Political correctness has essentially doomed our project in Iraq. Our efforts to claim the moral high ground by including everyone in the political process hasn’t reformed the bad guys. It has only enabled them.
Our basic mistake was to assume that political factions in Iraq were essentially the same as political factions at home: (mostly) good people who just have differing opinions. We assumed that all factions in Iraq would put aside their own interests and hatreds and work together to build a new Iraq, if only given the chance.
Indeed there are good people in Iraq. Most of them are good. But there are also evil thugs who would love nothing more than to be the next Saddam. Assuming that the thugs could be reformed by participation in democracy was our single biggest mistake of the occupation. Frankly, it’s a mistake from which we may not be able to recover.
It isn’t politically correct to recognize thugs for what they are: Evil and Unreformable. Yet, the mess we find ourselves in clearly demonstrates that thugs cannot be expected to reform. Of course, facing that fact is also not politically correct.
The only way out of this mess that I see is highly politically incorrect: the thugs need killin’. I humbly propose the following solutions:
- Kill al-Sadr. I don’t give a shit whether he’s part of the government or not.
- Then kill any other government minister who doesn’t disband their personal militias immediately.
- Shoot any militiaman on sight, regardless of affiliation.
- Summarily execute any unauthorized person caught wearing an Iraqi police or army uniform. No arrest. No trial.
- Summarily execute any policeman or soldier found to be affiliated with insurgents or militias.
- Flatten any city that rises in rebellion. Do not tolerate another Fallujah.
- Immediately retake any city that falls to a militia — especially in the southern part of the country.
Brutal and nasty? Yes. A violation of the Iraqi government’s sovereignty? Yup. Overreaction? No, because the current “feel good”, politically correct approach sure as hell hasn’t worked.
So, in a way, I have to agree with the leftists: the occupation has been totally fucked up. But invading was still the right decision.
Tags: barbarians, Iraq, war