Comments on the cost of Iraq

Ehhhh … how did you link the Empire State Building murderer to Iraq? According to what I turned up, he was 58 years old and served in the Coast Guard in the 1970s, after the end of the Vietnam War. Now, if you meant to indict the police officers who gunned Johnson down with 9 shots from 9mm pistols, that’s another matter ….

The Resistance’s Tactics Were SuccessfulThis is the lesson of the Iraki Resistance’s war on the American invaders. The goal was not just to inflict death and physical wounds they goal was to drive American troops into mental and moral breakdown.

The tactic was to attack American troops relentlessly — to force the American invaders to live in a situation where they never ever had any respite.

The American invader was never to be able to relax they must be denied any respite, they were denied meaningful rest.

The resistance consciously set out to inflict constant tension,constant sleeplessness, constant mental pain, and constant uncertainty, and fear upon the American invaders. The idea was to do this until a large proportion of the invaders were worn out with fatigue, grief, horror and pain.

The Resistance’s intent was to not just inflict pain and horror on the invading troops for the sake of doing, the object was to shatter their minds so that while they were still in Irak they turned on their comrades. And then after they returned to America that they turned on the American civilian population at large.

This tactic was, one resistance commander told me, far more successful than they had dared hope.

The American high command, and American civilians are only now beginning to appreciate what the resitance did to them. They are only now starting to realise that they are not the only ones who can inflict “collateral damage” and that there is more than one form of it.

It is not just Americans who can say “Mission Accomplished”.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
There! That is exactly what the stupid motherfuckers running the U.S. government and military will never understand, believe, or pay any attention to, what-so-ever; ever!
If somebody would just understand that; then and only then, will there be a place to start.
The rest is just so much theater and bullshit! EOM.

If Canada was invaded, I would fight, and I would join the resistance, and if the invaders were American (and who else could it be) I would rejoice at every dead American soldier.

My reaction on the converse? If America was invaded, my response to that would be “it depends”. If the invader threw our criminal elites in jail, provided health care to all citizens, and in other ways promoted policies that promoted the public good, I’d welcome them with open arms and work *for* them, not against them.

For you see, a “people” (however you define that) don’t deserve some fiefdom of their own “just because”. They deserve good government, they deserve humane government that respects their rights, they deserve a voice in that government, but they don’t deserve their own state. (It’s why Israel isn’t justified, IMHO). We must get away from the notion that a homegrown despot is preferable to a foreign benefactor “just because” he’s/she’s homegrown.

Down with mindless tribalism. I’d much prefer good government coming from those of a different skin color, or tongue, or religion, than bad government coming from someone who looked/spoke/worshipped just like me.

And before anyone starts talking about the American Revolution, I should say right now that it was probably the least-justified revolution among the major ones; that given time the Thirteen Colonies would have evolved into an independent state just like Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and others did. In fact, in regards to slavery and the genocide against Native Americans, one could make an argument that for *their* freedoms US independence did more harm than good.

My only other comment is that while such scorched-earth tactics are often tactically successful (they kick the invader out), the problem is that their leadership nearly always gravitates towards those for whom ideology trumps humanity. Those that celebrate the death of a foreign solider “just because” he’s a foreign soldier, with few or no qualms about killing just because he’s a “them” and not an “us”, usually become new bosses just as bad as the old.

That does not necessarily mean that armed resistance isn’t the course; just stating that when it gets to that point, “victory” becomes something less than appealing. Or, as you say, there’s no win in it.

StewartM

Sometimes I wonder, do people living in the US know what peace feels like? Everyone can feel free to answer, it’s not a rhetorical question. I imagine the effects of all this aren’t immediately visible to the average citizen, but the US has been in cold or hot war for more than a century now.

I cannot imagine how it must feel like, to live one’s whole life in a country that is always at war or preparing for war. I suppose it must leave deep emotional scars.

PS: WRT to 1, 3, and 4 above (I never asked the men who come under point 2) I’ll point out that unlike the British, the Israelis, the Americans, at no point did any of those people to the best of my knowledge and belief engage in acts of collective punishment of civilians, deliberate targeting of civilians, or (take a big big bow) US Army take and use children as hostages.

mfi

@ amspirational

Really? Russian culture, customs, religion, and norms, aren’t Eastern European with an Eastern European cultural and Eastern European religious historical background? Have you told the Russians that? How did they react?

From the point of view of a Persian, Afghan, or Arab yes they are Western. They were western under the Czars, (ask the Persians), they were western under the Soviets (ask the Afghans and the Arabs), they’re western now under Putin ask the Arabs (and the Chechens).

mfi
mfi

MarkfromIreland:

Taking it from the top:

1. Knowing my grandfather who commanded an IRA unit during our war of independence.

Ireland is a shining example of the great results to come from a no-holds barred resistance movement? Please. (And Ireland’s one of the better examples on your list).

2. Meeting men who had been partisan fighters and commanders in Russia during World War II.

1) Russia’s immediate or long-term aftermath from WWII wasn’t pretty or anything desirable. True, of most examples I can think of the Russians had the least choice in the matter, they had to fight back no-holds-barred against an ideology determined to exterminate them like so many cockroaches. But there was little “win” to their sacrifices for a better outcome, as Solzhenitsyn and others have documented.

2) Russia’s resistance movement made a contribution to the war. But what is forgotten in these discussions is that militarily, an insurgency virtually always fails against a determined occupation. Russia ultimately did not “win” because of its partisans, victory was won by the Red Army. Despite the Russian partisans having–compared to other guerrilla and resistance movements—a comparative wealth of military equipment (they even operated airfields) and a cadre of officers and soldiers participating who had military experience and training, and favorable terrain in northern Russia and Belorussia, a partisan “center” during all the war never successfully withstood an attack by even second-rate German military formations. The German problem in dealing with the partisans corresponded to their problem on the Eastern Front as a whole: i.e., not enough Germans to go ’round.

3. Having had dealings with people who were in Hezbollah and successfully kicked the Israeli invaders out of Lebanon.

Again: the Middle East–Lebanon–how’s that doing again now?

Yeah, sometimes kicking out people with the wrong clothing has to be done. But some of us are then interested in the question of “Ok, what comes next?”

4. Having had dealings which are ongoing with quite a few Iraki resistance commanders and fighters.

I agree with Ian’s comment. The US maybe lost, but Iraq did not win. There was no “win” to this. That was my point, is that when you resort to such tactics and mindset you may kick the invader occupier out but the aftermath often isn’t pretty. None of the examples you offer show me much in of a positive result save that those “different” people wearing the offending garments and speaking the odd accent or tongue left.

And even then, there’s the caveat that resistance movements win by the “uncle” theory–you keep the fight up not because you can win militarily, you just make the cost higher than the occupier wants to pay. That’s why Russia in WWII turned out the way it did–Hitler *was* willing to pay any cost (or, rather, make the slobs in his armed forces pay it). That’s why the partisan movement would have failed by themselves, and why it took the Red Army to win.

And lastly:

How very nice and easy for you as a civilian in a country that does the invading and occupying to say. Where’s your evidence to back up your assertion?

An odd riposte to my comment that:

If America was invaded, my response to that would be “it depends”.

You see, I’m against those very invasions precisely *because* I don’t regard the people in those countries as my enemies. I regard my own country’s leadership and our homegrown elites as far more a danger to my economic future and my personal freedom than anyone over “there”.

StewartM

@ StewartM – I think on the IRA MarkfromIreland was referencing the IRA after the Easter Rebellion (1919 – 1922), not the Provos of the Troubles, since he mentioned his grandfather who fought during the war of independence. But I could be wrong. In the instance of the original IRA and their war for independence, the British were rather happy to murder loads of civilians using the Black & Tans. From anything I’ve read at that time the IRA were targeting police informants, police, judges, attacking barracks and making it impossible to govern Ireland. The British were lucky Michael Collins didn’t take the war to London from what I can tell.

Deckhand

I think on the IRA MarkfromIreland was referencing the IRA after the Easter Rebellion (1919 – 1922)

That occurred to me too, after I wrote my reply. However, even conceding that point, 1) the British had already conceded the point of Irish Home Rule in return for nationalist support during WWI, much in the same way that the US did with the Philippines in and the British with India in WWII; and 2) after the IRA victory there transpired a civil war among the winners that was bloodier and than the effort to kick the British out and which did kill civilians.

So…was all the mayhem and killing a great success? Was it even necessary?

StewartM

in which case who are “those people?”

@Bill H: According to points to 1, 3, and 4 – the IRA, Hezbollah, and the Iraqi resistance.

(Neither endorsing nor otherwise markfromireland’s points, just clarifying.)

@ Bill H

As Pedro pointed out in the comment immediately below yours it is very clear that what I was saying was that unlike the British, the Israelis, and the Americans neither the IRA, nor Hezbollah, nor the Iraki resistance engaged in the collective punishment of civilians. Unlike the British, the Israelis, and the Americans neither the IRA, nor Hezbollah, nor the Iraki resistance engaged in the deliberate targeting of civilians. Yes in Irak during the American occupation there were targeted sectarian attacks on civilians however you cannot say that a fighter who came to Irak with the sole intention of attacking Shi’i Muslims was engaged in the resistance. Nor can you say that a fighter who came to Irak with the sole intention of attacking Sunni Muslims was engaged in the resistance. In fact there was very close cooperation between resistance factions irrespective of sect against the deservedly hated American invaders.

There was no targeting of civilians other than police, intelligence and security officials, judiciary and tax investigators by the IRA during the Irish war of independence.

The same applies to Hezbollah in Lebanon who, contrary to what the Israelis and the Americans would have you believe have significant levels of Christians, and Sunni Muslims both amongst their political cadres and their fighters including at commander level.

mfi

@ Ian Welsh September 18, 2012

The point my friend would make, and has made is this: they were trained, given doctrine, given orders. You know how US enlisted are trained: they do not question orders, and they are stripped of inhibitions in a fashion that I, who have studied brainwashing, do not like.

I don’t like how they’re trained either but I don’t accept what your friend says as an excuse. It’s not even a good excuse.

They volunteered. They obeyed blatantly barbaric and illegal orders, they engaged in blatantly illegal and barbaric behaviour against civilians, against uninjured captured resistance fighters, against wounded resistance fighters, against civilian prisoners. Sometimes they did in response to orders to do so, very often they did it because they wanted to and believed with good reason they could get away with it.

Yes their officer corps and their government must shoulder a lot of the blame. But Ian when they signed up the submitted themselves to the UCMJ and one the UCMJ’s provisions is that any member of the US Armed forces who obeys an illegal order is a criminal and subject to criminal sanction.

There’s a point that needs to be made here about American soldiers and the ease with which they commit attrocities. They are overwhelmingly American, American born, and bred. Reared in American homes by American parents who inculcate American values into them. They go to American schools where American teachers continue the process of socialisation and of inculcating American norms into them. Their military trainng, much of which as you rightly say resembles brainwashing, isn’t even pushing at an easily opened door. The door is already wide open and has a very large “Welcome in, make yourself right at home” on it. Americans are brought up to believe that they are intrinsically better morally and in every other way than everyone else. From this it’s a very easy step to believe and act upon the belief that:

1. Americans can do what they want because they’re manifestly the “good guys”.
2. Anybody who opposes what an American wants is manifestly a “bad guy” and deserves whatever happens to him, his wife, his parents, his kids, and neighbours.

The Israelis have the same sort of ugly ideology as did the Afrikaners.

Every man must take responsibility for the orders he follows, and so I cannot say they are not responsible, especially as they were not drafted, and yet the greatest responsibility lies with the officer corps, the political class and all those who pushed for the Iraq war. Many people hate me because I have constantly pointing out that they are complicit in mass murder, torture and war crimes.

See above. I can well believe they hate you – if the venom directed at me is anything to go by.

As for the civilian population, they voted George Bush back in AFTER knowing he was torturing people.

Indeed.

Nor can I disagree that Iraq is better off without Americans. If it appeared I was claiming otherwise I certainly did not communicate well. Merely that the brutality has brutalized far more than just Americans. I do not forget the sanctions, or Albright’s monstrous comment. There can be no moral order or justice when one innocent life is worth more than another.

Irak is far better off. There’s actually some rebuilding going on. Corrupt officials and contractors are winding up behind bars where they belong. Most importantly violence levels and civilian casualties are way way down from when the American invaders were present. All of this could and should be far far better but as both of us agree this is a very brutalised society. The Americans went out of their way to destroy every single social and legal institution and every thing that keeps us from barbarism. The Americans did this cynically and viciously with malice and with forethought knowing full well what they were doing and what the results would be.

It’s to the eternal credit of the Iraki people that so few of them behaved with the savagery that the Americans were trying to foster. It’s a source of amazement that now that the Americans are gone that there’s been so much progress. These people are trying to re-build a completely shattered society.

America is going down.

I cannot find anything to grieve about in that, they’ve become just too damned vicious and too damned dangerous. The weaker they wind up the better for the rest of us. Including or perhaps particularly you Canadians. What I hope will ultimately happen is that they’ll break up into a set of (divided weak and fractious) regional confederations.

And a large part of it is the Iraq war. That’s not all there is to it, not even close, but it is a big contributing factor. As for the Iraqis, I wish them nothing but good.

Indeed.

The Iraq war vets are going to be a factor for a long time. Fools keep telling me that insurrection can’t happen in the US, I keep telling them they don’t understand the lessons of Iraq, Afghanistan… and Mexico. The area denial techniques developed or perfect by the insurgencies are astonishingly powerful.

The insurrection will I think come from the extreme right wing. It’s not as if their not ploughing very fertile ground.

Finally, I am happy with the govt. in Egypt, overall. I believe in Democracy. But I’m quite sure that DC, including Obama and Clinton, are not. From their point of view, this is blowback. From the POV of OBL, were he still alive, its existence is in large part a result of the Iraq and Afghan wars, neither of which would have happened without him.

I’m sure that Tel Aviv and Washington are horrified. Not least because the new governments are going to have to be at least somewht responsive to the desires of their populace.

The price has been huge. I hope, on balance, that good arises. The fall of the American empire is, I think, going to have a bloody chapter of two yet.

Agreed.

mfi

@ StewartM

1. Ireland first the Free State and then the Republic is indeed a shining example of what can go right after a people win their independence by force of Arms. Unlike in the part of Ireland which the British continued to occupy there were no pogroms against minority communities.

Unlike in the part of Ireland which the British continued to occupy there was no discrimination against minority communities.

Unlike in the part of Ireland which the British continued to occupy the police force that was set up by the new state was unarmed and remains so to this day.

Unlike in the part of Ireland which the British continued to occupy the police force does not routinely engage in massive human rights violations and flagrant breeches of the law. The one occasion when an entire unit went down that road – the so-called “heavy gang” they were exposed by the other members of out police force, driven out of the force, and successfully prosecuted.

Ireland is exacty what you said it is – a shining example of the great results that can come from a no-holds barred resistance movement that wins its freedom from a brutal occupying power.

2. Answer my point without all the irrelevant flim flam. Provide me with evidence from a reputable source that Soviet partisans engaged in acts of collective punishment against civilians. Not the Red Army, not the GRU, not the KGB. Provide evidence that from a reputable source that Soviet partisans engaged in acts of collective punishment against civilians.

3.

never successfully withstood an attack by even second-rate German military formations

Evidence please, and no your unsupported assertions aren’t evidence. Did you read this in some textbook written by a civilian? The whole point of successful partisan war is not to engage with the enemy on their terms but to enage in hit and run tactics, sabotage, and disruption both of communications and logistics all of them activities at which the Soviet partisans excelled.

The same point incidentally can be made of the IRA during the war of independence, Hizbollah, and the Iraki resistance. All of whom won their wars of resistance using precisely those tactics and drove their very determined occupiers out.

“Ok, what comes next?”

In the case of Hizbollah massive economic regeneration in the parts of Lebanon where they hold political sway. Coupled with intensive preparation for the next war that the USA and its Israeli satrapy are planning on launching against Lebanon.

I agree with Ian’s comment.

I doubt it. See this from Ian:

Iraq is better off without Americans. If it appeared I was claiming otherwise I certainly did not communicate well.

There was no “win” to this.

Yes there was. The Irakis won, the Americans lost, proof of the fact that the Irakis won and your country and your armed forces lost is that your armed forces ran away. Running away as I have already pointed out is a tactic engaged in exclusively by losers.

The tyranny instituted by the government and people of the United States of America in Irak from the moment they occupied the place was worse far far far worse than that of the Ba’ath under Saddam Hussein. The Iraki resistance threw the brutal and savage American occupation out of their country. That’s a very big win.

Now for some of the rest of your unsupported assertions:

1) The IRA has targeted and killed civilians.

Wholly and completely false. At no point during the war of independence did the IRA target civilians other than civilians who were part of the British occupation – police, inteligence operatives, judiciary, tax investigators.

2) The Russian partisans targeted civilians (and, given the multiplicity of resistance movements in the East, each other).

You are still trying to evade answering. Provide me with evidence other than your own unsubstantiated word to support your allegation that Russian partisans engaged in acts of collective punishment of civilians.

3) Hezbollah has been accused of targeting civilians (the

You are still trying to evade answering. Provide me with evidence other than your own unsubstantiated word to support your allegation that Hizbollah has engaged in acts of collective punishment of civilians.

4) The Iraqi good behavior was probably more just a lack of opportunity.

False. They had plenty of opportunity.

I say this as someone who has defended groups who have fought back against American or Western or Israeli occupation.

Appeals to authority including self-referential appeals to authority are a fallacy not a rebuttal.

Simple fact is that war, especially guerrilla war, gets ugly fast.

Oh indeed as a professional military officer who has spent most of his adult life in the Middle East trying to mitigate some of the evil done their by your country and its allies I have rather more experience of that than you do. Tell me when are you personally going to do something effective to end the ones your country is engaged in?

mfi

Ian Welsh:

Also, anyone who questions whether Ireland should have gone for independence really hasn’t read Irish history much. To say the British had been brutal in Ireland is a vast, vast understatement.

More brutal and callous than the British government was to the plight of their own people? I mean, yes: the Irish suffered depossession, religious persecution, famine, discrimination, and want. So did most of the English. The only thing that the Irish suffered during the modern era suffered that the English poor did not was legal slavery (in the 17th century) put the distinction between that and the English workhouse was marginal.

There is a reason why there was such a huge outflow of Irish to America, Canada and elsehwhere, and it wasn’t that British rule in Ireland was great.

There was also a huge outflow of Germans to the US (“Pennsylvania Dutch”) during the 19th century. Religious and political persecution does such things, as well as economic misery. You can say that the Irish had plenty of company. And yes, they endured discrimination in the US once they arrived, but they have plenty of company there too.

In fact, a very good case can be made that the British treated the Indians better than the Irish. For that matter, American complaints are trivial compared to Irish ones.

I don’t deny the latter about the American Revolution. I had just said so myself.

But the idea that the remedy for every historical wrong is that the wronged should get a country all to themselves is simply–to put it bluntly–stupid. People don’t deserve a country, people deserve good government. When you try to give the wronged their own country you get Israels and Pakistans.

One wonders if violence is every justified to Stewart.

You seem to not notice that I specifically said that the Russian and Eastern European resistance to the Nazis was unavoidable.

StewartM

StewartM

Provide me with evidence from a reputable source that Soviet partisans engaged in acts of collective punishment against civilians.

Stop trying to duck the issue. It’s very specific and very clear. You have asserted that the partisans engaged in acts of collective punishment against civilians. Come up with evidence from a reputable source for your unsupported assertion.

Provide evidence other than your unsupported word that:

• War of independence IRA.
• WWII Partisan fighters and commanders in Russia.
• Hizbollah.
• The Iraki resistance.

Support your contention:

Those that celebrate the death of a foreign solider “just because” he’s a foreign soldier, with few or no qualms about killing just because he’s a “them” and not an “us”, usually become new bosses just as bad as the old.

Provide evidence from reputable sources how each of those movements were as bad as the vicious and brutal tyrannies they fought and won against.

Provide evidence from reputable sources how each of those movements subsequently became parts of regimes that were as bad as the vicious and brutal tyrannies they fought and won against.

mfi

StewartM, yes, your comparisons are silly, and you obviously haven’t read much about the subject.

MarkfromIreland:

Stop trying to duck the issue. It’s very specific and very clear. You have asserted that the partisans engaged in acts of collective punishment against civilians. Come up with evidence from a reputable source for your unsupported assertion.

I just did. You just either skipped it, or refuse to believe it.

(Other points to be addressed later).

StewartM

From @markfromireland’s devastating indictment:

There’s a point that needs to be made here about American soldiers and the ease with which they commit attrocities. They are overwhelmingly American, American born, and bred. Reared in American homes by American parents who inculcate American values into them. They go to American schools where American teachers continue the process of socialisation and of inculcating American norms into them. Their military trainng, much of which as you rightly say resembles brainwashing, isn’t even pushing at an easily opened door…

A great sadness is risen in me as I read this.

I have spoken before in these threads of my alienation in my own country, and allow me add one more dispatch from within the belly of the beast.

I fell in love at a very early age with the idealized America that was taught to the young children of the ’50’s & early ’60’s – full of lies, this education yet retained a metaphysical loyalty to an historically whispered promise of a forward march of history, informed by missteps, misdeeds and malice of the previous social arrangements of Man.

This narrative was full of lies, as I say, and noisome as they were, the whisper spoke more loudly to me, as did the brutality of the historical truths that they were designed to obscure. I do not understand why this is so – I had no more access to the truth than the children around me, and I certainly was no precocious scholar of history! I only know that I was willing to suffer the isolation that came with this intuition.

I don’t understand why the vast majority of American incubi fell so easily into the spell of American Exceptionalism, with its patriotic incantations of allegiance pledges and spangled banners of vulgar fabulousness. Growing up, I stayed mostly silent on these matters except when my complicity was aggressively sought, and I still remember the cognitive dissonance brought about as I simultaneously understood why the “group” despised me when I refused to salute to or recite the pledges that so clearly contradicted the ideals of my imaginary America and, at the same time, was unable to understand why others could not see what I saw.

Hunter S. Thompson spent his life writing with self-immolation of the dark and ugly vein of venality that is America incarnate. Having grown up amongst it, I have no trouble understanding the dark suspicion with which this country is beheld by those abroad. I also still retain the sense of guilt that any traitor must feel when he can’t bring himself to behold the heart of his homeland without revulsion.

At long last, after a lifetime of sensing that the whisper of my idealized America could still yet rise beyond merely a promise, I grow sadly ever-convinced that what I once thought was an excisable cancer is truly the skeleton, the backbone of this country and its only cure is death.

The answer is that Washington’s empire extracts resources from the American people for the benefit of the few powerful interest groups that rule America … The US Constitution has been extracted in the interests of the Security State, and Americans’ incomes have been redirected to the pockets of the 1 percent. …

@jcapan: A point outstanding and true. However, as testified above, it’s doesn’t rise to an absolution from the darkness of America herself, which is how that narrative is employed by the apologists of the American left (not that I’m implying that was your purpose in raising it here.)

@ amspirnational

Really you need to get a grip.

mfi

StewartM

No you haven’t and it is disingenuous of you to put it mildly to pretend that you have. The sources you cite DO NOT claim that the partisans engaged in collective punishment of civilians.

I’ve given you plenty of rope with which to hang yourself and you’ve done so. You falsely tried to pretend that:

• War of independence IRA.
• WWII Partisan fighters and commanders in Russia.
• Hizbollah.
• The Iraki resistance.

Are evidence for your assertion that such people “usually become new bosses just as bad as the old”

You have not provided one shred of evidence that any of those groups of people I have mentioned who rose up against a foreign occupying power, a foreign occupying power that consistently behaved with genocidal savagery against the people of the lands they had invaded became “new bosses just as bad as the old” you haven’t done it because you can’t. You can’t back up your assertion with evidence because your assertion is a blatant flagrant lie. You know that you can’t back up your assertion with evidence because it is a blatant flagrant lie and you know it is a blatant flagrant lie.

War of independence IRA:

It is a blatant flagrant lie to try to pretend that the War of independence IRA became “new bosses just as bad as the old”. Far from emulating the behaviour of the British the governments of all stripes both in the Free State and in the Republic treated all citizens equally and engaged in programs to lift the population from extreme poverty.

It is a blatant flagrant lie to try to pretend as you have done that:

after the IRA victory there transpired a civil war among the winners that was bloodier and than the effort to kick the British out and which did kill civilians.

It is completely false to say the civil war was bloodier than the British attempt to hold onto the country in the years followed the 1916 uprising. The casualties among combatants and noncombatants combined are a fraction of the civilian casualties caused by British forces engaged in acts of collective punishment and reprisal against civilians in the years between the 1916 uprising and their withdrawal from the 26 counties. Moreover at no point during the civil war did either side resort to the British tactic of collective punishment against civilians.

WWII Partisan fighters and commanders in Russia

I note your attempt to pretend that you misunderstood what I wrote, I note further that it is not the first such attempt you have made:

Ok, I’m supposed to provide “reputable evidence” and not use, by your standard of evidence, the GRU, the KBG, or Red Army sources (you probably would also exclude Nazi/German sources too?)

Your consistent display of intellectual dishonesty does not serve your case. It was very clear that I was asking you to provide evidence from a reputable source that the partisans as opposed to other Soviet forces such as The Red Army, GRU, or KGB engaged in acts of collective punishment and that the partisans as opposed to other Soviet forces such as The Red Army, GRU, or KGB became “new bosses just as bad as the old”.

It is a blatant and flagrant lie to try to pretend as you have done that the WWII Partisan fighters and commanders in Russia became worse than the genocidal Nazi scum they were fighting. It is a breathtakingly flagrant and blatant lie which is made all the more disgusting by your statement that you have read about that war.

Hizbollah

It is a blatant and flagrant lie to try to pretend as you have done that Hizbollah are evidence for your unsupported assertion that fighters who rise up in arms against a brutal foreign occupier become “new bosses just as bad as the old”. Even their worst enemies in Lebanon admit that unlike the Israelis and their allies the Americans the Hizb have NEVER committed collective punishment against civilians. Never, not even once. It is not only a blatant and flagrant lie, it’s a stupid blatant and flagrant lie easily refuted by anyone with who has ever lived for any amount of time in the parts of Lebanon controlled by the Hizb.

Hizbollah’s national appeal in Lebanon, the reason why they have considerable support across the political and religious spectrum in Lebanon, the reason why they have a both a military structure and a political structure in which Lebanese from the entire spectrum of religious and ethnic identities found in Lebanon participate is precisely because the are very different indeed from “the old boss”.

Unlike your country’s forces and unlike the Israeli forces Hizbollah make a point of not inflaming sectarian tensions. They make a point of not engaging in collective punishment of civilians. Furthermore unlike your systemically corrupt American politicians and unlike the systemically corrupt Israeli political class the Hizb make a point of being demonstrably scrupulously honest.

The Iraki resistance

It is a blatant and flagrant lie to try to pretend as you have done that “The Iraqi good behavior was probably more just a lack of opportunity”. The difference between me and you is that unlike you I do not need to engage in blatant flagrant lies. I was present in Irak for the years of sanctions which your viciously corrupt country used to try to effect regime change and in the process murdered more than ½ a million Iraki children and infants. I was in Irak when Albright said those children’s deaths were “worth it”. I was in Irak during your redneck Republic’s invasion and occupation of the country. I’ll be going back there in a few weeks to continue my efforts to mitigate some of the evil done there by the people of the USA and their government. It was your soldiers all-American racism, brutality, and viciousness that caused spurred the resistance on. Bad though Saddam was your country’s behaviour in Irak was far far far worse than anything Saddam and the Ba’ath did and was so right from the start. Your claim “The Iraqi good behavior was probably more just a lack of opportunity” is not only a lie but it’s a stupid lie. It’s the sort of stupid lie which Americans in thrall to some sort of half-assed Fukuyamaist belief that everyone is the same tell each other. The reason why the resistance won, the reason why they never lost the support of the population was precisely because they did not engage in targeting Iraki civilians. They left that sort of despicable and cowardly behaviour to the Americans and to the death squad members who flooded into country on the heels of your American soldiers. They targeted the hated and hateful American armed forces who were attempting to put your country’s boot on their necks.

In all of this I don’t know what I find more contemptible and pitiable your mendacity, your intellectual dishonesty, or your feeble attempts to drag everyone down to your level. Either way I’m through with you, I see no reason to waste my time on somebody who consistently engages in bad faith and mendacity as you have done. Your consistently dishonest behaviour throughout this exchange is a small but very cogent example of why you Americans and your government are loathed not only in the Middle East but throughout the Muslim world, and a small but very cogent example of why so many people both throughout the Muslim and elsewhere increasingly despise America and Americans in general.

mfi

@ Formerly T-Bear September 22, 2012

Thanks for the welcome. I’d noticed! In StewartM’s case I gave some examples refuting his garbage knowing as I did so that a mendacious self-satisfied fool like him would be unable to resist walking into the trap. I’ll admit that the added bonus of a ludicrous lying little lard assed civilian trying to claim that somebody in my particular speciality of my profession who has spent his entire professional life in the Middle East has and I quote:

a heckuva pair of rose-colored glasses on when it comes to guerrilla warfare

came as a bonus. That sort of buffoonery is simply too hilariously funny to be offensive. I have, I admit it, a banana skin sense of humour, and watching somebody publicly make a complete and total fool of himself in the way StewartM does is really rather entertaining – in a slightly shameful sort of way.

mfi

MarkFromIreland:

No you haven’t and it is disingenuous of you to put it mildly to pretend that you have. The sources you cite DO NOT claim that the partisans engaged in collective punishment of civilians.

Yes, I have. You just won’t admit it. Moreover, it’s a nice spin on your part to try to shift the discussion from the statement I originally made that the Russian resistance “targeted civilians” to a more narrow one of collective punishment.

But even on that, from my quoted sources:

“The drama of Naliboki reflected not only the extreme character of Nazi policies toward the civilian gentile population, but also the brutality of the erstwhile Soviet occupiers-turned-partisans. It appears that for the majority of small farmers in Belarus, the situation resembled one in Darfur in 2005. On 8 May 1943, two months before the Nazis obliterated the town, the Soviet partisans massacred 128 gentile men of Naliboki in a surprise night attack”

(….)

“In another case in January 1944, the Soviet guerrillas torched the village of Koniuchy, killing at least thirty-four gentile civilians.””

I mean, destroying entire villages, or lining up a village’s male population and executing them for suspicion of either being collaborationists, or pro-Polish, or pro-independence movement, or even not sufficient pro-Soviet doesn’t sound like some sort of collective punishment, I don’t know what does.

StewartM

MarkFromIreland

If you want to believe that, for example, members of the Syrian Baathist/USSR kinship….presently continuing in the Great Russian
refusal to sell out Syrian comrades, some of whom were educated in
Moscow and environs….if you wish to believe these Syrians refer to Russians as Westerners, you have my welcome to do so.

Petro

I truly don’t care Petro – the man is a liar who has consistently engaged in blatant flagrant and stupid lies in support of a blatantly flagrantly false proposition. I gave him lots and lots of rope and he duly hung himself. As to my response to Tbear – I know Tbear from another forum and am delighted to make his reacquaintance he made a comment and I responded. If you or anybody else choose to see that as some sort of loss or victory or whatever go right ahead. Sometimes one has to point out the glaringly blatantly obvious.

mfi

Libya ? Yeah, none of you guys!

Don’t a majority of Americans now live in cities, even with all the subsidies for suburbs? That’s a good sign.

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Hey, maybe the U.S. can do what France does and put all the undesirables in the ghettoized suburbs.

My wife and I would have loved to live in the city of Atlanta, but as David mentioned, it is ridiculously overpriced, unless, of course, we situated ourselves in the ghettos, but I’ll let you do-gooders go first with that one. I was subjected to that when I lived with my mother in Dallas, Texas, and sorry, but a lot of the people in the apartments where we resided were low-life scum. Our windows would get broken once a month, and the drug dealer threatened to kill my mother if she ever parked in his spot again…..and there were no designated parking spots in this complex….but that was his spot, and he was willing to brutalize anyone who took it. This place had its share of White trash, but there was also Mexican trash and Black trash. I’ll never forget my brothers and I playing basketball at the school across the street at night and this Mexican guy, maybe 17 years old, comes up to us waving a 357 Magnum in our faces, asking us if we saw a certain person. Of course, all three of us nearly pissed ourselves, hoping he wouldn’t pull the trigger and kill us all right there. He was high on something and he was ready to kill. Thankfully, he moved on, and a year later, we were out of there.

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MarkFromIrleand

Evidently advocating pro-Islamic Eurasianism gets you put on moderation here.

I am not averse to the Traditional West; it simply doesn’t exist as anything but a curio anymore; that is why I am sympathetic to pro-Islamic Eurasianism as juxtaposed with the American-Israeli imperial entity. As such I don’t take the side of your antagonists here
on any of the other points you’ve made.

Stalinism was not Western politics, it was Great Russian imperial politics, thus certainly European.

You said above Arabs and Muslims regarded the USSR and Russian culture generally as part of the West.

I don’t believe Russian-educated Syrians for example regard Russians as Westerners,
but they certainly regard them as Europeans.

Of course a truly Western European political-cultural outlook at present would certainly
regard the United States as un-Western, as it is controlled by Zionism, is pervaded with
enforced multiculturalism, and thus a truly Western European outlook at this time would certainly find more in common with Putin and Russia generally, than with the United States, and would act accordingly.

This would of course allow what you call the (still occupied) “West” to function as more than a curio and to potentially fluorish–as a component of Europe, which in fact has a better
future than the collapsing American Empire.

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I am a Muslim I am Iraki maybe you believe that God told you that must turn aside when you have been struck.That is not what God tells me.

What God tells me is what he tells every other Muslim when you are attacked you defend yourself and you keep on figthing until your attacker is in such pain that they offer truce or surrender. You attack back and you continue attacking relentlessly, never ever giving any respite, until the invader flees worn out with grief and horror and pain. Any sacrifice is warranted to expel the American I feel no grief when I see an American soldier die. I feel only relief that this one less barbarian to kill innocent Iraki children.

This is farcical in the extreme. Satire is now reality. It’s a billboard that says “you better nuke us now, because if you don’t, we will destroy every last one of you Westerners.” And you will get nuked. We all will. Then you can be with your God, and us Infidels who don’t believe in a God will be reduced to the ashes from whence we came.

This, and this alone, is why I don’t join in with the Muslim world in criticizing the actions of the West. I’ll own my own criticism of the West as opposed to your ridiculous and misdirected rendition. I have to laugh when I see Progressives, or former Progressives turned a bit more radical, joining hands with Muslim idiots who conjure their God as a rationale for defending and annihilating their enemy. That’s like being Gay during the rise of Nazi Germany and having a beef with Jews and siding with Hitler to settle your score. We’ve reached a point where religion can no longer be tolerated. It’s no longer live and let live. It never was, really, and it’s not now. I’ll be damned if I’m going to be critical of Christianity and Judaism and yet let Islam off the hook. You Muslim bastards are as crazy as the Christians and the Jews, so you can take your religion and shove it where the sun doesn’t shine, just like the Christians and the Jews can do.

There, now you can put a Fatwa on my head for being blasphemous….as if it matters. All of Humankind has a self-imposed Fatwa on its collective head, and it has nothing to do with any God. It’s called a self-destruct button, and it’s been pushed. Bye, Bye. Now it’s time to move over and allow other less destructive life forms to rise from the primordial soup and give it a try. Humans never really left the starting gate before we up and shot ourselves first in the foot, and now in the head.

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As for the civilian population, they voted George Bush back in AFTER knowing he was torturing people. ~~Ian Welsh

Or, as is quite possible, Ohio voting in 2004 was “manipulated” by a Republican owned and backed computer company which had some kind of role in “counting” the votes…. So, just maybe, the American electorate did NOT vote Bush II back into office.

However, American politicians would not allow real investigations in voting irregularities, even when the outcomes were orders of magnitude different from exit polls and thus at least suspicious.

Nor did the American people react as strongly as necessary against the Supreme Court theft of the 2000 election.

Passisivity. Belief that the US “system” is the best possible way of determining elections. Fear of protesting (now made even greater by police militarization and probably unconstitutional actions by those in power and the police, FBI, NSA).

Something has made the American people unable to react to clear and present danger within this nation, from our elected leaders.

Now the powerful and wealthy and even more powerful and wealthy; we the 99 Percenters are increasingly unable to take back any of that wealth and power.

@ Jawbone

You the 99 per centers are getting the government you deserve. The American people gave their tacit consent to what you have detailed above. It is long long past time that Americans learnt that actions and failure to take actions have consequences and that they suffer some of those consequences themselves.

It’s an American proverb that Americans used to ram down the throats of everyone else whenever they felt like it that people get the government they deserve. Americans deserve a far worse government than the one they have but its early days yet.

I take no joy in that but having spent my entire adult life trying to mitigate some of the appalling evil done by America and Americans in the Middle East I make no bones about my belief that it’s long past time that Americans experienced some of what they’ve consistently done to others.

mfi

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mfi

@jcapan, that was an outstanding retort, well done. Some balance has been restored to the thread.

The USSR treated its Muslims and those of the Mideast well, as contrasted with Amer-Israel’s
theft and havoc waged.

If MarkfromIreland won’t make this distinction, he’s got an agenda and so be it. If he lays it bare, I’ll comment then.

If the non-Baathist, in retrospect anti-Nasserite religious extremists of the Muslim world can help liberate Palestine, fine, but as far as their capabilities of building stable societies afterwards, not much of a chance there.

amspirnational

Why exactly are you changing the topic?

mfi

ks

Precisely – thank you.

Your comment about what somebody who has experienced the American empire in murder mode is entirely apt (and yes you can transliterate it as “Fallujah”). If you read what I wrote above about Mohammed’s experience of what Americans get up to when they’re busy raping somebody else’s country:

1. His grandfather shot to death in front of his eyes. The soldier who shot his grandfather and his platoon then savagely beat Mohammed as he tried unsuccessfully to revive his grandfather.
2. His parents murdered during the Arbaeen massacre.
3. His younger brother targeted and murdered by an American sniper. Ali was 9 years old and small for his age the day he was murdered.

Or you can read some of Mohammed’s writings:

Gorilla’s Guides » Blog Archive » What will we talk about today you and I?:

When I heard the bomb explode last Saturday the first thing I did was telephone my father. But there was no reply. Again and again and again I tried to phone him. My fingers hurt I stabbed them onto the buttons on my phone so hard. I fell onto the floor and prayed please let him not be dead. Please let it be that he died quick if he is dead.

And my heart was sick inside me.

… … …

Everywhere inside there are pieces of flesh and blood and rubble. Pulling the living flesh from the rubble. Separating the living from the dead. Climbing over rubble to reach bloodied living flesh. She is so small she cannot be older than 5. The cars and the trucks and the vans begin to arrive. A man takes my bloodied burden from me and others run in to help. I run to the next shop.

Where is my brother?

It’s worth your while reading the full thing.

mfi

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Hey Deckard, you scummy intelligence piece of garbage, screw off. You boys aren’t fooling anyone with this latest garbage you’re doling out. You’re a bunch of vermin, and if ire’s to be directed, it should be directed at you scum who sow discord for a living. You’re a bunch of cowards, to boot. And in case any of you are wondering why I’m saying that, it’s because some of these intelligence scum have followed me around the internet. Don’t fool yourselves. They’re here….they’re everywhere such things are discussed outside of, and inside of, mainstream blogs. Their aim is to direct and misdirect the conversation, and if someone doesn’t follow the blueprint, they try to chase them off, and make it appear as though their misdirection is a group consensus. I despise that, and I despise those who do it. They deserve to be covered in spit. Their faces deserve to be stepped on. They are not deserving of one shred of respect. They are the worst of cowards. They are scum.

jcapan, you hit the nail on the head, especially when you said this:

And you’re a little bitch unless you strap a bomb to your back and blow up your congressman–clearly, that’s where this is going.

That’s exactly what’s going on, and anyone with half a brain can see right through that transparent little ruse. If they can’t, and there are a couple of them here that can’t, then one of three things can be concluded.

1.) They’re complete idiots
2.) They’re in on the ruse
3.) They’re caught up in their ego and will side with creeps to score points against those with whom they find disfavor.

And, I have to laugh at the Expats who continue to check in here. If suburbia was once upon a time White Flight, then Expatriation is the next phase of it, so these sanctimonious Expats and their self-righteous attitude is likened to Whitey fleeing the Darkies to suburbia and then chastising the Darkies for destroying the urban areas. You gotta love it.

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MB,

I’m on “notice”? Um…okay. Too funny. Anyway, are you going off the deep end again? Your amusing paranoia and self flattering persecution complex is getting the better of you…again. Relax.

@ Deckard

Thank you. One of the things I’ve noticed about America and Americans in recent years is that the more their country declines and the closer they get to a modern form of serfdom the less capable of debate they become.

mfi

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His re-write of the “Protocols Of The Elders Of Zion” during which he “exposed” Pat Lang as one of the elders was a classic of the genre.

That’s proof enough for me. You scummy intelligence piece of garbage……and you know it, too.

ks, are you finished with your training to hijack an airliner and fly it into the Capital Building? Nothing would make mfi happier. Maybe you and some of the boys can hit the titty bar the night before and then forget your Koran in the rental car before you depart. mfi will make sure to plant the passport in the debris. It will be like old times, or better yet, déjà vu all over again.

And for those who want the real scoop on what went down between Pat Lang and myself, I have the e-mail correspondence between us since he censored my posts that would have clarified my comments at his site. Of course, mfi knows this, so if you want elaboration, I’ll provide it….not for mfi’s benefit, but for others with integrity.

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amspirnational

Actually I haven’t changed the topic. I did refute the stupid and blatant lies of a stupid and blatant liar. You have changed the topic of my interaction with you – other than citing a miniscule and utterly unrepresentative group of people you’ve not managed to provide any evidence whatsoever against my contention that for the majority of Muslims that Russia is a part of the west. Now you’re shifting the topic to how the former Soviet Union behaved toward its Muslim populace and insisting that I have or have not some obscure agenda which I must acknowledge or something.

As to your comment on American “left” “liberal” “progressives” that goes without saying. There’s an Iraki saying “Away goes the white dog and comes the black dog” – living and working as I do in the Middle East I agree completely. When it comes to the consistently despicable way in which America and Americans behave abroad particularly in their war against Muslims there is no difference between American “left” “liberal” “progressives” and the various shades of American right-wing and extreme right-wing politics.

Ian has made the point on occasion that the Obama administration is a more effective evil than was that of George W. Bush I agree completely.

mfi

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You’re the idiot, ks. I suppose all that money that’s going to the Dept of Homeland Security, The CIA, the NSA, Darpa, The FBI, the ATF, the DEA…..the list goes on and on….is for what exactly? Oh, I see, ks really does believe there are Muslim terrorists around every corner and under every bed, and those myriad agencies are using that money efficaciously to pursue and thwart terrorist attacks. No, it could never be to control a possible unruly populace when the shit hits the fan….NEVER. That’s paranoia talking. Those agencies are busy frying all those Big Fish, aren’t they, ks?

And what the hell are you talking about when you say “persecution complex?” Shove your armchair pop psychology up your ass. It makes no sense. It’s not about me….it’s about everyone here. You’re the one trying to make it about me by making up bullshit descriptions like “persecution complex.” Next you’ll be telling me I wanted to kill my father and fuck my mother. Go get a PhD and hang out your shingle. Maybe you can offer pro bono to the PTSD GIs. Psychiatrists make much better money than the zero you make to support intelligence creeps on the internets…..and, you can still support them with your tax money when you start making the Big Dough. It’s a win win since psychology seems to be your passion.

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For that matter, Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki are war crimes equal to those of the Axis Powers, especially if one accepts Prof Arno Mayer’s arguments in his “Why Did The Heavens
Not Darken?”

His drone bombing in Af-Pakistan-Yemen is beginning to approximate Bush-Cheney’s
war crimes, and they turn a blind eye because what is a Paki life compared to
the rights for gays to marry?

I agree with all of that, but I don’t need Arno Mayer’s book to validate it.

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MarkfromIreland

You went out of your way above to call the Soviet a Western Empire. It was not, but Afghanis did drive it out with Amer-Zionist help.

Frankly, I don’t expect the man or woman on the Muslim street to be able to distinguish between the West and Russia. Equally, I don’t expect it of them. But you have no way of establishing the Muslim on the street regards Russia as part of the West; there are no polls extant on the question. Gamel Abdel Nasser certainly did not regard the USSR as a Western political entity, distinguishing between the two often.

The work the Soviet did with the Rejectionist Bloc contrasts with the Amer-Zionist
wroight havoc appreciably. I can’t tell from your remarks whether Russia drawing the
line at Syria/Iran against Amer-Zionist aims would interest you in the least as a positive.

What you call the West and I call West as historical curio only, I call largely the supine and/or occupied part of Europe as related to Amer-Zionism.

That is why, for example, Germans who care about their nation currently, will adopt a friendlier attitude to Putin than to Obama or any American likely to be president.