You never can tell what will happen when you decide to break up an ossified socio-political system. All sorts of things can happen, including very unexpected things - as noted over at Strategy Page:
The rising threat of a sectarian civil war appears to be helping to avert one. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and some other nations bordering Iraq are increasing measures to curb extremist support in Iraq, and are curbing assistance to groups responsible for actions that are feeding sectarian tensions. Apparently leaders in these countries have decided that an Iraqi civil war along sectarian lines will inevitably spill over onto their soil, as large numbers of refugees flee the fighting, while their own citizens become radicalized in support of co-religionists in Iraq, both events possibly fueling internal disorders. There are a lot of Shia Arabs in places like Saudi Arabia, Syria and Kuwait. Most of these Shia Arabs live near the Saudi and Kuwaiti oil fields. It has always been, at least since the oil was discovered, the policy of both nations, to keep their Shia happy, or at least quiet.
Our leftwing friends will never get this, because they don't want to. But to repeat for the 1,000th time: by breaking in to the Arab/Moslem world and overthrowing a tyrant who - in Arab/Moslem minds - had successfully defied the United States, we took down a generation of pre-concieved notions. Among these now-defunct notions are that the US will forever prop up friendly tyrants, that we lack the will to take casualties on the ground, that things can stay the same forever.
We've already radically changed the middle east - there is no going back to the old way of doing business. The Arab/Moslem world will either become free and prosperous, or it will sink in to a new and perverted Dark Age, slavishly devoted to a false idea of Islam.
There is nothing like the sight of Americans still engaged hotly in the battle three years on along with millions of Iraqis voting under US protection - together they let even the densest Arab oligarch know that the times, they are a-changing. Better to get with the change and ride it out to cushy retirement - the alternative is eventually bloody revolution and strung-up oligarch's after all (and this is regardless of whether the Islamo-facsists or we win).
HAT TIP: NRO's The Corner
Posted by Mark Noonan at April 15, 2006 12:31 PM
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.blogsforbush.com/mt/president.cgi/6936
Comments
Perhaps one of the most telling events to support your point on this issue is the recent story about how Saudi Arabia is calling for bids on a contract to build a several-hundred mile long fence/wall on its border with Iraq. The question in my mind at this point is: Are they hoping that by building the wall they will be able to keep people OUT of their country, or is it to keep people IN their country from joining the jihad in Iraq? It could be either. It could be both.
It would seem that they are beginning to see the light.
A bit off-topic, yet striking in comparison is the fact that while the US and Iraqi forces are struggling mightily to secure the borders in Iraq, they have some grounds for hope that their neighbor to the south, Saudi Arabia, might be inclined to join them in that effort for reasons known only to them.
Yet, here in the USA, our Congress is waffling between pandering to illegal trespassers and assuring Americans that they are serious about dealing with illegal trespassers in this country. Lip service is being given to some sort of border enforcement, but implementation of existing border security measures is sorely lacking. Add to the mix a southern neighbor who steadfastly discourages this nation's attempt to regain border control. They've gone so far as to dump their underclass upon us, and tell us that we are obligated to take more. Not only are they working against our efforts, they are actively encouraging their citizens to protest in our streets to demand their "civil rights" within a country whose laws they do not respect...
Posted by:
dbogdan at April 15, 2006 05:38 PM
Post a comment
Perhaps one of the most telling events to support your point on this issue is the recent story about how Saudi Arabia is calling for bids on a contract to build a several-hundred mile long fence/wall on its border with Iraq. The question in my mind at this point is: Are they hoping that by building the wall they will be able to keep people OUT of their country, or is it to keep people IN their country from joining the jihad in Iraq? It could be either. It could be both.
It would seem that they are beginning to see the light.
A bit off-topic, yet striking in comparison is the fact that while the US and Iraqi forces are struggling mightily to secure the borders in Iraq, they have some grounds for hope that their neighbor to the south, Saudi Arabia, might be inclined to join them in that effort for reasons known only to them.
Yet, here in the USA, our Congress is waffling between pandering to illegal trespassers and assuring Americans that they are serious about dealing with illegal trespassers in this country. Lip service is being given to some sort of border enforcement, but implementation of existing border security measures is sorely lacking. Add to the mix a southern neighbor who steadfastly discourages this nation's attempt to regain border control. They've gone so far as to dump their underclass upon us, and tell us that we are obligated to take more. Not only are they working against our efforts, they are actively encouraging their citizens to protest in our streets to demand their "civil rights" within a country whose laws they do not respect...