Via Memeorandum, I discovered that Andrew Sullivan is recommending the equally clueless Juan Cole’s “Top Ten Myths about Iraq 2007”:
I’ve learned to discount some of Cole’s gloom, but his current analysis is factually crammed with data and news that suggest what we are experiencing right now is not peace but a lull. Much of the evidence suggests a deepening of the sectarian divide, not a lessening, despite some local cooperation…
Sullivan then quotes Cole: “Among the primary effects of the ‘surge’ has been to turn Baghdad into an overwhelmingly Shiite city and to displace hundreds of thousands of Iraqis from the capital.”ÂÂ
The facts and data backing that assertion? Cole claims that between January, 2007, and July, 2007, Baghdad went from 65% Shiite to 75% Shiite. Yes, a whopping 10% shift in the population.  Neither Cole nor Sullivan can be bothered to note the Iraqi Christians who fled a district of Baghdad that declared itself an al-Qaeda caliphate have returned home to celebrate their first Christmas in two years. Or the thousands of Iraqi Christians who made their way to church through checkpoints and streets lined with blast walls, to celebrate Christmas Mass in numbers unthinkable a year ago. Plus, nothing says “deepening sectarian divide” like a peace march and and talks to relink Sunni and Shia neighborhoods in Baghdad.
Sullivan (with help from Cole) then blows the lid off the trends for violence in Iraq:
Violence has indeed gone down dramatically since the peak of the hot civil war but it has not disappeared…
Shocking. Sullivan then quotes Cole’s statistics about attacks and civilian casualty figures in Iraq. Of course, Cole provided no link to support his statistics. I suspect that he cribbed them from the Washington Post, as I can understand why he wouldn’t want to link to a story titled, “Violence in Iraq Still Falling, but Pace of Decline Slows.” Moreover, Cole gets at least one of the stats wrong. Here is Cole:
Fact: in the past 6 weeks, there have been an average of 600 attacks a month, or 20 a day, which has held steady since the beginning of November. About 600 civilians are being killed in direct political violence per month, but that number excludes deaths of soldiers and police. Across the board, Iraqis believe that their conflicts are mainly caused by the US military presence and they are eager for it to end.
The correct number is just under 600 attacks a week, not a month — and that number includes ineffectual attacks.  Given the approximately 600 civilian deaths per month, using the correct numbers tells you that the vast majority of those attacks are ineffective, particularly given that the effective attacks may kill more than one person.
That Cole and Sullivan take at face value the Iraqi opinion polling and focus groups blaming the US military for their conflicts says a great deal about them. Apparently, neither took a moment to consider that sectarian violence ramped up dramatically after AQI bombed the Samarrah mosque and dropped dramatically after the US increased its forces, adopted more aggressive tactics against AQI and counter-insurgency tactics which placed US troops in Iraqi neighborhoods.
For that matter, Cole and Sullivan ignore the analysis of those focus group results:
That is good news, according to a military analysis of the results. At the very least, analysts optimistically concluded, the findings indicate that Iraqis hold some “shared beliefs” that may eventually allow them to surmount the divisions that have led to a civil war.
***
Overall, the report said that “these findings may be expected to conclude that national reconciliation is neither anticipated nor possible. In reality, this survey provides very strong evidence that the opposite is true.” A sense of “optimistic possibility permeated all focus groups . . . and far more commonalities than differences are found among these seemingly diverse groups of Iraqis.”
This is apparently too much nuance for Cole or Sullivan to absorb. Or they are simply ignoring it because it does not fit their predetermined theses.
Also on their “ignore” list is any public opinion polling suggesting that Iraqis are increasingly adopting secular political values or are nearly unanimous in saying it would be a bad thing for the country to separate along sectarian lines (or that a majority wants the US to remain until the country is more stable).ÂÂ
They must also ignore plans to absorb about 20,000 members of the Awakening Councils and Concerned Local Citizens groups into the security forces, while spending $310 million on jobs and vocational training for other irregular fighters. And reports that the Concerned Local Citizens patrols’ make-up in Baghdad increasingly reflects the ethnic and sectarian communities they are guarding. They also have to ignore “bottom-up” reconciliation in the provinces, the passage of a “Unified Retirement Law” that will allow civil servants from the Baathist government to collect pensions, the de facto oil revenue sharing, the Cabinet’s approval of a draft law that will offer a general pardon to thousands of prisoners in US military and Iraqi custody, and any other news suggesting reconciliation may be slowly occurring.
Instead, Sullivan buys into Cole’s version of Iraq, in which violence is plunging, but it is not due to the US troop surge, Iraqi reconciliation or even Iran laying off on the flow of weapons and training to Shiite extremists in Iraq. Cole, in a rare lucid moment, notes that the decrease in violence in Anbar is due to the Awakening, rather than troop increases, though it has not occurred to him that the US had a role in the Awakening. Sullivan does not even have that explanation, because the fact that the Anbar tribes (followed by others) decided to side with the US and against AQI does not support his thesis that the decrease in violence is merely a lull.
Man, I wish I could get one of those stay-at-home writing jobs where I could get paid to be a clueless fuck like Sullivan or Cole.
Teh Fluffer Curve.
Captain Travis Patriquin died over a year ago. Tell me who is ahead of the curve and who is behind, among Patriquin, Cole and Sullivan. Then tell me who has an Iraqi Police station in Anbar named after him.
what we are experiencing right now is not peace but a lull
This reminds me of how Snoopy would lie on his doghouse and I would always think that no way could that be comfortable really.
Maybe he can use this as an opportunity to self-link a half-dozen more times. You’re fooling no one, Andrew.
I almost made a joke about what’s likely to be named after Sullivan, but I’ll refrain, because it was in bad taste.
Yes, even for ’round here.
Nah, the job market for clueless fucks is too tight these days. And if it ever picks up, you know the jobs will all go to people who’ve been practicing clueless fuckery on a volunteer basis all this time. Semanticlown and andy, for example.
Damn this worst economy in 50 years!
Anyone remember just how clueless Cole was about Clinton foiling the Millenium Plot (not), and how promptly he failed to retract his comments to that effect?
I do. Cole long ago let what scholarship he had go by the wayside, in favor of hackery.
All the Iraqis need to do is legalize gay marriage and Andy Baby would have an epiphany all over again about Iraq…
Too bad Yale didn’t hire Cole. It means we’re stuck with him here in Michigan.
Gee the bluster around here is pretty funny.
Do y’all really imagine, for one moment, that we all will ever forget that folks like y’all have been wrong on every thing related to Iraq, for the past 5 years? And that Cole has been largely correct?
But hey, y’all are pretty sharp with the f-word!
Ben, you need to get factually crammed. “Cole has been largely correct” doesn’t have any fact-y qualities.
@BenPope: Interesting comment on an article that cites actual facts, as opposed to Cole’s articles, which routinely misquote facts. Do you imagine, for one moment, that those of us who, y’know, read and retain information, will ever forget how at every turn folks like you have been trying to sabotage freedom for Iraqis since the beginning? Do you think the Iraqis will forget?
Somebody’s BenPoopin’ in our comment threads again. BenPooperScooper needed on aisle three!
I am not a military general or a military tactician or one of those retarded news media bias talking heads,
however
I am a bit of a war news junkie
and
This war news junkie has noticed an overwhelming and substantial drop in the violence in Iraq, a “sustained overwhelming drop” in violence in Iraq for the last two months
Bent Pope?
Isn’t that like, homophobic, or somethin’?
‘Specially considering this is a Andrew Sullivan thread, and all.
Andrew Sullivan fit more better with Time I think cause they are kind of on his level already. The Atlantic did have a kind of cachet but now they’re sort of like competing with Salon which is kind of sad but in a notice it kind of way not really a feel it kind of way.
Hey, get off Sully’s back! He got new knee-pads for Christmas and hasn’t even had time to try them out yet. Oh wait, there come Juan, the test is on!
Moqtada al-Sadr voluntarily reined his troops in for 6 months, in late August. After that, the most demonstrable drop in casualties followed.(the summer drops were from surge-provoked highs)
I’m not an expert on clueless fucks, but I’m pretty sure if I had been given a mulligan every six months, I’d be getting the ball nearer the cup 4 years after Saddam was captured, too.
But I don’t think it’d be wise to be lifting the flag on the 18th green till the April referendum arrives, as al-Sadr seeks a political voice, possibly the only Shia leader beyond al-Sistani willing to work out a compromise with Sunni leaders.
Should al-Sadr be blocked by al-Malike, al-Hakim or Bush, there’s certainly potential for a resumption of higher levels of violence.
Great work over here. I’ve linked to you here:
http://americanpowerblog.blogspot.com/2007/12/real-media-story-on-iraq.html
4 years after Saddam was captured liberals kinda sorta attempt to grasp that we are at war through golf metaphors. Zippy golf metaphors, really. They do try to play the home game, these ones, and I guess I can kind of see how a Clinton administration could have a certain Caddyshack flavor, but I don’t know that I could pretend to think that it was witty and entertaining for four years of my one God-given life.
You know that Cole and Sullivan have no conception of history whatsoever when he calls what is going on in Iraq a civil war. You want a civil war, Juan and Andy? Take a good look at Yugoslavia in the ’90s, now that was a civil war. On a per-capita basis the level of violence in Iraq is more comparable to peacetime in Los Angeles county.
The media did everything but buy blue and gray uniforms for Iraqis, but I don’t think anyone with any sense really bought into the civil war meme and it’s fun having the ones that pretended to buy into it be on the record.
Mookie’s relevance could also be waning. His big draw was the Shia’s thirst for vengeance against Sunnis for high profile attacks against them. Those high profile attacks were perpetrated by AQI. Since, the Sunnis turned against AQI, the Shia have little reason to attack Iraqi Sunni. Therefore there’s no guarantee that Mookie can stoke up more violence.
Aw, come on! You know those
sand monkeysbrown peopleoppressed Othren don’t need a reason to attack their fellow oppressed Othren. They do it becausethey don’t know any betterevil white neocons make ’em do it.Cole is an interesting person. I find this telling: there’s a move afoot, for which I have no links, to have the Enlightenment and Early Modern Western thinkers — Voltaire, Locke, that bunch — translated into Arabic, because there doesn’t appear to be any similar line of thought spontaneously arising in Arabic society. Years ago, post-9/11 but before the war started, Cole was proposing something similar, for similar reasoning. That ambition apparently died in 2003, and nowadays he seems to regard Arab culture as immutable, impervious to any influence toward change.
It is the curse of the long-standing academic. They must, as a stricture of their profession, regard their study as a study, and its objects as, well, objects. As they get older a peculiar version of conservatism sets in, in which the things they learned when they were younger must somehow still be valid despite changes that an outside observer, or a younger scholar, might consider visible, even obvious. It’s a survival mechanism, really. If what they learned or discovered when they were thirty is obsolete when they’re sixty, what use are they? How can they continue to command attention and deserve their comfortable lifestyle? So the earlier version must still be true… it’s bad enough in the “hard sciences”, where the cynical truism is that no new paradigm is accepted until the proponents of the old die, but in the social sciences it ends up objectifying people, denying them the capacity for adapting to new circumstances.
In Cole’s case the tendency is made worse by the details of the subject of his studies. He knows, and knows well, the customs and practices of the elite of the societies he studied — the sheiks and viziers of the larger tribes, and overwhelmingly the political leaders in place thirty years ago, and the academics and quasi-secular business people who formed those leaders’ social circle and support. Despite his erudition and scholarship, it’s fairly obvious from recent pronouncements that he knows as little about, e.g., poor Shi’ia in Baghdad as any common or man-in-the-street American — those people were pariah to the circles he moved in. The intersection of Allah and Ahuramazda obvious to anyone who’s spoken much with an educated Iranian is opaque to him, because to the people he knew and studied they occupied the social slot taken up here by snake-handling Pentecostals: Uneducated hicks of no real interest to the movers and shakers.
Make no mistake, Cole is an intelligent man and a serious scholar. When he discusses Sunni, or the ruling and governing classes of Arabia in the Eighties — the Husseins (both) and Mubaraks, Quaddafi before his sons grew up — read him closely and take him seriously. On Iran, or anything regarding Shi’ia below the priesthood, think of a NYT reporter forced to spend the weekend in a country town in the Appalachians. It might not be actually wrong, but the focus is bound to be a little off at best.
Regards,
Ric
“Cole claims that between January, 2007, and July, 2007, Baghdad went from 65% Shiite to 75% Shiite. Yes, a whopping 10% shift in the population. ”
The population of baghdad is something like 7 million people. 10 percent of that is 700 thousand. Whopping, when compared to thousands of people going to a peace marc or church on christmas.
“clueless fuckery”.
Yeah, that one’s going in the kit bag.
And to show you that I’m a giver too, BenPope, giving Cole credit for being “largely correct” on Iraq, is guilty of dumbfuckery.
You’re welcome.
I think Cole is as invested in Iraq being a fiasco as Harry Reid. I will try to take him seriously the way you describe but it will be hard.
Oh, and the other thing that makes Cole less than infallible: He has clearly bought into the Received Wisdom of modern Western academia, that the whole sheaf of impulses and motives that come under the heading of “religious” does not exist in any real sense. In that view, any motive or rationale given as based on religion is (perhaps unconsciously) a smoke screen for economic and class-based concerns; the talk of God is simply a way of putting the real issues into other terms, a sort of code for what’s “really” going on. Given history, I consider that a remarkably pernicious fad.
Regards,
Ric
– So what part of the scaring the crap out of them”, as they face the possibility that they “will get caught, pure and simple, as braying surrender donkeys, don’t you understand.
– The Secular Progressives, peaceniks, and the rest of the so called “antiwar” gaggle, which everyone knows is as much anti Indutrial complex, anti Military, and anti-American as anything else, will not, can not, ever admit for a second that Iraq may turn out well. They see that admission as political suicide on the eve of the upcoming presidential election cycle.
– And quite frankly, its the only thing they’ve been right about in a hundred years. Well that, and Marx’s carbunkles resulted in a 100 million dead bodies. They were right about that too. Never said anything about it, but thats the SecProg way.
– At some point Iraq will become just another Leftie embarrassment, much the same as the wall of shme that is Cuba, all the “quaint” Leftie revisonist bloggers, head firmly in anus, not withstanding.
“Moqtada al-Sadr voluntarily reined his troops in for 6 months, in late August. After that, the most demonstrable drop in casualties followed.(the summer drops were from surge-provoked highs)”
The problem with attributing it just to that is that violence has been decreasing in areas that he never had any influence or connection. There’s also a cause and effect issue – I just never saw Al Sadr as a benevolent well-intentioned guy–the guy’s truce could just as easily be him seeing that his forces would get slaughtered if he tried to stop this openly or could merely be that he doesn’t have the power or influence he used to.
“Do y’all really imagine, for one moment, that we all will ever forget that folks like y’all have been wrong on every thing related to Iraq, for the past 5 years? And that Cole has been largely correct?”
Umm, last time I checked, what we’ve been arguing about is whether this is a futile effort or not, so if this succeeds we’re not really going to forget that you spent five years trying to abandon 30 million people to a state of anarchy and leave a result that would have left the people who sided with us out to dry, handed over Iraq to Iran, handed Al Qaeda a major victory, and made it clear to everybody in the world that all you need to do to defeat the United States is place bombs in street markets and that you should never stick your neck out for us because guys like you will spend a few years trying to toss them out like a used cigarette at a wedding when no one is looking.
Happily, the idiot impostor Cole has ruined his academicide career by his senseless mindless rantings. I myself am an Arabist & recognize that Cole knows and understands a lot about the Sunni/Shi’ite divide. However, Perfesser Juan has lied & exaggerated at every turn, employing his real knowledge as a polemical tool which is a blunt sledgehammer, not a surgical instrument.
Cole was rejected by Yale for his sleazy polemics and whoremaster antics. He gets face time on MSNBC, but no one really takes him seriously except seriously silly lefties.
Sullivan is such a silly lefty nowadays that he started to froth at the mouth at Ann Coulter’s name on one of Chris Matthews’ rantfests. Sullivan started to quiver and shake because he thought it was SO HURTFUL about what Ann said concerning John Edward’s masculinity…!
Wonder whether it was that she is an eye-candy chick or that he himself is threatened by his own effeminate identity—care to guess?
“Cole claims that between January, 2007, and July, 2007, Baghdad went from 65% Shiite to 75% Shiite. Yes, a whopping 10% shift in the population. â€Â
The population of baghdad is something like 7 million people. 10 percent of that is 700 thousand. Whopping, when compared to thousands of people going to a peace marc or church on christmas.
700,000 people relocated in 6 months? You would think somebody over there might have noticed a migration like that, huh?
Man, I wish I could get one of those stay-at-home writing jobs where I could get paid to be a clueless fuck like Sullivan or Cole.
I thought that was what Jeffy was aiming for?
Not quite good enough.
[…] Crazed professor lists ten myths about Iraq thereby prompting outrage! and, uh, more outrage! […]
Jeff tried being a clueless fuck but he failed.
Michelle – Jeff would have to get a full frontal lobotomy to drop down to Sullivan’s level – and maybe several severe concussions to dive to Cole’s, or your’s for that matter…
“700,000 people relocated in 6 months? You would think somebody over there might have noticed a migration like that, huh?”
Over here, its considered “whopping.” I’m unimpressed.
“Oh, and the other thing that makes Cole less than infallible: He has clearly bought into the Received Wisdom of modern Western academia, that the whole sheaf of impulses and motives that come under the heading of “religious†does not exist in any real sense.”
The few times i’ve read his website, he seems to have treated religious motivations seriously. Specially when discussing religious leaders and sects.
When BenPope writes that Juan Cole has been largely correct, do you think he knows that Cole supported the invasion in 2003? MaybeBenPope can enlighten me as to which of Cole’s opinions about the 2005 election is Cole’s real opinion. It’s easy to be right when you take both sides of an issue.
What more can you expect from a “Over the take hank” like him?
(Did I say that?)
Chuck,
I think you wandered into the wrong thread. You really need to be commenting here.
andy,
Is this the same Juan Cole who makes huge errors on his blog and then airbrushes them?
BTW, I have many, many more examples.
Also, today’s lesson is that the trolls roll in when you make the top of Memeorandum.
Heh. I forgot about Cole’s slip-up on the whole Jenin “massacre” thing. What a dumbass.
When you’re reduced to citing Juan Cole, it’s time to rethink your position.
Oh, and the reason Mookie “reined in his troops” wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that every time they poke their heads up in numbers greater than two or three those heads teleport in a fine red mist? Naaahhh!
If the generally accepted definition of insanity is represented by the obseseive act of doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different outcom, and most agree it is, what would you call the Leftist propensity to do the same thing over and over, over and over; Utopian insanity? Uber insanity? Uber insane stupidity? Delusion in the extreme?
– The 15% of the electorate that represents the maximum gaggle the Left can muster on their best day has enjoyed its brief political day in the sun. All the Hadatha’s, and AnythingGates, and PlameScams, and Murtha-whores, and Pelosi-pukes, are now going to come home to roost, using their own words.
– As a famous sports announcer once said, “The mustard is about to come off the hotdog” for the Democrats, and their crazy aunts in the attic. I am going to thouroughly enjoy watching the political massacure about to unfold in the next year+.
– The Left is about to prove the old saw that running solely on the basis of your opponents faults, with an empty wagon of ideas of your own of any substance, beyond the old shop worn propoganda of race baiting, class warfare, and Nanny-statism, is a political position with a very short shelf life.
– For what its worth you will all be able to tell your grandkids about another brief interlude in American politics where the myth of Socialism made yet another doomed run which failed as it is always inexoribly doomed to. Pity the fools whose mothers never taught them anything.
It’s actually a 20% shift: -10% Sunni, +10% Shiite. 1.4 million people on the march would be kind of hard to miss, IMHO.
Patrick, I’ll see what I can find when I make it to Taji in 7 weeks or so. I suspect there will still be a fair number of footprints or other evidence of 1 in 20 of every Iraqi existant, fleeing a single city…
Say, maybe if the Lancet was right, all those ethically cleansed Iraqis are already dead! I’ll check the morgues.
Again we are left with that question I keep asking: How much of all this is reasoned thinking and how much of this is fervent hope?
A less hysterical and more nuanced approach to ther above topic would acknowledge progress while still remianing focused on the fragility of the situation. al qaeda took a shot at destabilizing the entire country by formenting sectarian violence through maximally heinous acts of terrorism. Fortunately, as is their nature, they overstepped even the Iraqi/Arab/Islamic limits on common decency. There is a universal norm that people get tired of endless violence for no purpose other than simple power plays. al qaeda is so locked into their 8th century mindset that they failed to see the almost inevitable turning of the tribes and locals away from their ham handed medieval concept of power through absolute intimidation and are now reaping the whirlwind. All that was needed was aggresive military support and an understanding that the support would continue.
We can thank the jihadist goons for providing the spark for various factions to recognize that just living is more important than everything, even someone’s 1000 year concept of religious barbarity. Iraq is going to end up to be al qaeda’s greatest failure and hu,iation no matter how many audiotapes declare “victory” over the internet. Now it behooves Maliki, al Sistani and Mookie to find a way to co-exist or the end result will be a perpetual stinkpot of Iranian proxie and al qaeda thuggery rtesulting in a country in name only.
That is the true opportunity for which we can thank both the surge (really the new, more aggresive tactics and diplomacy) and al qaeda’s clueless blunder. The key is the local,. tribal recognition of of the consequences of failure. We hope that the Iraqi government has also absorbed that lesson. It would appear that their model for this understanding would be the Afghani government’s ascendancy as the Taliban continues to demonstrate their lack of “popular” support as they continue to die in large numbers.
Thank the good Lord for those stuck in historical time capsules.
– Bhuttos asassination today in Pakistan will prove yet another “overstep” by al Qeada. At some point, the world is going to understand there is no coexistance with these insane murdering thugs. You either eradicate them or they will continue to murder at will. The madrasa’s are turning out drugged up killBOTs as fast as they can.
Big Bang:
Bingo!
Big Bang:
Bingo!
Ooo eee, ooo ah ah ting tang
Walla walla, bing bang
Google “juan cole pond scum”.
Talk about “trying to get to the top of ‘who needs his ass kicked the most?'” list.
[…] Skewering Sullivan, “tenaciously behind the curve”. […]
Re: the Baghdad population
I was going to let it go when it was just andy, but as others are now latching onto it, I must note that Cole’s claim was this:
There are few reliable sources for figures on displacement. The Iraqi Red Crescent estimates the number to be 169,666 displaced families in Baghdad province; given the size of Iraqi families, Cole is probably correct to say that hundreds of thousands left during the surge.
However, I did not question that part of his statement. Rather, I question whether a shift from a city that was already 65% percent Shia to one that is 75% Shia somehow made it “overwhelmingly Shiite” in a way that it was not before the surge.
Displacement is a serious problem. OTOH, displaced people are not dead people. The reduction in the latter is also among the primary effects of the surge, which Cole seems bent on ignoring.
Do y’all really imagine, for one moment, that we all will ever forget that folks like y’all have been wrong on every thing related to Iraq, for the past 5 years? And that Cole has been largely correct?
Strawman. Assumes that we’ve been putting on fake smiles and engaging in Happy Talk. Wrong.
Wars are never easy. Everytime we’ve hit one of the hard parts. Clueless fucks like Sullivan, Cole and yourself have fallen all over themselves to declare the war is lost, or that Iraq was the wrong county, blahblahblahblah. SOme of the critics have actually been cheerleading the terrorists on. You don’t put artificial timelimits on wars, you clueless fucks. That guarantees a loss to your side. And some of you are counting on a loss.
So, I don’t put much stock in what they or you say.
Reports that the “Western Canon” including Enlightenment figures such as Locke, Voltaire, etc. are being translated into Arabic …and for the first time!…..should give the multi-culti crowd fits. After all, non-Western cultures are equally valid and each has much to offer the oppressive West, right? RIGHT? Well if that’s the case, Arab culture don’t NEED no stinkin’ Enlightenment! Right? RIGHT???
The first thing to come to mind when I read this was the post over at Belmont Club,
http://fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com/2007/12/last-remake.html ,
about the possibility that Al Queada will try to remake Tet by staging a large operation make all the good news out of Iraq look like a passing thing in the press. The Cole writing to me looked like an attempt to be in line to say, “I told you so and that makes me right about everything”, if that occurs.
geoffb:
It’s depressing to undertand that that sort of attack may the only strategy left to the jihadist thugs. That being the case it could be monstrous, something that would make the first mosque attack look like a car accident. Even so, if al qaeda in Iraq is tied to some sort of horrific attack (say a school full of children, echoing the Taliban) they may not get the traction they desire. Cole and Sullivan may howl but the Iraqi’s will be even more determined to rid themselves of this pestilence.
Still the possibility is worrisome.
The attack would be aimed not at effecting Iraqis as much as effecting the US through the media and our 2008 election.
I don’t think it would have the effect that Tet did because we no longer live in a world that only exists through MSM “facts”. Truthiness can’t get the traction it did in the 60’s.
Well, geoffb, the most important consideration in musing about a “Tet” style attack is whether or not either al qaeda or the Baathist insurgents have the planning, manpower and material capabilities to execute what, upon reflection, would have to be a series of attacks aimed at the government/military infrastructure. Right now most of those capable of such are either dead, imprisoned, running for their lives, or holed up in some dark spot.
That thought gives me hope.
Or, at the least, parroting enemy propaganda without applying any critical thought.
Well, al Qaeda claims to have just thrown Pakistan into deeper chaos.
“SOme of the critics have actually been cheerleading the terrorists on.”
Or, at the least, parroting enemy propaganda without applying any critical thought.
Yes, that would be the Useful Idiot Wing of the Multicultural Studies Department, without which, such stupidity wouldn’t be able to flourish.
Tenaciously behind the curve – It all about the number of layers of NUANCE actual facts have to penetrate before they can be spun to fit the current narrative. Full meme ahead.
Do y’all really imagine, for one moment, that we all will ever forget that folks like y’all have been wrong on every thing related to Iraq, for the past 5 years? And that Cole has been largely correct?
What saddens me is that people like this really do think this is true, because they’ve either convinced themselves, or have only read people they agree with and ignored the facts.
The people with the facts are faced with two choices: realize they are wrong and have the maturity and courage to admit it… or deny the facts, bury their heads further in the sand, and keep moving the goalposts with furious energy. The coward’s dishonorable and immature way out is what they’ll take. The ones who would change their minds did on one morning in September, seven years ago.
I think this all misses the larger point: Sullivan has already announced a U.S. defeat in Iraq. Since we have been defeated, logically, any positive news in Iraq, such as an apparent decline in violence, is illusory. Sullivan’s job as a commentator must then be seen within the confines of his larger pronouncement on the course of the war; he must find ways to demonstrate the reality of our defeat and impossibility of progress. Here it helps to remember Sullivan’s Catholic background. He, like myself and millions of other RCs have found our way to rejecting or, more typically, ignoring claims of Papal infallibility. Sullivan, however has taken the unusual, and rather generous step of transferring this quality to himself.
“#
Comment by geoffb on 12/27 @ 10:49 am #
The attack would be aimed not at effecting Iraqis as much as effecting the US through the media and our 2008 election.
I don’t think it would have the effect that Tet did because we no longer live in a world that only exists through MSM “factsâ€Â. Truthiness can’t get the traction it did in the 60’s.”
Well, the truth is that Tet was an ginormous defeat for the VC and the NVA regular army, one from which the VC never recovered.
Comment by N. O’Brain on 12/27 @ 12:40 pm #
“Well, the truth is that Tet was an ginormous defeat for the VC and the NVA regular army, one from which the VC never recovered.”
That is true but the MSM “truthiness” of that time was that Tet “proved” that we had lost the war and the best thing would be to leave and cut our losses.
This caused the 1968 election to be about how to leave Vietnam not how to win. All the major candidates were expressing how they would end the war not how they would win it. Nixon’s “Peace with Honor” was the one closest to victory but still fell short of saying win it.
I personally don’t think this kind of media offensive will work because the memories of the 1968 one are still there and resonate.
Guys,
I don’t see why you are even considering Sully’s ethnic percentages for Baghdad. He’s snowed you if you are.
First, the data lack important context. If the overall population of the city has increased due to Iraq’s urbanization (another trend the Lefty media has missed due to BDS), then the change of the ratio of Sunni to Shia need not logically equate to an exodus of either ethnic subsect out of the city, which is Sully’s main lament.
Second, and Sullivan should have seen this, the same ratio-change could result just as easily from a differential influx of these Islamic sects, too.
Could Andy’s illogical conclusions be due to laziness? ‘Cuz I’d hate to think he’d mislead his readers in the hopes of inciting fears about a newly pacified Sunni-Shia Baghdad.
That wouldn’t be like him, would it?
– Not the Tet offensive,nor the NVA,nor Nixon,nor all the fucking Libtards in the Height, had one iota to do with getting out of Nam. It was one of those wild conjugations of events that seem to be connected, where no connection exists. We were finally able to end that war because the Nuclear fleet refitting with MIRV’d missles was finally completed by `74-`75, and after that no one could touch us with out MAD being absolute and final. I’ve posted this before, but it seems with each new generation of young turks who have been brain frozen with the Socialistic swill of our friendly Marxist poli-sci peofs, it needs to be repeated.
– As for the dead beat “beat” generation, they will take the illusion of having made a difference to their graves, because thats what you do when its all you have.
– Nixon had no interest in MAD, and had no clue as to the overall goals of the state department and Dod, both of whom just kept their heads down and pushed the technology as fast as they could. The only shame is it cost more American lives because it took longer than we hoped for.
– After 75 not a single inch of ground was gained by a Communist/Marxist/Socialist regime anywhere in the world, which was the legacy of Eisenhower and Kennedy, Johnson also being a total fucking hack, with no idea what the “stop the advance of worldwide Communism” plan, coulpled with MAD, was all about.
– Carter was so busy totally fucking up Iranian diplomacy, and setting off the rebirth of the Celiphate, he had no idea what a gift he’d been handed.
– History lesson ends, sans the emotional bullshit, and Liberal revisionism.
There’s more to do with Vietnam than you’re giving credit here, Bang. We proved that we were willing to use the blood and time and dollars to stop communism wherever it happened, so much so that China and Russia realized they weren’t going to gain any ground through proxy wars.
– Yes Christopher. The war on Communism had many handmaidens, that is certainly true. Some were effective in stalling until we could get the missles in place. Others just went along for the ride, such as the entire gaggle of US antiwar numbskulls. Nixon and the flower power bunch had a great time, doing absolutely nothing of importance. They did entertain each other and generate a hell of a lot of pop culture/anti-culture icons, but neither ever had anything like the political importance they imagine.
– Until the missles were finished we would have hung on bitterly, which owing to the chrushing loss for the North during TET, and the fact that Min was on the brink of throwing it in, who knows how things might have rolled in Nam perse’. Maybe Min would have sued for peace, as he said he intended to do in his autobiography. Maybe Pot Pol would have never been alllowed to go on a rampage. But I don’t blame the Left for that for all the same reasons. We intended to leave all along, the instant we completed first strike assurance.
– Beyond a holding action, Nam itself was irrelevant. MAD made the real decisive difference. Once we achieved MAD, Nam was no longer needed.
I have yet to figure out exactly why the hell ANYONE listens to or care what Andrew Sullivan has to say, and exactly why the hell he is positioned as some sort of conservative pundit. The dude is a grade-A clown.
= Pol Pot – pimf
Big Bang – Not sure I agree with the end of your 75. Afghanistan was invaded in 1979 and the Russians stayed for a decade, although they did not control. Castro’s emmissaries of peace were active numerous places, particularly Africa. Central America had many “agrarian reformers” much beloved by the American left.
– DR – I don’t mean to convey that VietNam as a country is unimportant. Only uneccessary at that point in time as an arena to campaign a war of Democratization for the purpose posed by the original containment and control plan, once MAD was a reality.
– The Russain/Afghan thing. Well what can I say. I’m a Russian myself, and have studied a wide range of Russian history, Afghanistan included. I don’t think amyone, including the Politoburo itself, ever really understood why the hell they got involved in Afghanistan. Maybe it was a last gasp effort to project world power status on the eave of the fall. What I do know is that long before we actually did anything substative to help the Taliban, and before their efforts bore any real military fruit, the angst of the body bags arriving back home almost daily, (over 15,000 dead by the end of the conflict),had Russian mothers phyically threatening party heads with bodily assualt if they didn’t bring the troops home. The dire situation and anger of families steadily escalated as time went on. Overall it was arguably one of the most useless wars in the history of the Rodina.
Big Bang – My argument isn’t Vietnam, it’s with the following statement:
After 75 not a single inch of ground was gained by a Communist/Marxist/Socialist regime anywhere in the world, which was the legacy of Eisenhower and Kennedy, Johnson also being a total fucking hack, with no idea what the “stop the advance of worldwide Communism†plan, coulpled with MAD, was all about.
I just don’t believe it’s true, as I indicated.
“Well, Al Qaeda claims to have just thrown Pakistan into deeper chaos.”
Maybe for the short run, Rob.
But those idiots (AQ) have just brought the fires of Hell down on themselves. It may take a while, but I just can’t believe that AQ has not just provided Mushariff a more than legit opportunity to crack their fuckin’ heads open.
Northern provinces? No more “safe” area.
I just can’t believe that a majority of people in Pakistan (or Iraq or anywhere else, for that matter), think that these sub-human savages deserve ANY quarter. And they don’t.
They have just forced Mushariff(?)to come down HARD on the Taliban and their own pathetic seventh century asses.
You know, at first, I thought maybe Mooshy was responsible for the murder of Bhutto(?), but Mooshy just doesn’t seem to have the charisma to have some neanderthal (i,e, – splodeydope) blow his own life to smithereens.
Who knows”? But now Mooshy has every reason to go and tame the Northern Provinces.
Just watch what happens.
The US has got to be way beyond pissed off about this, and don’t think for a minute that 10 billion dollars a year doesn’t pay for some heavy influence.
AQ has finally reached the point where their dick reaches their ass…
And in their hubris, they have just fucked themselves.