighting this war on a peacetime footing. We can keep this up _forever_. So why are you so eager to declare defeat?

I suggest it’s because you _want_ us to lose, because you hate your own country. You don’t actually kill your fellow Americans because you’re physically afraid, but you’re perfectly willing to gloat when terrorists do it. You are a despicable person.

link

Today, the USN enjoys a “17 Navy standard”; that is, the total tonnage of Uncle Sam’s fleet is equal to the combined total tonnage of the next 17 smaller navies. Even combining the two biggest potential naval competitors (the Chinese and the Russians), the USN still outclasses them by over 3:1 in tonnage, and it has substantially more combat power. Of the world’s 34 aviation power projection platforms (i.e., vessels capable of operating combat aircraft), the US owns 24 (71-percent), eight times more than the second leading navy, the decidedly friendly Royal Navy, which has with three V/STOL carriers. In addition, the US surface fleet carries four times as many VLS (vertical missile launchers) cells as the rest of the world navies combined. The US submarine fleet enjoys better force ratios against the next two most numerous underwater fleets than it did against the Soviets during the Cold War.

And it probably was the strategypage that had the info I was reading. A lot of people interested in military strategy reads strategypage, I noticed.

You can’t survive in this world without supplies coming in through the sea lanes, and if the US closes that off, say for Iran, then their ability to do logistics is severely derailed.

The US can stop the supply of food, medicine, and oil to Europe, Australia, Japan, and China from sea cargo carriers (still the largest majority carrier of bulk cargo) and thereby accrue immense political influence at the negotiations table. But the US doesn’t do that… and you have to wonder why if all the US critics are right. Isn’t the US supposed to be greedy about oil? So why does the US spend shatloads on a navy that they won’t use to get more oil? The US submarine fleet alone can sink any cargo ship that tries to run the blockade to Iran or any oil tanker. And nobody, absolutely nobody, would be able to break that blockade militarily, although perhaps they could do so politically, although that is going to be hard when their people start starving and no oil is available.

The “we” that popped rice refers to is the mouse that he habitually carries in his pocket for such occasions.

Even more impressive is that it is well over a 1000 times as large as Iraq’s navy. It dwarfed the navy of the DRVN as well.

We recently ran a test of our multi-meta-phased plasma cannon. We were fortunate to have had some 40 brown people, renditioned by the CIA as test subjects.

We may not need another 20,000 troops.

The results of the test were shocking, just shocking.

We plan to conduct more experiments as soon as we can get a hold of a wet vac.

Or a really big sponge.

The “straight news” is that Britain is pulling some troops of out Iraq. And saying that the pull-out is reperesentative of success isn’t “straight-news” either. But I don’t read you complaining about that.

Which is fine. That’s the benefit of a free press - you can go a read whatever spin you’d like to read on whatever issue you like.

You might also consider that the Iraq war is mostly considered an absolute failure - and so the British pull-out can logically be framed under this generally accepted framework.

Not so if your a neo-con, for course, but not many are nowadays.

I suppose the real question is, Neo - do you like your news “straight” when the news doesn’t fit into your ideological niche, or do you think all news should be presented this way?

I only ask because I never read you complain about this from right-wing sources whose spin far exceeds anything the Sydney Herald can come up with- Fox News for example….

The “straight news” is that Britain is pulling some troops of out Iraq. And saying that the pull-out is reperesentative of success isn’t “straight-news” either. But I don’t read you complaining about that.

Which is fine. That’s the benefit of a free press - you can go a read whatever spin you’d like to read on whatever issue you like.

You might also consider that the Iraq war is mostly considered an absolute failure - and so the British pull-out can logically be framed under this generally accepted framework.

Not so if your a neo-con, for course, but not many are nowadays.

I suppose the real question is, Neo - do you like your news “straight” when the news doesn’t fit into your ideological niche, or do you think all news should be presented this way?

I only ask because I never read you complain about this from right-wing sources whose spin far exceeds anything the Sydney Herald can come up with- Fox News for example….

For example, it’s straight news to say that the pullout is happening. And it’s straight news to quote what different people might be saying about it. What Tony Blair says, what the Iraqi President might say, what Howard in Australia says, what some foreign policy wonk says, what some antiwar person says, it’s all news. Just let me know what happened, let me know who says what about it and who they are. Then I can attempt to sort out the biases myself. Please don’t inject your own biases into what should be news.

Yes, that’s a terrible accusation for me to make. So stop providing me with evidence of it and I’ll stop saying it. Liberal sentiments are social skills, illustrating that you’re a person who “gets it.” You guys really don’t reread your posts for tone very much, do ya? It jumps off the page to the rest of us.

Link

We need to expedite the development of full plated powered armour, ala John Ringo. The power of a tank, but the size of a robocop. Powered exo-skeleton attached ligaments and pseudo-muscles, combined with monomolecular blades for eviscerating terrorists hand to hand, and the main armament being a plasma cannon. Hrm. Great for both sides. We get to live via peace through superior firepower. The terrorists get to die and go to heaven. Everybody is happy.

Sure, by people who know nada about COIN warfare. Those who know quite a bit about it, say, those who have done Ph.D. dissertations on it and then gone on to participate in it, don’t generally consider it a failure at all. Sure, there have been failures, but overall the successes have far outweighed them. What is more, in 80% of Iraq, the war’s been a clear success. It is only certain parts of Baghdad and Al Anbar province that are proving troublesome.

So I can assume your upset about this post too, assistant village idiot?

You complain that I say things without evidence, assuming everybody knows what I’m talking about. Like the fact that the majority of the world; the majority of the U.S; the majority in your state - believe the Iraq was either wrong to begin with, or is a total failure(in terms of what it was supposed to accomplish in regards to Bush’s “war on terror”).

And yes I would assume you should know that. You might not agree - but you have to know that most people see it that way.

And then you have the above post - that assumes that since most people don’t have a phd in “COIN warfare” than they aren’t in a position to have an educated opinion on the conduct and /or ethical issues of the Iraq war.

guy in pj’s doesn’t offer any names or sources, either.

Incidently - the point is pretty much rubbish. One doesn’t need an understanding of how wars or fought to make a determination about the success/failure of the war. The goals were spelled out by the Bush administration before and during the war. And when you back up those assertions against what people with phd’s in sociology, history, political studies, middle eastern studies etc etc - you find that most view the war as a failure.

That some(not even most)(military people are convinced the war is going well - or even ‘winnable’ - isn’t surprising at all. That some people who study warfare think the war is going well isn’t either. But, what he isn’t saying is that there are those who do who don’t think the war is going well.

Anyway - only “in parts of Bagdhad”. So I guess that’s as good a marker as any of guaging the war. When you through in 80% of of the country is feeling the success of war - what does that tell us?

Nothing. Not only is it mostly false - it doesn’t tell us anything at all….

That’s not just a rhetorical question. TC is really asking for help here — kind of like asking “Where am I?” The real question is whether clinging to an over-ripe marxism in itself could reduce someone to this sort of babble.

A more interesting and general point is the one AVI made above: “Their focus is not on the events in Iraq, but what people think about them”. This is the herd mentality of the left in action, folks, and they’ll follow that herd even if it’s right over a cliff.

Sorry, Sally.

The British failure in Basra

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2296829.ece

FACTBOX: The U.S.-Iraqi Baghdad offensive

4 Militia Members Nabbed In Iraq

Iraqi government welcomes British plans to withdraw troops from country

So, TC, simply because a majority of people—far away from the fighting and informed only by slanted or blatantly wrong information—believe that our efforts in Iraq are a “failure” proves only that a majority believes this, not that the “failure” is actualy happening.

President Thomas Dewey would agree with me….

But judging by your response, I’d say you know very well what I’m saying - even with the spelling and grammatical errors.

Those are swell links.

What are we to infer from the content of them? That things are improving thanks to the ’surge’? - and that things improved so much in Basra that British troops have been able to leave “mission accomplished”?

Do tell….

Thats a fair point, stumbley.

If only it were applicable to the Iraq war, then you’d really be on to something…

If your going to make the claim that most people simply believe something because everybody else is saying it - well then you need to provide specific examples of how the war has been successful to 1)Iraqis (assuming this was a humanitarian war as some of you suggest, 2)Americans (i.e the greater “war on terror”.

And, if I may be so bold, nobody hear seems very capable of making a convincing case as such.

Which isn’t surprising. Most Americans are a pretty optimistic bunch - particularly in light of their government, war, and after 9/11.

If they aren’t buying the neoconservative propaganda than it must be pretty bad….

Local militias are often not only out of control of the Iraqi government, but of their supposed leaders in Baghdad. The big money earner for local factions is the diversion of oil and oil products, with the profits a continual source of rivalry and a cause of armed clashes. Mr Knights and Mr Williams say that control in the south is with a “well-armed political-criminal Mafiosi [who] have locked both the central government and the people out of power”.”

Eh, I didn’t imply you had to have a Ph.D. in it; I did imply you have to know something about it to have an educated opinion. But that’s obvious — You can’t have an educated opinion about anything you haven’t been educated in.

guy in pj’s doesn’t offer any names or sources, either.

Not on this thread. I’ve offered plenty of names and sources on other threads in other conversations with you, and you ignore them. So why bother?

Incidently - the point is pretty much rubbish. One doesn’t need an understanding of how wars or fought to make a determination about the success/failure of the war.

Not after the fighting’s over and the result is clear, no. But the fighting isn’t over, and if you want to understand how it’s going, you need to understand COIN.

And when you back up those assertions against what people with phd’s in sociology, history, political studies, middle eastern studies etc etc - you find that most view the war as a failure.

They viewed it a priori a failure: It was a failure because it was a war.

The majority of people are making the judgement that the war is a failure because of 1)the facts on the ground

The average person doesn’t have a clue about the facts on the ground. Most don’t seem to have a clue about the war beyond the headlines.

That’s not AVI’s claim. His claim is, you care more about what “everybody thinks about events” than about what’s really happening. Here, read it again:

AVI: Both TC and WR oblige me again! Their focus is not on the events in Iraq, but what people think about them. … The events in Iraq are not the issue to them. Their battle is at home, for the Soul of America. When they are up in the polls, they’re winning their real battle.

TC: Like the fact that the majority of the world; the majority of the U.S; the majority in your state - believe the Iraq was either wrong to begin with, or is a total failure

Who gives a flying monkey’s dodgy uncle what the majority believes? What does that have to do with being right? As a Marxist, you should understand this, because the vast majority of the world believes Marxism is both wrong and a total failure.

Yes, that’s what we are to infer. I’m glad you liked the links, and there’s a lot more where they came from.

“Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations may she always be in the right; but our country right or wrong!”

Usually only the last phrase of this toast is cited, out of context - verbal and historical.

The ‘fighting’ is against the occupation and amongst Iraqis. The fight against the occupation will never end as long as there are foreign troops in Iraq. Don’t forget the war was about deposing a tyrannt - which is “mission accomplished”. So the the reasons the war was fought has come and gone. And now the country is worse than before. C0IN? That’s got nothing to do with it.

“They viewed it a priori a failure: It was a failure because it was a war.”

Lol. Err, no.

They view it as a failure because, like in the material I posted above, they weighted what we said we would accomplished with what is happening now. And that is why we say it is a failure. This isn’t rocket science..

“The average person doesn’t have a clue about the facts on the ground. Most don’t seem to have a clue about the war beyond the headlines.”

And just, exactly, are you? Clearly one of those average people - if you think that facts on the ground indicate a success. And yes - most people don’t investigate that - but those that do will tell you the same thing - failure.

Nonsense. Bad analogy. 1)The majority are ‘right’ the war is a failure, 2)who gives a dodgy uncle what you believe - particularly when your only evidence is to criticize what the majority correctly believe?

I offered the majority because this is the major issue in the country- which is also supposed to be a democracy.

Yes sometimes the majority are wrong - like when information is unknowable or they are being lied too.

And, for a time, the majority were being lied too - and did believe it.

But nowadays it’s much easier to find out the truth that our leaders hide from us - and hence the majority now believe the war is a flop, waste of money and lives etc etc.

That’s how it is.

Your welcome….

What are leaders say?

Maybe you should point out some examples of how this surge has been succesful so far in the big picture - the everyday situation for Iraqis - economic, social, health care, not being blow to pieces everyday, etc etc…

And for U.S soldiers - dying at the same or an increased rate everyday in Iraq.

Or the fact that 9(or more) U.S helicopters were shot down(notice how the pentagon was covering that little bit of news up) in the last two weeks as the insurgency continues to improve their ability to inflict casualties on U.S forces.

Lol - your cute, Sally.

In a child-like, sweetly naive way….

What are leaders say?

Yes, the links I posted do in fact show “that”. (No idea what the last “question”, if it is that, is supposed to mean.)

By the way, what are you and your fellow sheep going to do if and when the polls turn around, TC? Flip-flop along with them?

“In fact, allow me to “speculate”. My assesment is that the insurgency knows it’s time on this earth is not long, thus more and more desperate attempts to show the media they are still big and bad. Goes under the theory of “use it or lose it”. Quite similar to the desperation shown by the Kamikazi(Japan) and Elbe Squadron(German).”

Such small minds with such big mouths.

Yeah - lets see where we are in a few weeks. Probably in another war and Iraq exactly in the same shape it is now.

But no doubt you’ll find some more BS to drone on about how we’re ‘winning’ in a country that hates us more and more everyday we’re there.

And Lee will be calling me a “Nazi” still.

Yep - some things are pretty(yaaawwwnn) predictable….

So only Iraqis fight? 140,000 US troops in Iraq, not one is fighting? Are you drinking while you post?

Me: “They viewed it a priori a failure: It was a failure because it was a war.”

TC: Lol. Err, no.

Chuckle. Er, yes.

TC: They view it as a failure because, like in the material I posted above, they weighted what we said we would accomplished with what is happening now.

LOL. Right, TC. Sure they did.

Me: “The average person doesn’t have a clue about the facts on the ground. Most don’t seem to have a clue about the war beyond the headlines.”

TC: And just, exactly, are you?

I’m just a guy in pajamas,TC, who happens to have paid attention for the last couple of decades. Certainly, I’m no expert, but unlike your ‘average person,’ I’ve gone quite a bit further than the headlines. As have you and most of the people commenting here.

Me: “Who gives a flying monkey’s dodgy uncle what the majority believes? What does that have to do with being right? As a Marxist, you should understand this, because the vast majority of the world believes Marxism is both wrong and a total failure.”

TC: Nonsense. Bad analogy.

It’s an excellent analogy, TC. Except, in the case of Marxism, the majority are right, it is an utter failure, and in the case of the war, they’re wrong. However, in both cases, the fact that the majority of people believe it has nothing to do with it actually being right or wrong.

TC: I offered the majority because this is the major issue in the country- which is also supposed to be a democracy.

What does being a democracy have to do with it? We choose our leaders in a democracy, not our truth.

It’s not the part that shows it, TC, it’s the whole.

And you didn’t say what you would do when the polls show the “war is lost” crowd is in a minority. Flip to “the war is won”? Mutter “rubbish!” and “lol!” over and over again? Stop referring to what other people believe? Change the subject? Stop typing?

Not that there’s anything wrong with that, of course.

Who is this ‘Mr. Cordesman’? Well, the one referred to in TC’s comment recently wrote this:

President Bush has presented a new strategy for the war in Iraq that may be able to defeat the insurgency and reverse Iraq’s drift towards large-scale civil war. His speech has, however, raised many questions as to both the risks it will create over the coming months and the real-world ability to actually implement his plans.

Much of the criticism of the new Bush approach has been unfair. The new strategy is considerably more sophisticated and comprehensive than the details the President could fit into his 20-minute address – which had been cut back from a longer 40-minute version. It combines political, military, and economic action in ways that do offer a significant hope of success.

Blair’s political career and historical legacy have been destroyed by his role as Bush’s poodle; the farthest he can go in the month or so he has remaining before being forced out of office is to start a British end strategy for Iraq. Watch and see how fast his successor, be it Gordon Brown or anyone else, puts the pedal to the floor on withdrawal.

Too bad our fearless leader, Neo, hitched her wagon to a seemingly rising star, only to find out she has been duped by the people she admired and has ended up supporting a political philosophy that is well on its way to being thoroughly discredited and will be seen historically as a tragic perversion of the American people’s honest desire for justice and security in the world.

If only the evil men and women in and behind this incompetent administration had pursued Al Qaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan to the ends of the earth instead of abandoning the focus on the perpetrators of 9/11, leaving Afghanistan to its own devices, and attacking a paper-tiger Iraq which presented no threat but animosity.

Too bad for the U.S. and the world that Boy George has another two years to do more damage.

Having been a fairly frequent participant of this blog in the past, when the neocons seemed to be in control, I seldom bother to check it out nowadays — the predictable ravings of its neocon participants have become pretty much irrelevant.

See you all again in a few months, maybe.

tequilamockingbird

The rest of the comment is only the typical attempt to project leftist fantasy on history. So is this, for that matter, but it’s a bit interesting just for what it says about lefty disabilities — because they have a problem trying to walk and chew gum at the same time, lefties imagine that a similar problem must plague the entire nation. It doesn’t. Not only is the US quite capable of pursuing Al Qaeda “to the ends of the earth”, and is actively doing so — which may be one reason we haven’t heard so much from them lately — but it can do this while pursuing a larger strategy against the roots of islamist terrorism at the same time. Such multiple and complex objectives can only bring gasps of disbelief from lefties, so focused on “focus” that they really can’t see the forest — or in this case the swamp — at all.

You haven’t heard much from Al Qaida lately? Listen more carefully for the bombs and the gunfire. The Administration — I hate to see this band of criminal incompetents characterized as “the US”, as you do; thank God they’re not the U.S. but just a band of rogue idealogues — can pursue Al Qaida and “a larger strategy against the roots of islamist terrorism at the same time”? Al Qaida was truly in its last throes in January 2002, and now Al Qaida and Islamist fundamentalism are flourishing worldwide, thanks to W and his merry band of warmongering fools.

Get used to your philosophy’s position in the rubbish bin of history, Sally.

… a great deal of ink and pixels have been used in excoriating opponents of the Iraq war for their cowardice, lack of patriotism and refusal to stick with the struggle: I believe completely that the U.S. people would fight to the limit of their ability for as long as it took — in the cause of a just war. Iraq is a war of choice dishonestly foisted on a fearful population by a dishonest, fearmongering band of political idealogues.

Iraq is not a just war! That’s why it doesn’t have popular support!

No! Iraq IS a just war!! Whether or not it has popular support!!!

Seeing that argument by exclamation mark apparently impresses teq, I thought I’d try a few myself. Hard to dispute, aren’t they?

Commandante teq is also apparently dead certain that if only he, or someone like him, had been in charge in Afghanistan he would have nabbed the few guys “stumbling around in the snows of Tora Bora”, and thus have put an end to the threat of islamist terrorism. This is the kind of thing I’m referring to when I talk about a lefty fantasy world. Back in the real world, real people have to accept that you can’t always get what you want just when you want it, and also that some problems and threats go deeper than a few yokels in the snow. Interesting, though, that teq would refer to “the bombs and the gunfire” as evidence of Al Qaeda — would that be in Iraq, do you think?

A David and Goliath Story
Iraqi Labor vs. Big Oil

By KATHLYN STONE

According to British media, the US and UK governments are on track to achieve a March victory in Iraq. This victory will not be publicized nor will it mean an end to the occupation.

Written by Bush and Blair’s big oil business partners who serve as the leaders’ advisors on foreign policy, the new Iraq hydrocarbon law opens the door for international investors, led by BP, Exxon and Shell, to siphon off 75 percent of Iraq oil wealth for 30 years. This economic model is called a Production Sharing Agreement.” But is a 75/25 split, with bloated oil companies taking 75 percent of the country’s wealth and leaving just 25 percent for the devastated Iraqis, a sharing agreement or an a! rmed ro bbery?

The law is cur rently under consideration in the Iraq Parliament, with deputy prime minister Salih, chair of the oil committee, carrying the legislation.

Iraq’s unions, if not its occupied government, are standing firm against the oil law. With the oil sector representing 95 percent of the country’s revenues, and with only 17 of Iraq’s 80 known oil fields under production, much is at stake.

The General Union of Oil Employees in Basra has taken a strong stand against the proposed law. GUOE’s courageous members booted KBR, the Halliburton subsidiary, out of refinery workplaces shortly after the invasion despite Cheney’s award of a ‘no bid’ contract. Members also went on a two-day strike last August, winning their demands for higher pay. From what one can glean from foreign press and unfiltered words from Iraq, so does every other union in Iraq. In his February 6 speech at a conference held a t Basra University to debate the oil law, GUOE president Hassan Jumaa Awad al Assadi minced no words. “Among the objectives America wishes to achieve from the military occupation of Iraq, all the causes of which we do not want to return to, but simply to emphasize one central objective of the American political leaders who crossed oceans and wasted billions of dollars, that is Iraqi oil. Indeed we in the Federation of Oil Unions consider this the most important reason for this foul war.”

Assadi, who was jailed three times for opposing the former Baath regime, called on Iraq’s Parliament to “bear the Iraqis in mind, to protect the national wealth, and to look at the neighboring countries. Have they introduced such laws even when their relations with foreign companies are closer than in Iraq? If those calling for production-sharing agreements insist on acting against the will of Iraqis, we say to them that histor! y will not forgive those who play recklessly with the wealth and destiny of a people and that the curse of heaven and the fury of Iraqis will not leave them.”

The oil workers must be braced for a response. After GUOE’s first anti-privatization conference last summe