Zlex said:
If the case can be made that, "Look, this is what these arab folks do; that is their way, the knife to the throat, they are genetically unable to hold peaceful elections and contend for power, its just the way they are, we are fools to think that these knife to the throat low life are up to an election as a means to power"... then go ahead an proudly make that point. That would be the only argument to not be in Iraq today. Of course, that would also be justification for simply nuking the entire place, and sleeping like a baby after the fact.
(emphasis mine)
I was almost with you until the sentence I bolded.
First reason not to be there:
The type of government another country has is not justification for invasion. We should only invade another country because of the threat that country poses to the US.
Second reason (and more important):
If Hussein were the
only obstacle to democracy in Iraq, we'd be out of there by now.
Third (and most important):
Often the cure is even worse than the problem.
Angola - After a 14 year war against Portugal, they gained independence in 1975. The Communists persisted through 14 years of civil war before being displaced. This followed by democratic rule and another 14 years of civil war. Maybe the real cause is confining several 'nation - people' into one country border (European colonization paid little regard to the distribution of the indigenous population). Main ethnic group is Ovimbundu (37%) followed by Kimbundu (25%), Bakongo (13%) and other smaller ethnic groups. Life expectancy is 36.8 years, literacy rate 42%, unemployment rate >50%, inflation rate 106%.
Central African Republic - Same basic story, but without the interference of US or USSR. Inpependent in 1960, longest one group has stayed in power is 14 years. Same root cause - Baya 33%, Banda 27%, Mandjia 13%, Sara 10%, Mboum 7% and other smaller ethnic groups all forced to live in one border. A decent standard of living in spite of wars - has a decent amount of natural resources.
Democratic Republic of Congo - Almost a success story. Gained independence from Belgium in 1960, had some civil wars, but was stable as a dictatorship from 1971 until 1997. Has been in civil war ever since. Over 200 ethnic groups. Main problem is that the DRC was a safe haven for rebel groups from bordering countries to hide out, causing instability in bordering countries to spill over into the DRC. A decent life expectancy (48), inflation of 14%.
Somalia - Went nearly 10 years from Jan, 1991 to Aug 2000 without any working government at all. In fact, the US tried to fix this problem. Hard to put a government in place if no one in the country gets along. Over nine years with no government made this a nice place for terrorist groups to hang out, which made the instability a lot worse. (With 85% Somalis, you'd think this country would have had a little more unity). Literacy rate of 38% with inflation > 100%.
Sierra Leone - Civil wars 1992 to 2002. Temne 30%, Mende 30%, other native African tribes combine for another 30%. Life expectancy 42.7 with a literacy rate of 31%. Diamond mining increases standard of living, but also increases external support for rebel groups who can illegally smuggle Sierra Leone diamonds out of the country.
Here are 21 of the 'forgotten' crises in the world:
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0920809.html
14 of the 21 are due to incessant war in the country.
Your post was limited to the Shiites in Iraq. If the Shiites can control the rest of Iraq democratically, you might be right (the Shiites are the majority). I don't have much confidence they'll be able to keep the Sunnis and Kurds on the same page without brute force oppression. The resulting government will be a small improvement over Hussein, at best, or unsuccessful, relegating Iraq to the fate of the Angolas and Somalias of the world.
Looking at past experience, I'm not sure US presence will mean a hill of beans as far as finding some kind of stability - the USSR couldn't do it in Angola or Afghanistan and we couldn't do it in Viet Nam or Somalia. Some problems have to be solved by the country itself, not outside entities.
On the other hand, the US and Europe did manage to control the damage in the break-up of Yugoslavia after they lost their dictator. In the end, a semi-controlled break-up wound up being a better solution than trying to unify the country. That only took about 10 years.
