How can you bring Democracy to Iraq?

Why can people understand that the Iraqis are not children they can take care of their own they survived Sadam rule, they can take care of their country affairs and their natural resources, they don't need US breeding down their neck and privatizing their oil.

Let them be to make more history that they all ready have since the begining of the civilized world who is a baby nation like US to tell them what they are to do.

They have suffer enough death already.

How can Bush liberate the Iraquis when he is, clearly, working towards taking away some of our civil liberties? That's absurd. I think most people can see right through the foolishness.

When we, as a people, collectively see what is really going on with the US government, change will come because people hate being fooled, used, and mistreated. He should leave the Iraquis alone and practice what he preaches.

I like the oil distribution to the Iraqi people idea. However it won�t be coming about anytime while under an occupying force.

Numerous conquerors have tried to tame the peoples of this 5,000 year old area, each determined to bring their own brand of morality, discipline, doctrine, religion and democracy to bear. Only those with similar cultural attitudes have prevailed. If there is a lesson to be learned after all this time it is precisely their 5,000 year old defiance in defence of their own laws and preservation of doctrines.

Back to the future:

Wikipedia:
Iraq was carved out of the old Ottoman Empire by direction of the UK government on January 10, 1919, and on November 11, 1920 it became a League of Nations mandate under British control with the name "State of Iraq".
At the end of the war, ownership of and access to Iraq's petroleum was split five ways: 23.75% each to the UK, France, The Netherlands and the USA, with the remaining 5% going to a private oil corporation headed by Calouste Gulbenkian.
The Iraqi government got none of the nation's oil. This remained the situation until the revolution of 1958.

Excerpts from : www.globalpolicy.org...

As long ago as 1914, a senior British official was told by "local [Arab] notables" that "we should be received in Baghdad with the same cordiality [as in southern Iraq] and that the Turkish troops would offer little if any opposition".

The British invasion army of 600,000 soldiers was led by Lieutenant-General Sir Stanley Maude�

Proclamation... Our military operations have as their object, the defeat of the enemy and the driving of him from these territories. In order to complete this task I am charged with absolute and supreme control of all regions in which British troops operate; but our armies do not come into your cities and lands as conquerors or enemies, but as liberators... Your citizens have been subject to the tyranny of strangers... and your fathers and yourselves have groaned in bondage. Your sons have been carried off to wars not of your seeking, your wealth has been stripped from you by unjust men and squandered in different places. It is the wish not only of my King and his peoples, but it is also the wish of the great Nations with whom he is in alliance, that you should prosper even as in the past when your lands were fertile... But you, people of Baghdad... are not to understand that it is the wish of the British Government to impose upon you alien institutions. It is the hope of the British Government that the aspirations of your philosophers and writers shall be realised once again, that the people of Baghdad shall flourish, and shall enjoy their wealth and substance under institutions which are in consonance with their sacred laws and with their racial ideals... It is the hope and desire of the British people... that the Arab race may rise once more to greatness and renown amongst the peoples of the Earth... Therefore I am commanded to invite you, through your Nobles and Elders and Representatives, to participate in the management of your civil affairs in collaboration with the Political Representative of Great Britain... so that you may unite with your kinsmen in the North, East, South and West, in realising the aspirations of your Race.

Britain lost 40,000 men in the Mesopotamian campaign.

Earl Asquith was to write in his memoirs that he and Sir Edward Grey, the British foreign secretary, agreed in 1915 that "taking Mesopotamia... means spending millions in irrigation and development".

the British, once they were installed in Baghdad, decided in the winter of 1917 that Iraq would have to be governed and reconstructed by a "council" formed partly of British advisers "and partly of representative non-official members from among the inhabitants".

The traveller and scholar Gertrude Bell, who became "oriental secretary" to the British military occupation authority, had no doubts about Iraqi public opinion: "The stronger the hold we are able to keep here the better the inhabitants will be pleased... They can't conceive an independent Arab government. Nor, I confess, can I. There is no one here who could run it."

But, by September 1919, even journalists were beginning to grasp that Britain's plans for Iraq were founded upon illusions. "I imagine," the correspondent for The Times wrote on 23 September, "that the view held by many English people about Mesopotamia is that the local inhabitants will welcome us because we have saved them from the Turks, and that the country only needs developing to repay a large expenditure of English lives and English money. Neither of these ideals will bear much examination... From the political point of view we are asking the Arab to exchange his pride and independence for a little Western civilisation, the profits of which must be largely absorbed by the expenses of administration."

Within six months, Britain was fighting a military insurrection in Iraq and David Lloyd George, the prime minister, was facing calls for a military withdrawal. "Is it not for the benefit of the people of that country that it should be governed so as to enable them to develop this land which has been withered and shrivelled up by oppression? What would happen if we withdrew?" Lloyd George would not abandon Iraq to "anarchy and confusion". By this stage, British officials in Baghdad were blaming the violence on "local political agitation, originated outside Iraq", suggesting that Syria might be involved.

(Three years later The British now realised that they had made one big political mistake. They had alienated a major political group in Iraq - the ex-Turkish Iraqi officials and officers. The ranks of the disaffected swelled. For Kufa 1920,...

In 1920, another insurgency broke out in the area of Fallujah, where Sheikh Dhari killed a British officer, Colonel Leachman, and cut rail traffic between Fallujah and Baghdad. The British advanced towards Fallujah and inflicted "heavy punishment" on the tribe. For Fallujah, of course, read Fallujah. And the location of the heavy punishment? Today it is known as Khan Dari - and it was the scene of the first killing of a US soldier by a roadside bomb in 2003

The Guardian recounts:
The British responded with gas attacks by the army in the south, bombing by the fledgling RAF in both north and south. When Iraqi tribes stood up for themselves, we unleashed the flying dogs of war to "police" them. Terror bombing, night bombing, heavy bombers, delayed action bombs (particularly lethal against children) were all developed during raids on mud, stone and reed villages during Britain's League of Nations' mandate. The mandate ended in 1932; the semi-colonial monarchy in 1958�

The RAF was first ordered to Iraq to quell Arab and Kurdish and Arab uprisings, to protect recently discovered oil reserves, to guard Jewish settlers in Palestine and to keep Turkey at bay�

An uprising of more than 100,000 armed tribesmen against the British occupation swept through Iraq in the summer of 1920. In went the RAF. It flew missions totalling 4,008 hours, dropped 97 tons of bombs and fired 183,861 rounds for the loss of nine men killed, seven wounded and 11 aircraft destroyed behind rebel lines. The rebellion was thwarted, with nearly 9,000 Iraqis killed.

Churchill was particularly keen on chemical weapons, suggesting they be used "against recalcitrant Arabs as an experiment". He dismissed objections as "unreasonable". "I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes _ [to] spread a lively terror _"�

Lieutenant-General Sir Aylmer L Haldane, quotes his own orders for the punishment of any Iraqi found in possession of weapons "with the utmost severity": "The village where he resides will be destroyed _ pressure will be brought on the inhabitants by cutting off water power the area being cleared of the necessaries of life". He added the warning: "Burning a village properly takes a long time, an hour or more according to size".

Wrom: TQNQEMSFDULHPQQWOYIYZUNNYCGPKYLEJGDGVCJVTLBXFGGMEPYOQKEDOTWFAOBUZ
In May 1941, in the midst of a World War, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill ordered his reluctant Commander-in-Chief Middle East, General Sir Archibald Wavell, to march on Baghdad to effect a "regime change."�

Wrom: XUWLSZLKBRNVWWCUFPEGAUTFJMVRESKPNKMBIPBARHDMNNSKVFVWRKJVZCMHVIBGDADR
By mid-May 1941, the British had occupied Basra thereby asserting their rights under the 1930 treaty�

Britain's primacy in the Middle East had begun to unravel, beginning in Palestine. By the 1950s, Iraq, Iran and Egypt were in turmoil. Therefore, the prevailing historical verdict on Britain's interaction with the Arab world during World War II is that, in its effort to preserve its political base through the invasions of Iraq and Persia, the exile of the Grand Mufti and sponsorship of Zionist counter-terror groups like the Haganah, and heavy handed tactics against the young King Farouk in Egypt, Britain fanned the flames of Arab nationalism and Islamic fundamentalism that ultimately compromised its long term interests in the Middle East.

In 1958, a core of "Free Officers" in the Iraqi army led a coup under the leadership of Brigadier Abdul-Karim Qasim�

On 14 July 1958, the "Free Officers" declared Iraq a Republic. The spontaneous response of the people was overwhelming. In Baghdad, Basrah, Nasiryah, Kirkuk, and Mosul mass mobilizations of people in the streets were described as "overflowing rivers," "tides that engulfed," "purifying floods." The popularity of the revolution was beyond doubt. In Baghdad, over 100,000 people tore down the statue of King Faisal I and of General Sir Harold Maude, standing in front of the British Chancellery, which was set on fire. Hashemite Iraq as a dictatorship propped up by the coercive power of the British Empire came to an end.

SomewhereinBetween

Nice lesson in historical facts, I think iraq has been around since the begining of time and will be there long after we stop breathing.

ZeroDeep I respect our differences and have to aknowledge your point of view however misguided it may be. (we're not all religious) Please don't paint to broad a brush when infering all republicans are of a certain ilk.

And I don't think I'am guilty of such an accusation; I stated George Bush is, though, I may have insinuated a more broader generalization, if so, then I apologize. I've stated in other threads that this "left, right and center" innuendo to characterize parties is anti-ameliorate.

Misguided? Maybe ignorant and un-informed, but I do not consider myself misguided in any light. I believe President Bush -bastion of devine inclination -- is misguided, and I have stated this.

My quandary is still with the current adminisration to grasp the ramnifications this war had. They seem quite adamant in rearousing patriosm and reassuring that the war is going fine and dandy, when we know it is not.

But, this is about the ability of the Iraqi people to accept democracy, and if they understand the pro-cons of such an ideology. I think SOMEWHEREINBETWEEN filled in some much need gaps on the socio-political predisposition in the Middle East.

Deep

Truly the only way to know what the Iraqis want is to have actually been to the country doing research.

All this debating is over "facts" we get from the media.

It does not matter how long we are there or whether there are "oil accounts" (good idea) for the Iraqi people to own.

The problem is that the Iraqi's refuse to fight for their freedom. When the outside terrorists move into town the people just look the other way. With all of the personal weapons in Iraq you would think they would kill the terrorist themselves. Why don't they?

The reason they do not fight for themselves is because they are cowards. They could very easily give information to the "Coalition" They also wont fight for themselves because their religion stresses family/tribal ties more than country. Because they cannot see past their religion and are meek when it comes to questioning those beliefs they are cowards. IMHO

Originally posted by tomcat
It does not matter how long we are there or whether there are "oil accounts" (good idea) for the Iraqi people to own.

The problem is that the Iraqi's refuse to fight for their freedom. When the outside terrorists move into town the people just look the other way. With all of the personal weapons in Iraq you would think they would kill the terrorist themselves. Why don't they?

The reason they do not fight for themselves is because they are cowards. They could very easily give information to the "Coalition" They also wont fight for themselves because their religion stresses family/tribal ties more than country. Because they cannot see past their religion and are meek when it comes to questioning those beliefs they are cowards. IMHO

How about the ones willing to serve in the new Iraqi army? Your right saying that Alot of them do look the other way, But out of 25 million people are you saying not even one wants freedom. This war is worse than being a fox stuck in a trap, you don't win if you bite off your leg, and you dont win if you wait for the hunter to come back. These people Have been conditioned through generations to think the way they do. It will definetly take more than 1yr to bring them Democracy (if that's even what they want). Are you suggesting leave? Would leaving Really be the best thing in the long run? for us, for them , for the world?

Dont get me wrong , Our troops shouldn't be there. but we did destroy their government. THat does hold us accountable on some level don't you think?
They would not be in this current sitiuation if we didn't half-ass it all up. Do you think Our government should just invade any country, Capture all their leaders and just let hell breakloose and call it a day? but if we stay till things are peachy it'll be years before our troops come home? meaning more causaulties, more money , more time wasted.

THe only thing i can think of to do , is Apologize to the UN for going in there(even if they dont' deserve it). Ask them to take over, and as punishment pick up teh tab. Which would be ALOT OF MONEY. OVer alot of years. But again this could make things worse?

Did people Love the soviet union? if they didn't like it why didn't they Fight their government? Probably cause the were oppressed, controlled and told what to think, even after their collapse did democracy Rise from the ashes? no they were pretty messed and still are. i think i better stop my ranting :bash:

How will Iraqi's come to see US efforts to bring "democracy" to Iraq as legitimate when the US openly supports many undemocratic Arab regimes?

So far the US has only brought "democracy" to those Arab nations which it has fought and occupied. Wars which the vast majority of Iraqi's feel are illegal. So it seems that any form of democracy that is created in Iraq will always be illegitimate in the eyes of Iraqi's.

True Dat' , i see your point because it didn't come about in a natural way. Democracy Wont naturally Evolve in their society , We are Forcing it on them. thank you for stating that. i can see how they would dislike anything we have to offer. Of course i could see from all the years of living in fear, how they prolly wont trust any form of government introduced.

Originally posted by Phoenix

Now back on subject the Iraqi situation is not reversible in that we cannot just pullout. So policy disagreements about how we got there in the first place are now irrelevent.

What is important and should be at the forefront of all of our minds is how to make this a success no matter your base political leanings, this is what will save american lives and prevent that oft worried about draft mentioned so frequently.

Or would you rather agitate for defeat which will guarantee more lives lost and a longer recovery for the Iraqi people.

The time for partisanship is long gone if solutions are to be made for the Iraqi's and our soldiers welfare.

You have stated the problem and solution in a nut shell.

At this point forget about how we got there.....we can examine this later and hopefully will have learned something from this experience.

Right now we must come up with the solution to solve the problem. I like your idea of opening an oil account for each Iraqi who registers to vote. If I understood you correctly?

Do the Iraqi's have any ideas about how to stop the terrorism? They must be part of making the peace in Iraq.

I also understand from another thread that there is wide spread hunger. Wasn't the UN involved in taking care of this? Or did they leave when the terrorists became more active?

As long as the USA continues crusading throughout the middle east there will always be terrorism. America labels it as terrorism.. however some label it as freedom fighting.

America has been at war with Iraq since 1989

Why isnt the Bush administration lifting a finger to help put an end to the dafur/sudan crisis? They dont give a rats arse about poor dying people who deserve a free existance on this planet, their's no profit to be made in that!

Iraq is about the US controlling the global Oil markets and to use up the military spending of the 90's. Out with the old and in with the new, just look at all the no contest contracts that the US governement is offering to Haliburton, the Carlyle group etc increasing spending on defence and military modern day toys. Their's nothing but profits to be made in war so why would they want to capture Bin Laden and end the spending? The Carlyle administration spending millions (pre 9/11) on cheap dying defence companies only to see their value sky rocket through the roof after 9/11, Afgan and Iraq war.

Big brother wants new bigger guns and we have no choice but to keep living in fear and pay our taxes.

[edit on 22-11-2004 by syntaxer]

Again, sloganeering is great, but with the administration not being held accountable, we only need look at the actions. A Pliable figurehead government that would quell revolt & push forth American interests is all that was ever wanted in any of these invasions.

Originally posted by bordnlazy
Democracy Wont naturally Evolve in their society

I don't think this is true. You are, basically, saying that the reason why democracy wouldn't work in the arab world is that fundamentally, there is something in their culture that makes it counterposed to democracy. This is completely untrue. I have spoken with many arab youth, from many different arab countries, and not a single one of the ones I talked to didn't want democracy in his or her respective country. Even now, in countries such as Egypt and Lebanon, democracy is flourishing. As I made the point above, iraqis have always fought for democracy, but it has always been denied to them by the US. Now, the US wants to give it to them? Sounds like its time to install another pro-US dictator, to me. The cycle has come full circle since 1959.

Originally posted by General Zapata

Originally posted by bordnlazy
Democracy Wont naturally Evolve in their society

I don't think this is true. You are, basically, saying that the reason why democracy wouldn't work in the arab world is that fundamentally, there is something in their culture that makes it counterposed to democracy. This is completely untrue.

No No sir you got me all wrong, i was just stating that I can understand how they can percieve that we are forcing it on them, not that they dont' want it.And also they have had a Bad history when it comes to their governments, that also causes general Distrust. I never said that it wouldn't work, or that their ethnic background limits them from wanting to be free or perceiving freedom at all.

Democracy Wont naturally Evolve in their society

I agree. Democracy, per sa, won't exactly grow, but a form of goverenment that warrants a form of self-determination, parity regarding gender, race, caste, creed, and sexual orientation, and lastly, economic freedom: the ability to buy, sell and trade with whomever one choses.

There really is not codified form of democracy; we seem to live in a pragmatical society picking and choosing elements that best suite current sociopolitical matters, and those to come.

Deep

[edit on 22-11-2004 by ZeroDeep]

Originally posted by bordnlazy
No No sir you got me all wrong, i was just stating that I can understand how they can percieve that we are forcing it on them, not that they dont' want it.And also they have had a Bad history when it comes to their governments, that also causes general Distrust. I never said that it wouldn't work, or that their ethnic background limits them from wanting to be free or perceiving freedom at all.

oh okay. my mistake, I read it wrong.

Originally posted by General Zapata

Originally posted by bordnlazy
No No sir you got me all wrong, i was just stating that I can understand how they can percieve that we are forcing it on them, not that they dont' want it.And also they have had a Bad history when it comes to their governments, that also causes general Distrust. I never said that it wouldn't work, or that their ethnic background limits them from wanting to be free or perceiving freedom at all.

oh okay. my mistake, I read it wrong.

To be honest I probably didn't state it correctly, but thank you for accepting my correction

Originally posted by tomcat
When the outside terrorists move into town the people just look the other way. With all of the personal weapons in Iraq you would think they would kill the terrorist themselves. Why don't they?

they're trying, but they don't have tanks and planes and M-16s.