[Peace-discuss] Re: "Liberal" media

[C. G. Estabrook]

"Dishonest and disgusting" because America is unique (or
uniquely good) and therefore no right-thinking person can draw
parallels to any other military occupier?

For "evidence of these civil struggles in France," read the
history of the Vichy government (notably similar to what we've
set up in Iraq); of the (largely Communist-led) French
Resistance; and of the numerous French collaborators and
the reprisals taken against them. 

The genesis of the WWII French struggles was often old
political rivalries, unjustifiable attacks on civilians, and
routine calls for civil war. And "religious rivalries, church
bombings, and routine calls for civil war from the pulpit"
were explicit in Spain only a few years earlier, as part of
the last phase of the 20th century's Thirty Years' War (1914-45).

Civil war (largely class war, coded as religious and
political) was in fact far more typical of early 20th century
Europe than it is of the Arab world. As Juan Cole and others
have pointed out, Iraq has no tradition of civil war among its
communities.  Many believe that the major encouragement for
civil war in Iraq has come from the the US, practicing a
divide-and-rule strategy.  The US has openly supported
independent gangs, militias and death squads.  (The Pentagon
has even advertised it as a "Salvadoran strategy.") 

Since the US invasion in March of 2003 there have been 400
suicide bombings in Iraq; before March of 2003, there were
none.  Far more Iraqi civilians have been killed by the US
than have been killed by the insurgents.  Polls show that
overwhelming percentages of both Sunni and Shi'ite communities
want the US out. The solution seems obvious.

What stands in the way is the US determination to maintain
permanent bases in the world's greatest energy-producing
region as a strangle-hold on the world economy.  The liberal
language of "cleaning-up" and "defusing" is a helpful
cover-story, all the more helpful when it's honestly believed. 

--CGE
  

---- Original message ----
>Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2005 15:27:54 -0500
>From: ouroboros rex <c-bee1 at itg.uiuc.edu>  
>Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] Re: "Liberal" media  
>To: peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
>
>C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>
>>Suppose we were talking to a member of the German government
>>sometime from mid-1940 to mid-1944, and he said the following:
>>
>>“We hear constantly that those of us who support moving out of
>>France slowly to avoid massive civilian casualties are
>>'pro-war' ... My reasoning is based entirely on number of
>>French people killed per day ... Now that the political
>>elements there have begun to turn to attacking each other [as
>>Left and Right in France did under the Occupation and
>>afterwards], it becomes clearer than ever that the Germans'
>>job as honorable compassionate people, post-invasion, is to
>>get out, but to clean up the mess the invasion made before we
>>leave.”
>>
>>Would we believe him at all? Probably not.  But suppose he was
>>sincere.  Then his protestation that his was an anti-war
>>position -- that he was “talking about defusing the potential
>>for *more* war” -- would simply seem deluded.  “Cleaning up”
>>and “defusing” would be obvious euphemisms for continuing the
>>effects of the German invasion -- an unavoidably pro-war
>>position. --CGE
>>
>
>   The depths to which you have to go to refute my argument
indict your 
>position more thoroughly than I ever could, but it would
still be 
>interesting to see evidence of these civil struggles in France - 
>particularly their genesis in old religious rivalries, the
church 
>bombings, and the routine calls for civil war from the pulpit.
>
>   Or is this just a particularly dishonest and disgusting
straw man?
>