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Violence in Iraq to start rising again?

  2. Tori
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Remember the cease-fire called by radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr back at the end of August? Officials are acknowledging that move to be largely responsible for the decrease in violence in Iraq, after the Mahdi Army members put down their guns on the order of their cleric. The cease-fire is set to expire at the end of the month, and a message has gone out that if al-Sadr hasn't extended the cease-fire by the 23rd of February, then followers would "be free to resume their activities." Why would he want to lift the ban? Apparently, al-Sadr is upset that the Iraqi government hasn't purged "criminal gangs" operating within security forces he claims are targeting his followers.

Ugh.
Tori

10 responses // Violence in Iraq to start rising again?

  • ya know, he's right! he's trying to lead a murderous criminal syndicate grassroots style, outside the system, fighting the man! why cant those twisted, corrupt, self-serving, governmental gang leaders learn to do it the wholesome, family-friendly way, as he does?!
    dirty_mojo
  • Did we stop paying them to behave?
    Marilynn_Murray
  • we should get our people out of there quicker and let them sort things out themselves.
    pressrecord
  • Yes, ethnic purification. That'll sort things out...
    magnusdeus
  • oh, ok, the US, with its history of racism and anti-Muslim fervor should dictate to them how to deal with ethnic purification while we boast of our inability to save our own poor from catastrophe.

    we should stop acting like arrogant know-it-alls getting involved in other people's fight for self-determination as if we are the ordained police of the world. it's so annoying how people can't fathom letting the iraqi people figure it out for themselves. our military presence only fuels the violence and division.

    and this Mahdi guy, he did a better job keeping the violence down than we or the puppet government did when he ordered his people to keep it low. what have we done?
    pressrecord
  • actually, though it's obviously abhorrent, civil war is really the only way to sort this out. Imagine if england had tried to impose peace on america during the civil war. wouldn't have worked. for there to be peace one government has to be in power. we're really going about this all the wrong way as the 3 groups really want nothing to do with each other. We're creating Kosovo, why not create 2 more nations?

    (again, distasteful...but realistic)
    jh64487
  • pressrecord: I didn't say things wouldn't eventually stabilize if we left, but that would only be after hundreds of thousands died and then lived under suppression in a fundamentalist theocracy. We broke it, we have to buy it.

    jh64487: There'd have to be three nations, and two would get fucked out of oil profits. That and the Kurds would become the Middle East's new Israel...
    magnusdeus
  • An unrealistic expectation of the possibility for peace is what is making the situation so drawn out for americans. Iraq has seen fighting between sunni and shi'a for hundreds of years. Iraq only had peace through the tyranny of Saddam's regime. There can be no peace between these two people, at least none that can be imposed by an outside source (Note what I said carefully). America must wake up to the reality that we can't fix everything just by sending in our army or corporations.

    It "broke" back when Iraq was first created (1917?) because of England and France's imperial goals and random map drawing, the way to fix it is up for debate, but a central power-sharing government has not, nor will it ever, have success.
    jh64487
  • i agree with magnusdeus in that we should take some sort of responsibility for getting involved in the first place. i just don't think military occupation and government intervention is the way to go. it's like injuring someone then telling them to trust us while we pour salt on it.

    i also don't think we should just let our cousins fight endlessly either. if there's a way to calm them down enough to cool off and pray together then maybe we should be a phone call away. if they're gonna kill each other anyways, at least help pull the kids out of harm's way. and sending our own kids over there doesn't keep any of us safer.
    pressrecord
  • yeah, i agree with getting the heck out of there. (i was merely commenting on the irony of sadr's statement. actually, i take that back, given the history of leaders, that's completely typical.)
    and as bad of a taste as it leaves in my mouth, i have to say that maybe busting up the nation was for the best (for iraq, not us--no, no, noooo, not us!). like jh said, it should have never been a single nation to begin with, but that can't be helped now. at least now they can fight it out themselves, the way they seem to have want to for almost a century.
    dirty_mojo

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