@Billmon – it was blindingly obvious to anyone whose judgment was not impaired by oilthirst.
I have lived in Lebanon, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Iran. If I learned anything from the experience, it was the simple fact that a Muslim will not accept occupation by a Christian. I remember writing the following, just before the invasion: “The Muslims of Iraq will see themselves duty bound by their religion to work against the interests of the the ‘Coalition’. As a point of honour. Otherwise, they will have to live with the shame of not having done so for centuries.”

Posted by: SteinL | Aug 13 2006 6:19 utc | 4

@BillGalt — history and religion are quite intertwined there. But my point is in support of Billmon, who writes of “infidel soldiers”. The Muslims of any territory are duty bound by their religion, by statements in the Q’uran, to resist and eliminate anyone representing another religion, who seeks to impose their will upon the followers of Islam.
This is not Sharia – the teachings drawn from the Q’uran, it is a religious duty that was obeyed long before oil was discovered. Muslims can coexist with those of other religions, but in its purest projection, non-Moslems have no rights in disputes against Moslems. As in Saudi Arabia, for instance. This is why people are pouring over the border into Iraq to fight against the Americans – with the same zeal that fired European and American youths who poured into Spain to fight Franco.

Posted by: SteinL | Aug 13 2006 7:38 utc | 6

Alan:
Seems obvious to me too.

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Aug 13 2006 8:15 utc | 8

I rarely comment here but this isn’t correct:

The Iraqi resistance has little or nothing to do with Islam or the Koran, though the neoconservatives would have us believe that. Any nation will fight back violently against invaders. It’s a human reaction, not an Islamic reaction. The only difference would be the rhetoric, which is naturally based on the local culture and religion.

Don’t take this the wrong way but if that’s what you believe I suspect you’ve never lived either in Iraq or Southern Lebanon. Yes of course there’s a huge nationalistic ( – what’s wrong with calling it patriotic? ) element to the resistance but there is also a very strong religious aspect to it. Every Muslim has a duty (fard) to resist invasion of Muslim lands traditionally this is considered to be a collective duty (fard kifaya) in other words it is undertaken by the ruler on behalf of the community. However it is also an individual duty (fard ayn) to be undertaken when the ruler either can or will not undertake it. If you consider this to be the case then you are theologically justified in going to the territry under attack or occupation in defense of the umma. It is a very serious mistake for people from an overwhelmingly secular culture to underestimate religious belief as a motivation in Muslim societies.

Posted by: markfromireland | Aug 13 2006 9:09 utc | 10

He’s being a typical orientalist dan – westerners particularly since ’79 tend to view all Islamic activism as monolothic. They also categorise Muslims as “moderate” (cooptable) and extremist (not cooptable) big mistake.

Posted by: markfromireland | Aug 13 2006 9:19 utc | 12

I have had the pleasure of speaking with Muslim jurisprudents of various directions of belief — from reactionary Wahabis to moderates.
Anyone accusing me of projecting neocon talking points has no idea as to the forces at play in the society that Cheney chose to invade.
markfromireland does a good job of outlining the holy edicts underlying the need to resist any infidel threat to the umma.
The resistance is built up by many factors – nationalism, patriotism, pride and outrage being among them. But the moral cohesiveness devolves from religious authority in the nations of Islam.
Just as religion imposes a duty, it also imposes discipline. Had mere nationalism and patriotism been underlying the resistance, then the people would have risen long ago in Iraq. The Shi’ites are obeying their jurisprudents, chief among them Sistani, while clearly also readying themselves for the day when the nation will be under their control, and not under that of the ‘infidels’ and Iraqi Quislings.

Posted by: SteinL | Aug 13 2006 10:37 utc | 14

Le Monde is announcing that the Lebanese government and Israel have agreed on a cease-fire for 7AM on Monday.
I didn’t know they were at war.
Where to begin? One option is to take the position that the Lebanese government and Hezbollah are no longer distinguishable. On balance, that may be the truth and may be best for the Lebanese people.
Another is to say that this is all wishful thinking. The Security Council, stuffed firmly in the back pocket of the Israeli’s on account of their bombing of the Lebanese civilian population, gave Israel pretty much everything it wanted and the Lebanese have gotten on board. But that ignores the fact that Nasrallah has endorsed the cease-fire.
That leaves option one.
It is now blindingly evident that Israel’s strategy all along has been to entice foreign troops, the French in particular, into Southern Lebanon to fight Hezbollah. Bombing civilians, destroying a country, tiny little baby step feints into Lebanon… This was all supposed to force the Security Council to put French troops in Southern Lebanon.
Interestingly, there are huge swathes of the French Army who are dying to go. Sounds crazy, but it’s true. Their government is much, much wiser.

Posted by: arbogast | Aug 13 2006 11:44 utc | 16

I guess another way to put is: Israel has brought the Security Council to its knees.
We will see whether they have had similar success with Hezbollah.

Posted by: arbogast | Aug 13 2006 12:08 utc | 18

The term “Islamic fascist” is lifted right from Ledeen (see this article, discussed in the OT thread)
The Thirties All Over Again?
When discussing religion remember there is a huge variety within different religious umbrellas. In Lebanon there is for example a constitution that guarantees the Maronite Christians 50% of the seats, and that’s besides other, non-Arab, Christian minorities like the Armenians. Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Egypt and Maghreb countries even Iran were all mosaic societies traditionally, something quite different from for example Saudi Arabia.

Posted by: 2nd anon | Aug 13 2006 13:41 utc | 20

Dan,
Nope Stein has it right. There is a sense of brotherhood amongst Muslims. Yes there are lots of differences, lots of factions, things such as ethnicity, in some parts of the world tribalism, you name it. But Islam is a:

“blueprint for a community”

A community of shared belief and in particular of shared orthopraxy. I keep on quoting that quotation above(from Gellner) to people who don’t “get” this because it’s terribly important that westerners do “get” it. Yes there are huge variations but neither Judaism nor Islam lay the emphasis upon orthodoxy that Christianity does their emphasis is upon how you should live within the community of believers. I have to agree with Stein once that community feels itself under attack from outside then it draws together to repel the intruders. As a general observation while Muslims may want the benefits of modernisation they don’t want to lose their identity they don’t want a secular western society and are determined to resist it. Why on one earth secular westerners think that they want secularism is beyond me. Secularisation has been imposed upon them often with great brutality first by colonists and then by a post-colonial elite it’s rarely if ever been done for their benefit.
As to the power of motivation the Israelis easily kicked the hell out of the (secualar) PLO and are failing abjectly to do the same to the Hizb. Short of extermination you can’t defeat somebody who isn’t afraid of death. Note “just” not afraid of death I don’t say actively seeking it just not afraid of it.
Put it simply if an intrusion occurs be it military OR cultural then the community sets aside its differences until the extruder is expelled.
It’s often said that Islam is a religion of peace. It’s a bit more basic (and realistic) than that:
“No justice, no peace.”
Alan I’m not going to get into the “I know them better than you do” there’s a big difference between living there and travelling there. Either you “get” this or you don’t – I’ve spent a huge part of my time as a peacekeeper first in Lebanon and then on the Iran-Iraq border. The Irish tend to get on well in the ME precisely because (for my generation anyway) we’re NOT secular, we’re strongly anti-colonial, and because of our ´history grew up knowing that we might have to live in a culture different to our own this encourages flexible thinking 🙂 As to your coment about attacks on the American occupiers you’re own GAO admits that the majority of attacks in Iraq are upon the American occupation and forces allied to them. Yes there’s also apalling intercommunal strife but the day the ayatollahs say “rise” is the day that’ll end. The strife is amongst those who disagree about how to handle resisting the occupation not about resisting it. It’s the “near” and “far” enemy concept again.

Posted by: markfromireland | Aug 13 2006 14:40 utc | 22

Not even slightly next question. 🙂
I am from an “old IRA” family my mother was an English protestant from a colonial estate owning family. The difference is one of ethnicity for reasons to do with Englsih and Scottish history if you’re descended from the colonial settlers you’re probably protestant if you’re descended from “native” Irish you’re probably Catholic.
Religion is mostly a handy label for ethnicity nothig more.

Posted by: markfromireland | Aug 13 2006 15:08 utc | 24

Dan yeah – it’s western Europe’s last colonial conflict, I’ll note that within 20 years the native irish who give their allegiance to the Republic will be in a majority in the six counties anyway and that the Brits have very clearly stated in the “Good Friday Agreement” that the moment the majority of the population in the six counties vote for unity that they’ll leave pausing only to write a large cheque. I’ll see a united Ireland in my lifetime (I’m 46.)

Posted by: markfromireland | Aug 13 2006 15:33 utc | 26

westerners particularly since ’79 tend to view all Islamic activism as monolothic.
Bush links Hezbollah and ‘plot’

Mr Bush warned of the terrorists’ ever-changing tactics
… says Hezbollah and alleged UK air plot suspects share a “totalitarian ideology” they are seeking to spread.
Linking their actions with insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, he said they all wanted to “establish safe havens from which to attack free nations”.

they’re all plotting against us!

Posted by: annie | Aug 13 2006 15:51 utc | 28

oh my goodness you are so right mark! ….
hey, here’s a good one from harpers
AIPAC Points to Legion of Doom in Bekaa Valley

With nearly one thousand people killed in Lebanon, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) has outdone itself—spinning press releases with a mastery of the form that could bring a tear to the eye of even the most hardened and cynical flack.
Exhibit one is a July 27 memo entitled “Beirut Largely Unscathed as Israel Targets Hezbollah Strongholds,” in which AIPAC suggested that IDF forces were using state-of-the-art technology to wage a surgical bombing campaign that spared civilians. Despite large-scale destruction in Beirut and beyond, AIPAC cheerily noted that “an overwhelming majority of the city remains untouched” and lauded Israel for dropping “leaflets and taking other measures to urge civilians to leave the area.”

Posted by: annie | Aug 13 2006 16:37 utc | 30

Bwaaaaahahahahahahaha – Annie are we allowed “speak freely” as the men used to say to me when they wanted to call me an “effin little g*bsh**e”? I did a lot of my service in Beq’a . Ditto the stuff about the bombing and the leaflets I
ve plenty of friends in all the Lebanese communities they’ve bombed the Christian areas and the Sunni areas all they have to do now is bomb Walid Jumblatt’s holdout and they’ll have bombed everyone. That AIPAC stuff (ahem) is complete and utter codswallop. But if anyone is stupid enough to believe it I’d love to have their names and addresses as I own a whole heap of second hand and ownly slightly damaged bridges in Lebanon that fell off the back of a lorry 🙂
Sheeeeeeesh …… interesting pieces in The observer today – this one is on the impact of the lobby in the US:
The land of the free – but free speech is a rare commodity

Posted by: markfromireland | Aug 13 2006 16:59 utc | 32

markfromireland,
You don’t have to convince me the British will one day leave Northern Ireland.
But:
1) Why would the British write a check when they leave?
2) What happens then? Won’t the protestants just take over the IRA’s old role? Same old, same old just with Ireland proper instead of the UK, and Dublin taking the place of London? Or do you expect the protestants to go to the UK? Demographically I’d think this would be hard to do. And demographically there would be a lot more protestants to Ireland’s population than there were catholics the UK’s.
Heck, with the tables turned the protestants might find a little zest added to lovemaking. They might drop a “fuck bomb” of their own to increase their numbers. (“fuck bomb” is my mental term for the tactic of a population breeding to increase their numbers.)

Posted by: anonymous | Aug 13 2006 17:45 utc | 34

Anybody who’s taking an interest in this thread should revisit Jonathan Raban’s piece, published in the Guardian a month after the start of the war.
Here’s the trailer for the piece. Followed by the link (if I’ve managed to do it correctly). Followed by three crucial paragraphs from the heart of the article.
Jonathan Raban argues that, apart from the immediate cost in human life, military intervention in Iraq has also represented a disastrous failure of imagination and a fatal inability to understand the role of history – and religion – in the region
Link to ACLUhttp://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~thegroundoffaith/issues/2003-06/islamic_ummah.html
The post- Enlightenment, post-Romantic self, with its autonomous subjective world, is a western construct, and quite different from the self as it is conceived in Islam. Muslims put an overwhelming stress on the idea of the individual as a social being. The self exists as the sum of its interactions with others. Rosen puts it like this: “The configuration of one’s bonds of obligation define who a person is . . . the self is not an artefact of interior construction but an unavoidably public act.”
Broadly speaking, who you are is: who you know, who depends on you, and to whom you owe allegiance – a visible web of relationships that can be mapped and enumerated. Just as the person is public, so is the public personal. We’re dealing here with a world in which a commitment to, say, Palestine, or to the people of Iraq, can be a defining constituent of the self in a way that westerners don’t easily understand. The recent demonstrations against the US and Britain on the streets of Cairo, Amman, Sanaa and Islamabad may look deceptively like their counterparts in Athens, Hamburg, London and New York, but their content is importantly different. What they register is not the vicarious outrage of the anti-war protests in the west but a sense of intense personal injury and affront, a violation of the self. Next time, look closely at the faces on the screen: if their expressions appear to be those of people seen in the act of being raped, or stabbed, that is perhaps closer than we can imagine to how they actually feel.
The idea of the body is central here. On the website of Khilafah.com, a London-based magazine, Yusuf Patel writes: “The Islamic Ummah is manifesting her deep feeling for a part of her body, which is in the process of being severed.” It would be a great mistake to read this as mere metaphor or rhetorical flourish. Ummah is sometimes defined as the community, sometimes the nation, sometimes the body of Muslim believers around the globe, and it has a physical reality, without parallel in any other religion, that is nowhere better expressed than in the five daily times of prayer.

Posted by: Upharsin | Aug 13 2006 18:01 utc | 36

About DU. (top post by ET.)
The US – after Vietnam – can no longer accept high numbers of casualties in ‘wars’ – they all have to be light in injury and death, high on technology.
The decision to use DU no doubt rested on its miraculous power, punch and punch, destroy – powerful weapons.
The result is that soldiers do not die ‘in theatre’ – they hold the upper hand and survive, though that also is tied to the nature of the ‘wars’ being fought.
The deaths of US soldiers have to be hidden, thus shunted forward in time. More than a third of US soldiers who participated in Desert Storm are seriously ill or dying, many have already died, but at home, in the US, care of the VA, who give them the runaround, as they know there is nothing to be done, and they are not keen on palliative medecine, as that would reveal what is really going on.
The real toll of war is huge, but hidden in endless shoddy and murky statistics, or personal stories.
The US needs fresh bodies all the time. The soldiers can not be used after a 2-3 year span.
The rapid turnover also means loss of transmission of skills, capabilites, knowledge, and so on.

Posted by: Noirette | Aug 13 2006 18:42 utc | 38

Where did all these Orientalist come from?
The so-special Arab mind? Strange Arab customs?
Ethnic strife, incomprehensible rivalries, tribal loyalties!
Bombs away!

Posted by: Noirette | Aug 13 2006 19:09 utc | 40

I thought we were talking about llamas?
To the discussion about the HB soldiers not fearing death, and the greater topic of Muslims not fearing death, I note that Fisk points out that the Iranian soldiers during Iran/Iraq were the same way … absolutely unafraid as they fought in “human waves.”
Fisk is dead serious about this. I think it is definitely worth exploring further — and Fisk reads the action as specifically “religious” or stemming from faith. That faith fanned big-time in Iran by the Ayatollah; that faith is the fabric of the culture.
It seems completely wrong to call this process “religious indocrination” as if it can be turned on and off.
I am not simple enough to think that this culture can be easily changed, and not wise enough to know if it should be. I prefer to live and let live … having little experience with the culture of Islam I don’t have much to add.
I do know that the Muslims I have met and become friends with are beautiful caring people, fasting during Ramadan, enjoying the strength of their faith in knowing that they are acting righteously.
But clearly there is some misunderstanding of the depth of Muslim culture. Thanks all above for adding some first-hand knowledge to the discussion.

Posted by: jonku | Aug 13 2006 21:14 utc | 42

@danofsteele
“I do not accept the theory that the US is getting rid of its nuclear waste by making bullets out of it and shooting it into Iraq.”
You mean “intentionally”…? Because it doesn’t look like that’s a theory to me, although you are correct to state that they aren’t making it into bullets to shoot into Iraq. Some DU is made into armour plating, and it’s being used elsewhere, too.
This is one of those rare cases in which we do not need to ask whether or not they believe their own bullshit (“Depleted uranium dust is entirely safe, I sprinkle some over my oatmeal every morning! Now go back in there and kill someone!”). That the Isrealis are using the filthy shit on their own border indicates clearly that warmongers are not merely paying lip-service and do not think this it poses any kind of long term danger to anyone’s health.
But this brings us right back to the pointless “Let It Happen On Purpose” vs. “Made It Happen On Purpose” debates about intentionality that, in the final analysis, amount to precisely the worth of a turd. Maybe someone can explain to me how it’s a comfort having grossly inept leaders that let people die to pursue their selfish goals as opposed to malevolent leaders who achieve the same result with their eyes wide open.

Posted by: Monolycus | Aug 13 2006 23:08 utc | 44

The choice to use DU was made entirely for cost savings. Tungsten currently sells for more than $7000 USD/ton, a huge expense (even by US military standards) for ordinance that’s just going to be shot out a gun barrel. Of course, they could restrict their use of armor-piercing shells for purposes where the need to pierce armor is actually required, but why bother (in the military’s view) when DU is so readily available?

Posted by: Alan | Aug 13 2006 23:44 utc | 46

@Alan
“The choice to use DU was made entirely for cost savings.”
Thank you for the insight regarding the cost/benefit of depleted uranium use vs. tungsten use in military ordinance. I will have to amend the final statement in my #44 post to reflect this new data that has come to our attention. Please change to:
“Maybe someone can explain to me how it’s a comfort having grossly inept leaders that let people die as cheaply as possibleto pursue their selfish goals as opposed to malevolent leaders who achieve the same result with their eyes wide open.”

Posted by: Monolycus | Aug 14 2006 3:11 utc | 48

Yes, I second that. I don’t read German, so I’d love a translation, or at least a summary. Babelfish’s version, though amusing, is presumably misleading unless the authors sound incomprehensible in German as well: This week has shrills before eyes led, as deep the ditch between the USA and Europe is. The west threatens to break. (And I’d be remiss if I didn’t also quote them on eye around eye, tooth around tooth.)

Posted by: The Truth Gets Vicious When You Corner It | Aug 14 2006 5:04 utc | 50

the proof is in the poof

Posted by: anna missed | Aug 14 2006 5:43 utc | 52

the proof is in the poof

Posted by: anna missed | Aug 14 2006 5:46 utc | 54

Alan 36 and Monolycus 38,
I checked cursorily, and this 1980 US Army study
deploymentlink.osd.mil/ du_library/pdfs/1999279_0000010.pdf
this reference claims both cost and effectiveness differences, although I womnder what to make of their effectiveness claims for “future Soviet tanks”.
What do you make of this, Alan? Tungsten weighs 15% less, and they claim that it gets worse and worse effectiveness as the tank armaments get more complex. Is this just BS? If so, how?

Posted by: citizen | Aug 14 2006 7:34 utc | 56

@citizen:

I can’t claim any knowledge of ballistics or gun manufacture, but ordinary physics suggests that, yes, uranium would be more effective than tungsten as a projectile weapon or as armor, unless there are tungsten alloys with unusual properties. (Also assuming, of course, that you don’t mind the side effects of making things out of uranium, of course. But if we’re just asking what the Pentagon thinks, then that’s immaterial.)

It’s down to momentum, basically. An average atom of uranium has a mass of 238 atomic units (au) (rounded), while an average atom of tungsten has only 184 au. That means that, if travelling at the same speed, an atom of uranium has around 30% more momentum or kinetic energy — since both are linearly related to mass — than an atom of tunsten. That will make them about 30% more effective at penetrating barriers at the molecular level (which is ultimately what counts) when thrown, and make them 30% more effective at stopping incoming projectiles.

(Of course, you can balance that advantage, at least on the armor side, by making specially-constructed macromolecules where the strength of the bonds between the atoms means that any incoming projectile that doesn’t rip the macromolecule apart outright has to move the whole thing at once, thus exchanging a blow for a puncture. Since molecular bonds can contain a ridiculous amount of energy, relative to their size, this is a workable solution. But carbon nanotubes, the prime example, are difficult and expensive to manufacture, and in high demand for lots of other purposes as well — and the sci-fi geeks haven’t even organized well enough yet to seriously start work on an orbital elevator, which will blow demand through the roof if it ever takes off… pun unintended…)

Posted by: The Truth Gets Vicious When You Corner It | Aug 14 2006 8:28 utc | 58

ATTN B-, can you fill us in on this article I found referenced on a right wing blog on German media. Supposedly titled “America is Destroying the West”
The piece is from December 2005 and about a widening moral ditch between the US and Europe citing CIA secret prisons etc. It is not really right or leftwing but quite moral mainstream. It is bashing Bush policy for being irrational-fundamentalistic. A “solution” proposed is more contacts between the US and Europe to help the US to find its moral compass again.
Thanks. Would you do a weekly thread on what yr. media is saying about xUS/its policy?
I hardly get along reading the English sources. So I don´t get much of German media exept the local rightwing rag (which I read for local news) some weeklies and some TV news. It is in a tendency pro Israel and cautious pro U.S. but not nearly as manipulated as US news. I don´t think Fox would get much of a rating here. The flagship of the rightwing press, BILD-Zeitung has been losing lots of customers (down some 25% in 5 years).

Posted by: b | Aug 14 2006 8:58 utc | 60

An average atom of uranium has a mass of 238 atomic units (au) (rounded), while an average atom of tungsten has only 184 au. That means that, if travelling at the same speed, an atom of uranium has around 30% more momentum or kinetic energy — since both are linearly related to mass — than an atom of tunsten. That will make them about 30% more effective at penetrating barriers at the molecular level (which is ultimately what counts) when thrown, and make them 30% more effective at stopping incoming projectiles.
That’s not correct. Looking at the atomic weight of tungsten is inaccurate. You need to look at this from a materials science perspective, not a chemistry perspective.
Tungsten is more dense than DU (19.3 g/cm3 versus 19.1 g/cm3). Tungsten shells thus have more kinetic energy for a given size.
Tungsten is also harder than DU (7.5 on the Mohs scale versus 6.0).
In the real world, each of these is used in alloy form to further improve the material properties, but the fundamental fact is that tungsten is a better material for ordinance based on its physical properties. (Though it doesn’t have the potential to vaporize on impact.)
DU is used mainly as a cost-saving measure. It’s roughly on par with tungsten in most ways, but the cost of DU is a fraction of the high cost of tungsten. The producers of DU often literally give it away.

Posted by: Alan | Aug 14 2006 21:09 utc | 62

You can also google “Doug Rokke” if you’re interested in more info on DU. Wikipedia has a good synopsis. Yeah, it’s amazing what a well kept secret it is how many are ill and dying for Gulf War I (wasn’t one GW enough?) I bet if our soldiers serving in Iraq knew this stuff we’d have a whole lotta defections mighty quick.
But yeah, clear evidence of a worldwide death culture. Of course, US is be far the largest perpetrator, but over twenty states use DU weapons in their arsenals.
It goes without saying that the weapons industry is the single largest polluting industry in the world.

Posted by: Malooga | Aug 15 2006 2:02 utc | 64