By now, we have all heard of and got sick of the brouhaha over Salam’s sneering letter to Bush in Gaurdian and Lileks’ takedown of the letter. I don’t have anything to add to that issue, but I was reading Alaa’s blog when I found this post - TACTICAL CONSIDERATIONS - that made me realize what it was that irked me so much about Salam’s letter.
Where Salam was all sneer, ridicule and little substance, Alaa instead chose to explain the problem he had with the American soldiers’ methods - in this case, their tactics during house-to-house searches. Alaa clarifies to those who understand, why somethings are such a big deal to the Iraqis and also has a few helpful suggestions as to how the coalition soldiers can make their tactics more palatable to ordinary Iraqis. I think that is a great thing, since it is easy for people to sit on their butt and criticize, but pretty hard to come up with workable solutions to the problems at hand.
Posted by shanti at November 26, 2003 12:19 PMTrackBack URL for this entry:
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Alaa writes what is usually called “common sense”, an attribute seldom found. And we’ve certainly made, and will make, mistakes - one of which, as Alaa says, is to over-restrict access to decision makers. We are, though, learning and adjjusting: takes time, which is often frustrating.
As to SP’s post, while I agree with the treatment by Lileks, some of my problem with it is that he was addressing his “Darn it, don’t leave now!” rant to the wrong people, possibly because of his sources other than Iraqis being the European papers and opinions. ‘Tain’t Bush and Bremer wanting to pull out early, they are (I think/hope) reponding to pressures from the “other side of the aisle” and the other side of the Atlantic and some Iraqis of influence. Back before the coalition actually went in, I expected -
. the formal warfare to take six to eight months and be casualty-heavy
. rooting out holdout troops to take months of house-to-house fighting
. getting some type of replacement government to take two years, after which [most] responsibility for stopping left-over militarists could be handed over and the terrorists and other criminals be formally outlawed by Iraq
. staying as military/police support for up to five years, re-training police and military command as well as firearm support on request
A lot of things have moved faster than I expected.
Posted by: John Anderson, RI USA at November 26, 2003 2:49 PM
I completely agree with your points, John. I can see where the Americans could be taken aback by how fast things have happened and how some Iraqis might be frustrated by not getting everything hand-fed to them the way they were used to, in the 30+ years of dictatorship.
It is very few people who can keep a cool head under the circumstances and come up with not only a clear sense of the underlying problem, but a solution to get around it. That is one reason why I like the way Alaa, Zeyad and Omar write, compared to the other Iraqi bloggers. They keep a cool head and discuss things calmly in a way they can be better understood and not tuned out like the shrill rhetoric emanating from other sources.
Posted by: Shanti at November 26, 2003 2:53 PM