Progress on Iraq Acceptance – Moon of Alabama

April 13, 2008

Progress on Iraq Acceptance

Written here in April 2007:

Different parts of the U.S. public are in various phases of grief about the lost war.

The hard-core believers are still in the denial phase. Moderate Republicans have proceeded to anger. The Democrats are in the bargaining phase. The pro-war left realm is in depression and the anti-war people have long accepted the loss.

Like with the war on Vietnam, it will take years until a majority will have finished the grieving process and accept the loss. Only after that happened will the last GI leave Iraq. Only then will the Iraqi people be able to find their solution for peace.

Frank Rich writes today:

This war has lasted so long that Americans, even the bad apples of Abu Ghraib interviewed by Mr. Morris, have had the time to pass through all five of the Kübler-Ross stages of grief over its implosion. Though dead-enders like Mr. McCain may have only gone from denial to anger to bargaining, most others have moved on to depression and acceptance. Unable to even look at the fiasco anymore, the nation is now just waiting for someone to administer the last rites.

It seems like there has been some real progress on Iraq.

Posted by b on April 13, 2008 at 11:33 UTC | Permalink

Comments

Is it not an odd coincidence that the sum of $1 trillion – expected amount of damage from the financial crises will be roughly the total price tag for the war in Iraq?
Representatives on both sides are quoting the figure: Republicans to complain about the Euroweenies who did not chip in their “fair share” and Democrats who point to the war as one of causes of the financial crises.
I personally thing that the two are relatively unrelated, other than that they both represent cases of throwing good money after bad.

Posted by: ralphieboy | Apr 13 2008 13:05 utc | 1

Nothing is unrelated in the world. We learn of those relations by their effects but we never know what the effects are going to be, we act and obtain unforeseen results. The Germans wanted to extend their power towards the east and they ended moved towards the west. The French wanted to civilize the world and they ended up marginalized. We thought we were rich because we had automobiles etc.. and now we find ourselves enslaved and paralyzed by those posessions. Men make History but the result is not the history they wanted. Minerva’s owl takes flight at dusk, we never know anything before it happens.

Posted by: jlcg | Apr 13 2008 14:54 utc | 2

Here’s what I found interesting from Frank Rich, from the article in b’s post:
The simple explanation for why we shun the war is that it has gone so badly. But another answer was provided in the hearings by Senator George Voinovich of Ohio, one of the growing number of Republican lawmakers who no longer bothers to hide his exasperation. He put his finger on the collective sense of shame (not to be confused with collective guilt) that has attended America’s Iraq project. “The truth of the matter,” Mr. Voinovich said, is that “we haven’t sacrificed one darn bit in this war, not one. Never been asked to pay for a dime, except for the people that we lost.”
There you have it. It’s gone badly and they are leaving the bill to their children. It’s worse than that. It’s become perverted by the media. They wont show the caskets of the fallen soldiers yet they have no problem showing Arab snuff flics:

Tragically many Iraqis have been killed and even U.S. servicemen have been killed. The drone continues to fly over the street looking for its target, lining up the hellfire missile. Of course, the pilot is at another location flying this unmanned drone essentially with a joystick, if you will. And in a minute, you will see the black flash of the hellfire missile that goes against these insurgents that the U.S. military says are setting up another one of these attacks.
It’s quite a thing to see it from the air…
HARRIS: Yes.
STARR: …and see how precise these weapons can be, Tony.
HARRIS: Wow. That is something.

Oh yes WOW that is just so cool
And then they wonder why no Arab country on the planet will set up an Embassy in Baghdad. Here’s a little insight on the thinking of the leaders:

Intensely patriotic, they seemed proud of what they were doing and would not admit any errors.
…
Rostow also believed, or pretended to believe, that the forthcoming elections in South Vietnam would be free and democratic and thus strengthen the Government in waging the War. Still he was the first American to whom Dayan spoke who was prepared to admit that the US objective was not just to help South Vietnam but to set up a permanent military political presence in South East Asia so as to counterbalance the growing power of China. To that extent, the conversation with him was the most useful of those he had had so far.

Why Iraq Will End as Vietnam Did
Incidentally Martin Van Creveld is required reading for American military officers.

Posted by: Sam | Apr 13 2008 15:13 utc | 3

The American & Israeli neo-conservatives and Washington Pundits are still in denial. They can not see that their armies have been defeated. Evan Thomas, Newsweek, is still saying that the USA has to beef up armed forces. But, America cannot afford the costs. It is too far in debt. Taxes to pay for the war and the Draft will bring on class warfare. The only weapons left are nuclear bombs.
End the occupations or nuclear war; only Cassandra would dare point out reality’s stark dilemma.

Posted by: VietnamVet | Apr 13 2008 16:36 utc | 4

I think the Kubler-Ross analogy is right on in terms of the U.S. collective consciousness. I wrote here last summer that even if the surge were to produce tangible and celebrated gains, it wouldn’t change anything in terms of eroding public support for the war. While the “anger” phase (unlike the Vietnam experience) never fully manifested in an overt public expression, its denial and futility has had the effect of of doubling down the “depression” phase. Hence, the notably lackluster protest movement, because who wants to protest when its effects as an agency of change are so universally ignored by the politicians and media alike. What people do understand, as exemplified in the public dying process of Art Buchwald. No body, least of all Art, thought his premature release from hospice care meant that he had won his war on cancer.

Posted by: anna missed | Apr 13 2008 19:28 utc | 5

In a follow up to the style-less-ness is also a recognizable style thread, the apparent American preference for things without style might also apply to American culture (or the abhorrence of it) in general, and resistance to the war movement in particular. As a preface, I would disagree with DeAnander that style is always subordinated to, and exemplifies empire. While many post 19th century examples do showcase either a belief in or embrace of that notion, there are plenty of counter examples of style that embody other belief structures, as with the anti-industrial arts&crafts, religious, or other idealistic or idea centric movements exemplified as cultural values, detached from commerce. However, the fact that we have arrived at, and from a “style as culture”, into a “generic non-style” is testament enough that we have cast aside the former culturally grounded forms of style and adopted culturally, a non-culture, as the predominant culture. This has many ramifications beyond the bland architecture of that post, and could account for much of the problems created by the current reign of American (non-)culture. And its world wide infiltration and hegemony that is intentionally destroying traditional cultures world wide. As it must destroy indigenous culture in order to replace it with the non-culture of corporate dependency. It should be as no surprise that the internal citizens of the culture of non-culture would find themselves so impotent to the displacement of other cultures. And the citizens of deeply entrenched cultures find their greatest strength to resist non-culture, in their own still intact culture?

Posted by: Anonymous | Apr 14 2008 8:38 utc | 6

me at #6 – guess my computer doesn’t recognize me anymore.

Posted by: anna missed | Apr 14 2008 8:41 utc | 7

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