Spencer Ackerman takes note of reports indicating that al-Qaeda is encouraging would-be jihadis to ease off on Iraq (where John McCain wants to keep troops for 100-10,000 years) and instead focus on Pakistan where McCain thinks it would be naive to try to kill them.
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Go East, Young Jihadi
20 Feb 2008 01:38 pm
Comments (19)
Looks like Al Qaeda is conceding defeat in Iraq less than a year after Harry Reid did.
Looks like Al Qaeda is conceding defeat in Iraq less than a year after Harry Reid did.
Fred, given that Al Qaeda has been a minor factor in Iraq all this time, you apparently aren't aware of the point: violence is going up again in Iraq even as Al-Qaeda leaves. So McCain wants to stay in Iraq, where Al-Qaeda barely exists and the U.S. troop presence fuels the 2005-level civil war casualties, but doesn't want to go where Al-Qaeda actually is.
If you want to stay in Iraq, you want to hand Al-Qaeda a victory. It's that simple.
Only a deeply inexperienced candidate like Barack Obama would want to kill Al Qaeda terrorists.
"Fred, given that Al Qaeda has been a minor factor in Iraq..."
T.B.,
Al Qaeda hasn't been a "minor factor" in Iraq. It may have constituted a minority of combatants (as it will in Pakistan), but it has been responsible for the lion's share of mass-casualty suicide bombings, and it played a key role in fomenting sectarian violence.
In any case, Iraq was of prime importance to Al Qaeda, by its own admission. That its leaders are now advising new jihadis to avoid it -- and, pointedly, not advising them to go to the other battlefield where they can face U.S. troops, Afghanistan -- is a tacit admission of its defeat.
"If you want to stay in Iraq, you want to hand Al-Qaeda a victory. It's that simple."
It's "that simple" in Bizzaro World. It has been our staying in Iraq, hunting down and killing Al Qaeda cells, that is forcing them to concede the battlefield. Had we eschewed the surge and precipitously withdrawn from Iraq as Democrats demanded last year, Al Qaeda would have had its victory in Iraq.
Woo Hoo! Mission accomplished (again)!! The long-suffering troops are finally a-comin' home!! Break out the bubbly, Luella!!
I'm really not sure why Matt posted this. I understand that this is supposed to be a jab at John McCain. It just doesn't look like one to me.
Iraq was not a front in the "war on terror" until we made it one by invading - but how it became a front is irrelevant. The fact of the matter is that Iraq has indeed been a front in the battleground against extremism for the last few years.
And you are posting stories that indicate our enemy is abandoning that battleground? Like its a bad thing?
And say what you will about Pakistan, but the chaos of Pakistan isn't a direct response to US imperialism (unlike the chaos of Iraq). Between supporting Saddam in the 80s, the Gulf War, etc, the US has long played a role in determining the future of Iraq. Thats why we have some moral imperative there, I think. But Pakistan was a British mess really, and while we have supported Musharraf, he could have gotten along without us just as easily.
At any rate, I am also uncomfortable with the notion of launching unilateral airstrikes against a nuclear-armed nation. But I suppose there is some room to wiggle there.
One thing that I forgot to mention. Someone will inevitably try to point out that Al Qaeda only represents a small fraction of the insurgency, and thus is not even a major problem.
Only one word is sufficient for a necessary retort: Samarra.
Al Qaeda has probably not killed the majority of US troops. But it has done more than anything else to stoke the flames of civil war - being caught in the middle of which HAS killed many US troops. Al Qaeda has been instrumental in causing the chaos and fear that has prevented political progress from going forward.
Now there is a debate to be had about whether Iraq is strategically worth the US lives and money to continue to bother. And for the last year I've more or less thought that it isn't worth it. But I don't delude myself into thinking that Al Qaeda hasn't been a major part of the equation.
Al Qaeda hasn't been a "minor factor" in Iraq. It may have constituted a minority of combatants (as it will in Pakistan), but it has been responsible for the lion's share of mass-casualty suicide bombings, and it played a key role in fomenting sectarian violence.
There has never been any proof of this. The vast majority of Iraq violence has been carried out by native Iraqis (including "Al-Qaeda in Iraq," another word for native Sunni insurgents and not at all the same thing as the real Al Qaeda). The idea that foreign AQ jihadists were doing the bombings is a propaganda myth created to shift from the actual facts (Iraq is in a civil war that will not end until American troops leave) to more convenient "facts" (Iraq's wonderful pony democracy is threatened by Al-Qaeda and Iran).
In any case, Iraq was of prime importance to Al Qaeda, by its own admission.
Yes, but unlike conservatives, I don't believe all of Al-Qaeda's propaganda. What matters is action, not words, and AQ never sent many jihadists to Iraq (despite conservative propaganda, nearly all Iraq violence, including most of the big suicide bombings, has been carried out by Iraqis). If Iraq actually was of prime importance to AQ, they'd actually have had a major presence there.
So given the fact that Al Qaeda, the organization that actually attacked us on 9/11, has always been a minor player in Iraq, why do Republicans want to stay in Iraq and fight Iraqis, instead of going elsewhere to fight Al-Qaeda? Because they want to hand Al-Qaeda a victory and declare war on Al-Qaeda's enemies (a traditional Bush strategy, since Bush first took out Bin Laden's enemy Saddam and then turned his attention to AQ's enemies in Iran, proving once and for all that appeasement of Bin Laden was the "Bush Doctrine").
In Terror Case, Spain Detects Pakistani Ties
(print edition title)
by Elaine Sciolino, Victoria Burnett and Eric Schmitt,
Barcelona, February 10, 2008:
....The largely Pakistani cell formed quickly in Barcelona with support, and perhaps direction, from the tribal areas of Pakistan, the authorities said...
...in interviews, Spanish, American and other European officials — most speaking on condition of anonymity because the inquiry is not over — said the plot was indicative of the terror threat from Pakistan.“That these people were ready to go into action as terrorists in Spain — that came as a surprise,” said Judge Baltasar Garzón, Spain’s highest antiterrorism magistrate. “In my opinion, the jihadi threat from Pakistan is the biggest emerging threat we are facing in Europe. Pakistan is an ideological and training hotbed for jihadists, and they are being exported here.”...
T.B.,
One problem with your method of argument (which relies on redefining terms and moving goal posts) is that it forces you into logical inconsistencies.
Consider, for example, your claim that Al Qaeda in Iraq isn't the "real" Al Qaeda. Matt's post was about Al Qaeda (presumably the "real" one) encouraging its jihadi recruits to now go to Pakistan instead of Iraq. By your logic, when Al Qaeda was encouraging jihadi recruits to go to Iraq, those jihadis became "fake" Al Qaeda members when they got there; however, if those jihadis' younger brothers now set off to Pakistan, they will, presumably, become "real" Al Qaeda members when they get there. All this foolishness flows from your politically-motivated artificial distinction of "real" versus "fake" Al Qaeda.
In reality, Al Qaeda is a decentralized terror movement with local franchises that are run by foreign as well as local recruits, with managers often sent in from HQ (wherever that may be). For example, Zarqawi, who headed up Al Qaeda in Iraq prior to getting killed, was a Jordanian who, prior to entering Iraq, was a lieutenant of Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan. You may recall he came to Iraq to get treated in one of Saddam's hospitals for wounds suffered in Afghanistan. Again, according to your definition, Zarqawi was presumably a member of the "real" Al Qaeda when he was in Afghanistan, but then became a "fake" Al Qaeda member in Iraq. That makes no sense.
Consider also your alleged skepticism about Al Qaeda's claims of Iraq being its crucial battleground. Again, following your logic, you should be similarly skeptical about Al Qaeda's new focus on Pakistan. You don't seem to be. The reason, of course, is that you are starting with two premises ("Republicans are teh evil" and "Staying in Iraq is teh bad") and then disregarding any facts which you can't shoe horn into a narrative that supports those premises.
It's a bit like Zeno's Paradox. We're constantly progressing toward success, but never any closer to getting out.
That's some catch.
"It's a bit like Zeno's Paradox. We're constantly progressing toward success, but never any closer to getting out."
Jeffrey Davis,
You must not be familiar with American history. Typically, "getting out" doesn't follow closely behind "success". When we succeed, we tend to stick around for a while. You may have noticed that even to this day we have troops in Germany and Japan, 63 years after winning WWII.
You may have noticed that even to this day we have troops in Germany and Japan, 63 years after winning WWII.
And they're there to prevent the re-rise of fascism?
No?
Well then, there's another false analogy wasting space on my screen. Thanks a lot.
.
"And they're there to prevent the re-rise of fascism?"
One of their roles has certainly been to be a low-cost insurance policy against the re-rise of militarism in either country. And so, far it's worked. A re-militarized Germany or Japan may seem like an unlikely scenario, but that's what insurance is for -- to protect against unlikely scenarios that are potentially catastrophic. The presence of our troops in both countries is one of the reasons that Europe and Northeast Asia have been so peaceful and prosperous for the last few decades.
You'll note that we didn't leave any military bases in Germany after the first world war. Our mistake.
Nice posts, Fred!
The Left has an exceptionally difficult time fitting facts to their narrative.
I'll add that the Left's false front theory - that anywhere AQ is killing people doesn't count if our policies "drew them in" - is as true for "causing them to come here" for the 9/11 attacks in America as it is for policies "drawing them into Iraq".
And that besides defeating AQ in Iraq, we have had two immensurably important additional benefits:
1. Word of the Sunni Arab hatred of AQ butchers and them killing whole busloads of Jihadis has shot around the Muslim world and partially undone the damage the NYTimes and other Lefty Jew media did to America with years of touting Abu Ghraib, ludicrously exaggerated Iraqi body counts, Marine Atrocities, Torture!, sneaky eavesdropping on terrorists that shreds the Constitution.
The news Muslims are now getting is AQ is a pack of heretics, wannabe rapists killing villagers to get their women, REAL torturers, bloodthirsty bombers blowing up crowds of civilians - orders of magnitude worse than Americans who stupidly came in and made huge mistakes like dissolving the Army and Police - letting AQ come in - but who have their own honor like Arabs do and who have been good to their word more often than not and do not target civilians...
2. The second gift is that AQ hastily threw major ME, N African, and European assets into Iraq and failed to cover their trail. We have now got over 2,000 foreign fighters in custody and around 5,000 whacked bodies we have gone over. That has become a massive treasure trove of intelligence - we uncovered cell after cell in other countries, the recruiters, the financiers, the rat lines, info on where they got weapons and training.
It is a great opportunity. We have 2,000 that are now interrogated far away from ACLU and human rights lawyers like Kenneth Roth. We are learning their fellow fighters IDs in their home countries, why they joined up (most outside Sudan, KSA, and Yemen are university students from well-off families). Target lists, ongoing plots, methods and strategies. And Al Qaeda has been unusually cooperative with us, rather than take up the American offer that they be transferred into the custody of the sovereign Iraqi jails of either the Sunni or Shia they attacked for 3 years without mercy.
They lie or refuse to talk, the possibility of transfer to Shiite custody comes up and the college students all of a sudden sing like birds. Wonderful, isn't it? Along with bodies and belongings of dead AQ being given the full forensic treatment. We have taken blown in half skulls of suicide bombers, traced them back to the French ton they came from, got all the Euro cops cooperating to get the ID from the bomber's dentist, find out al the bombers friends and associates and Mosque Mullah -then French DST swoops down and nails a cell of Islamoids thanks to the US starting work on a Jihadi corpse in Iraq.
The AQ war in Iraq involves few jihadis recruited from East of Iran, and interogations show the terror groups in Europe, ME, N Africa are getting nothing in aid and next to nothing in support from the few AQ survivors left in Pakistan or Afghanistan. Indeed, Ayman al Zawahiri has said Iraq has damaged the AQ Brand so much it has dried up funding and urged AQ Iraq to send whatever funds they could spare to he and his associates in hiding in Pakistan..
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Consider also your alleged skepticism about Al Qaeda's claims of Iraq being its crucial battleground. Again, following your logic, you should be similarly skeptical about Al Qaeda's new focus on Pakistan.
I would be skeptical if they were just claims, but there is actual proof of a substantial AQ presence in Pakistan. You don't seem to understand, Fred, that just because Bin Laden says some place is the central front in whatever does not actually make it so unless there is reason to believe that AQ is there. There was never a substantial presence of foreign jihadis in Iraq, where nearly all the violence is civil war violence carried out by Iraqis.
The reason, of course, is that you are starting with two premises ("Republicans are teh evil" and "Staying in Iraq is teh bad") and then disregarding any facts which you can't shoe horn into a narrative that supports those premises.
We all have premises; your premises are that Bush is God and that America must stay in Iraq forever. But while we may all tend to de-emphasize facts that don't fit our premises, the conservative position on Iraq is based entirely on made-up "facts" like: Saddam was a buddy of Bin Laden, most of the violence in Iraq is being carried out by foreign jihadis, there is no civil war.
Any actual look at the relevant facts shows at a minimum that Iraq's violence has been home-grown and that AQ and Iran had very little to do with it. People can disagree on Iraq solutions based on those basic facts, but in order to arrive at the conservative view (wasting billions of dollars on Iraq is good!), you have to make up an alternate pony reality.
Why so many right-wing nuts in these threads? Does Drudge link here often? What gives?
Re: "what gives?"
If anyone who bases an argument about Iraq on documented and relevant facts instead of gossip, rumor, and disinformation from the MSM is labeled a "right-wing nut", you're going to find a lot of us wherever reasonably well-informed people congregate.
T.B. doesn't have the foggiest idea about the identity of most of the suicide bombers, which is well-established; about the significance of Iraq in general, and of these terrorists in particular; the best available methods for fighting AQ; the nature of Fred's premises; or the effects on his perceptions of his own.
Iraq is a key state in a region of vital national interest that's been officially identified as such since Jimmy Carter, and whose status in real terms preceded that action. One of the reasons we're having so much trouble there now is that we waited so long to get in rather than that we're taking too long to get out.
We will be able to effectively "get out" of Iraq at the point that, A) it's a reasonably stable, reasonably pro-Western state at peace with its neighbors and pumping oil; or, B) when cheap Persian Gulf petroleum is no longer the lifeblood of the world economy.
I'm not holding my breath.
Comments closed March 05, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
John McCain, like most Republicans, is not serious about foreign policy.
Posted by rea | February 20, 2008 1:44 PM