How thoroughly disgusting. CNN (http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/08/27/iraq.main/index.html) Under the agreement, the Iraqi interim government won't press murder charges that were lodged earlier this year against al-Sadr, said Kasim Daoud, Minister of State for Military Affairs.

Mehdi militia members will be treated as a political group as long as they disarm.

"Muqtada al-Sadr is free to go anywhere he likes. ... He is as free as any Iraqi citizen," Daoud said.
This is a man who led an armed insurrection against his government. Besides the obvious destruction to Najaf, he is directly responsible for the deaths of Iraqi soldiers, and American troops engaged in combat directly with him and his army.

Not only are they forgiving that, but forgiving also murder charges filed earlier against him related to the killing of another cleric.

Here's the lesson Iraqis learn today: If you have enough guns, kill enough people, and hole yourself up in a holy site that nobody wants to see destroyed, you can broker a "peace deal" which will allow you to get away scott-free.

That sort of garbage would absolutely not fly around here. Iraq has a long way to go. The US commanders must be fuming at this guy being let free after having killed some of their men.

I am not saying that I agree or disagree but they tried something different. Maybe it is the best thing for everyone. Obviously things have not been smooth to this point and they are trying alternative solutions to more fighting and killing.

Here's the lesson Iraqis learn today: If you have enough guns, kill enough people, and hole yourself up in a holy site that nobody wants to see destroyed, you can broker a "peace deal" which will allow you to get away scott-free.
You know, thats what I thought at first as well. But if he really thinks he is free and comes out of his hole, someone will eventually take him out. Its only a matter of time.

It's basic strategy for the area -- don't make him a martyr by killing him.

It's basic strategy for the area -- don't make him a martyr by killing him.Well, now he's still alive and can have an even more influential role on the proceedings.

The Iraqis in charge bungled this up beforehand though. For days they'd promised that "this is your last chance", and they never followed through. So, in addition to bluffing, which makes them look weak, now they forgive a guy, just so that they can save a building (which is really what it came down to - a nice big bomb would have solved the whole thing :D).

- a nice big bomb would have solved the whole thing :D).
You related to Mr Bush? :confused: :p

Well, now he's still alive and can have an even more influential role on the proceedings.

The Iraqis in charge bungled this up beforehand though. For days they'd promised that "this is your last chance", and they never followed through. So, in addition to bluffing, which makes them look weak, now they forgive a guy, just so that they can save a building (which is really what it came down to - a nice big bomb would have solved the whole thing :D).

But if he was killed, then as a martyr his influence could be bigger. destroying the mosque would make the situation there and everywhere in the Middle East much, much worse. (and yes, it could be worse)

This is what CIA sharp shooters are for..

Also those people don't want us there.. We just need to leave and let them have at it .. I agree with the reason we went there but our work is done.. so :gl:

We let Robert E. Lee go scott-free. He didn't spend any time in prison, and he worked for a much bigger, longer, and bloodier insurrection than Al-Sadr did. He became a University president. He had his citizenship reinstated. There is a statue of him in the capitol rotunda. And this isn't all just because he was a "nice guy."

Guys from Sulla to Cromwell and beyond for hundreds of years have ruthlessly executed even their most minor enemies. Very few of them stay in power for very long, and even fewer can look back at our world from the next and see their legacy amount to much of anything.

Conversely, when Julius Caesar took power over Rome, he offered amnesty and citizenship to any enemy who surrendered. His brief reign went down in history and formed the basis for a great civilization. His successor commissioned a great poem of which an excerpt, translated, reads -

"Roman, remember by your strength to rule
Earth's peoples - for your arts are to be these:
To pacify, to impose the rule of law,
To spare the conquered and battle down the proud."

Sure, if Al-Sadr is just a thug, then he needs to go to jail or get executed. But if his position poses any sort of serious threat to the new regime, it is far smarter to let him go free once he gives up. Life is cheap and there are a lot of people in the world - killing one dude is probably the single most overrated thing you can do to change the course of history; rarely is one person so important. There's always somebody to step in when somebody else leaves.

now they forgive a guy, just so that they can save a building (which is really what it came down to - a nice big bomb would have solved the whole thing :D ).

I'll do my best and try to think of this comment as being just naïve, and not extremely sad :d_frown:

This is what CIA sharp shooters are for..
Also those people don't want us there.. We just need to leave and let them have at it .. I agree with the reason we went there but our work is done.. so :gl:

:megafrown: Actually there were very few people in the world who wanted "you" there. Sigh...what do you mean by "our work is done, we just need to leave"? Now that you've destroyed the whole country and left the Iraqi people living in a state close to civil war and in such a poor condition is precisely when you have to be there and help the people you just bombed till exhaustion get back up.

And to all of you who think they should've killed Al-Sadr...as it's been said in this post you just don't have the faintest idea of how things work in the Middle East. Anyway, see you around.

PS: Please, don't even start with the "aaaaaaaa you're pro-Saddam" thing.

I liked reading Petedawg's post, and I know that he could have been a martyr, but the fact of the matter is martyrs can't command from the grave. People can do what they think the martyr wants them to do, but he's gone. Whether his death would have long term positive consequences or not I guess we'll never know.And to all of you who think they should've killed Al-Sadr...as it's been said in this post you just don't have the faintest idea of how things work in the Middle East.Well, I think we all know how it works in the middle east: Guns, violence, and religion decide how things go. Whether sadr's death would be good or not, there is still no denying the fact that letting him go is going to encourage this sort of behaviour in the future. He's suffered no repercussions for his actions. Now you've got a proven murderer who's going to step into politics and have a big influence leading the people. That sounds just wonderful to me.

"megafrown: Actually there were very few people in the world who wanted "you" there. Sigh...what do you mean by "our work is done, we just need to leave"? Now that you've destroyed the whole country and left the Iraqi people living in a state close to civil war and in such a poor condition is precisely when you have to be there and help the people you just bombed till exhaustion get back up."
__________________________________________________ __________

Work done.. Removed Sadam!
Yea nobody whats us anywhere until their butts are in a sling and need our help..
We destroyed the country?? Boy are you misinformed..

The Iraqi people don't want us there..if they wanted us there we wouldn't be having these problems with the country..If the people had some kind of back bone they would be helping us more with the criminals... Of course once we leave they will say we just left them high and dry.. This is basic BS 101

Poor condition?? This country with all it's oil??? it's one of the riches country in the middle east!

One last thing... If these criminals had any brains..they would'nt of caused any problems and let the goverment take over 6/30 and then we would've left.. and then they could've started their crap.. after we left.. but who said they had any common sense....ie.., suicide bombers..women suicide bombers, using children..etc.., Maybe this has more to do with morals ?

Oh, look at this. A day later, Al-Sadr's militia still fighting the US military. Whether he's still directing them or not, they are still around, still trying to maim and kill. LINK (http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/08/28/iraq.main/index.html)

now they forgive a guy, just so that they can save a building (which is really what it came down to - a nice big bomb would have solved the whole thing ).
That's just ignorance. Do you know anything about the religion or what the building even was? If you understood that you wouldn't have said that.

Besides, since when is the US army the savior here? As if they aren't killing anyone. Don't be so one sided.

It's not even as if Saddam could come back, these militia's know fine rightly that it's not happening, the US army has no right to be in that country anymore (or never did in the first place in my opinion).

Here's a quotation from Suz Tzu that might add a little bit to what I was trying to say -

"In general, the method for employing the military is this: Preserving the enemy's state capital is best, destroying their state capital second-best. Preserving their army is best, destroying their army second-best. Preserving their battalions is best, destroying their battalions second-best. Preserving their companies is best, destroying their companies second-best. For this reason attaining one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the pinnacle of excellence. Subjugating the enemy's army without fighting is the true pinnacle of excellence.

* * *

"Thus, the highest realization of warfare is to attack the enemy's plans; next is to attack their alliances; next to attack their army; and the lowest is to attack their fortified cities."

When you look at it like this, conflicts like Vietnam, the War in Iraq, and the War on Terror look a lot less like new kinds of wars and much more like very old kinds of wars fought with varying degrees of success.

It was certainly Al-Sadr's plan at some point to force the young Iraqi interim government to attack the mosque and massively discredit it in front of the Muslim world. The American-supported Iraqi forces, however, were at so overwhelming a strategic advantage that they were able to force surrender of the mosque (the main, contentious objective in this specific conflict) without fighting. I think this was a very decisive victory.

I personally think the administration could have stood to read a bit more Sun Tzu before embarking on this particular campaign.

"One whose troops repeatedly congregate in small groups here and there, whispering together, has lost the masses. One who frequently grands rewards is in deep distress. One who frequently imposes punishments is in great difficulty. One who is at first excessively brutal and then fears the masses is in the pinnacle of stupidity."

After 911 we have the right to root-out any terrorist anywhere... because we are the target..We needed to take it to their homes just like they did us. And other country's like Canada..France..etc.., think they can play both sides they are mistaken.. Because they are easy targets that will be next if we don't go after these animals.. They all better thank God the good old USA is here.. :claphigh:

After 911 we have the right to root-out any terrorist anywhere... because we are the target..We needed to take it to their homes just like they did us. And other country's like Canada..France..etc.., think they can play both sides they are mistaken.. Because they are easy targets that will be next if we don't go after these animals.. They all better thank God the good old USA is here.. :claphigh:

If you think the invasion of Iraq had anything to do with the war on terrorism, you are sorely mistaken. It is well known that the US has wanted to stake a claim in the Middle East years before 9/11. The US has wanted a US-controlled, open-market Iraq to extend its economic and political power in a region that has been closed off to westerners for decades.

All you have to do is look at the political and economic agenda of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA). The CPA is essentially responsible for rebuilding a "democratic" Iraq. Here are some highlights:

Paul Bremmer(May 2003- June 2004 CPA) had pushed more massive changes in one sweltering summer in Iraq than the International Monetary Fund had done during 3 DECADES in Latin America. This is called shock therapy. It is used on countries during times of political or military unrest. The push through reforms while the people are still somewhat "shellshocked" by the events.

Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate and former Chief Economist at the world bank called Bremmers reforms "and even more radical form of shock therapy than pursued in the former Soviet Union".

Bremmer set things off the right way with his first major act.

Firing of 500,000 state workers. Lots of them were soldiers, but also, doctors, nurses, teachers,publishers and printers as well as a host of other professions once controled by the state of Iraq.

Next, he flung the borders WIDE OPEN to unrestricted imports: no tariffs, no duties, no inspections, no taxes.

Iraq, Bremmer declared just two weeks after he arrived, was "open for business." No f*ing kidding.

About a month later, Bremmer made yet another blunder, his centerpiece of the reform package. He was going to liquidate the 200 state-owned companies to the highest bidder. Bremmer flew into Jordan, and attended an economic summit, in which he announced that these companies would be privatized immediately. Stating that "Getting inefficiant state-run compaines into private hands is essential for Iraq's economic recovery".

Things had just gotten started, he began a radical set of new reforms. Enticing multinationals to come in and start to show the world that capatalism is the best way to get things done.
These are laws he created for the pals I am sure he has in a few of these firms, I mean this is the guy that started a "Acts of terrorism risk insurance" company roughly a month after 9-11....a real genuine type of guy, always looking out for others best interests. Never the type to take advantage of peoples misfortunes.

Order 37 - Lowering Iraq's corporate tax rate from about 40% down to 15%.

Order 39 - Allowing foreign companies to own 100% of Iraqi assests outside of the natural resource center(they cartefully avoid being accused of stealing Iraqs oil...everything else...well we can take that if we want)

Even better about 39, is that investors could take 100% of the profits they made in Iraq out of the country; they would not be required to reinvest and they could not be taxed. Who does this benefit? Sure as hell is not the people or the country of Iraq.

As well, under 39 they can sign leases and contract that would last for 40 years.

Order 40 - welcomed foreign banks to Iraq under the same terms.

The only thing left, and this is funny shit, of Husseins economic policies, was a law restricting TRADE UNIONS and collective bargaining. Wow.

If this sounds familiar to any of you, it is because these are the law multinationals ask for in trade agreements with other countries. While these types of clauses are only ever offered one at a time, in small changes, in Iraq, they were all applied, all at once. In record time.

Iraq changed on paper overnight, they went from the worlds most isolated country to the widest open market the world has ever seen. A victory for the ideolgues in the big Conservative think tanks in Washington, but what did it really doe for Iraqi nationals?


What came next, was ugly and predicatable. If you give the Iraqi's any credit at all.


The people of Iraq are not as stupid as some people think they are in the adminstration. They understood what was happening.

As Bremmer tried to weasle his way around the laws, he made the choice of trying to draw up a constitution for Iraq, making the policies he worked to have implemented, written into law.

Problem 1.

The CPA derived its authority under U.N Security Council Resolution 1483, passed in may 2003, which recognized the United States and Britain as Iraq's legitimate occupier. It was this authority that allowed Bremmer and his neo-con handlers to unilaterally make laws in Iraq. But the resolution also states that the U.S and Britain must "comply fully with their obligations under international law including in particular the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and the Hague Regulations of 1907" Both of these things were created as an attempt to end the unfortunate historical tendency among occupying powers to rewrite the rules so that they can economically rape the nations they control. The conventions stipulate that an occupier must abide by a countries existing laws unless "absolutely prevented" for doing so. Also, it states that occupiers do not own public buildings, real estate, forests and agricultural assets" of the country it is occupyingbut is rather the "administrator" and policeman. Keeping the nation secure until soveriegnty is regained.

A big problem for the neo-cons and their Iraqi exiles(Year Zeroists) pushing for the reforms. They wanted a starting over. A complete razing of Iraq from the foundations up.


Problem 2:

In October 2003 there was a meeting of 25 members of the Iraq Governing Council as well as the 25 interim ministers, they decided unanimously that they would not particpate in the privatization of Iraq's state-owned companies. A lot of them saw the acts as illegal and unjust. They were able to quickly see through it, eventhough most of these individuals were far removed from Iraq. They still had the decency to watch out for the people living there.

Iraqi governing council was not buying. They basically told Bremmer to fuck himself when it came breaking the law, and laying off hundreds of thousands of Iraqi's for the sake of a profit margin of a few corporations. What did Bremmer do?


First he flew to Washington in early November to meet with President Bush. He created a second plan to try and make the Neo-Con dream work.

Because the occupiers could not legally sell off Iraq's assets due to international laws, the first thing to do was create a puppet governmant that could, and would do it for them.

In come the Interim Iraqi Government. All appointed by Washington, no elections, they could not risk waiting that long, Bremmer only had a few months before the Iraqi election(this November) and had to avoid having his corp-fellating radical laws taken away from him, this would spell disaster for the coalition, and disaster for the American tax payers, no return on their investment(in the form of American corps having free reign and syphoning the profits back to the U.S under the laws covered above) meant things were going to get super ugly.

Now comes the big one....

Problem 3.


What happens when you have been outted of a job by your occupier and your country has been detroyed by foreign armies in search of plunder? You arm yourself and go out looking to get violent.

And that is just what happened.

After 911 we have the right to root-out any terrorist anywhere... because we are the target..We needed to take it to their homes just like they did us. And other country's like Canada..France..etc.., think they can play both sides they are mistaken.. Because they are easy targets that will be next if we don't go after these animals.. They all better thank God the good old USA is here.. :claphigh:

Whether or not you have the "right" (and I think the term you're looking for is "mandate" or "moral high ground," not "right."), it's still not good military strategy to just go around and indiscriminately bust heads. Whether or not it's "right," the first priority in deciding whether or not to engage in armed combat should be whether or not you can achieve your objective quickly with overwhelming force.

More Sun-Tzu-
"No nation has ever benefitted from prolonged warfare."

(of course, some wars are long, some nations win long wars, and some wars are purposefully made long as a stratagem, but the nation always suffers more under a long war than a short one)

Busting heads wastes resources, thins out your army, weakens your alliances, sours the attitudes of the people, and stirs up trouble that you otherwise wouldn't have to deal with. It is downright stupid to go around and bust heads, mandate or no, "right" or no, September 11th or no.

The United States isn't the only wealthy, technologically-advanced civilization to ever go to war. It's not like we can rewrite the hardest, surest lessons of history just because of "gung-ho know-how," "sticktoitiveness," manifest destiny, a sense of moral superiority, or dudes with cowboy hats.

Right or wrong..they brought it to us..

I agree with alot of the points both of you have.. But I don't think this problem is going away by not taking action.. remember they brought it to us on 911 and if we didn't take any action we would be in alot more trouble in the world then we are now..

Right or wrong..they brought it to us..

I agree with alot of the points both of you have.. But I don't think this problem is going away by not taking action.. remember they brought it to us on 911 and if we didn't take any action we would be in alot more trouble in the world then we are now..

Iraq didnt bring anything to us. Al Qaeda did. Yet we spend a disproportionate amount of money, resources, and effort in "democratizing" Iraq, rather than hunting down Bin Laden.

We continue to lose American lives in a country that had nothing to do with 9/11. The whole "War on Terror" and WMD pitch the Bush Administration has sold to the American people is the biggest lie of his presidency. This is evidenced by the fact that we have found ZERO Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq. Now the Bush Administration is backpedaling and continues to spin the truth about why we really went to war with Iraq. Iraq is going to cost the American people billions of dollars and will haunt us for the next few decades -- all under the false pretense of the "War on Terror".

This is a great forum... I'm going to bow out of this discussion because it will only lead to neg. Let's agree to disagree :tucool:

This is a great forum... I'm going to bow out of this discussion because it will only lead to neg. Let's agree to disagree :tucool:

You bet. Nothing personal at all. Talking politics is always guaranteed to bring out heated debate.

Well, it looks like Sadr is up to his old tricks again. (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,131603,00.html)

This is a great opportunity to learn about history while it repeats itself. We’re all getting a great education in what happens when you invade and occupy a country you weren’t at war with in the first place -- and when you do it virtually alone. England learned this a long time ago, which is why they sent so few British soldiers to Iraq. If it’s any comfort, know that al Sadr’s place in this war won’t last forever. Just as you start to get really tired of him and his old tricks, someone else will take his place and we can start this stuff all over again. That is, until Americans realize that they are no safer, get fed up with the deaths, and start asking how we’re benefitting from fighting Iraqis.

If it’s any comfort, know that al Sadr’s place in this war won’t last forever.

War? What war?! Bush declared the war over, remember...back when there were only 300-400 U.S. casualties, rather than the 1000+ mark...
Is that a quagmire I smell???