How on earth did Iraq ever survive and prosper for five thousand

[Bandit]

years without the USA there to show them how? How did they ever build anything without Halliburton? It is just unimaginable to me how they could have ever survived. Only America knows how to properly form a society....:shrug: Anyone know how they did it? Was it sorcery?

[slackmaster]

1. Nobody knew about oil that whole time

:nuke:

[blm]

2. Kerry made a similar point a few days ago - he said Iraq armies fought off Iran for years

and they can manage to protect themselves again. He blamed Bush for setting up circumstances where the Iraqi politicians are told we'll stay there to protect them instead of stepping up efforts to get themm to assert greater control of military protection themselves.

[twilight_sailing]

5. The Iraqi Army has no weapons

beyond small arms.

[blm]

6. They will have plenty of our arms and our bases left behind.

That is the type of expense many in our country are willing to pay to withdraw our troops, imo.

[twilight_sailing]

7. Maybe not. Bases yes but arms?

I doubt it.

[blm]

14. In many cases it's easier to leave the equipment behind then ship it back.

We left a ton of arms behind when we were in Afghanistan, that is how the Taliban was able to take over there.

If we could make the decision to leave the arms behind then, we can leave needed arms behind now with the Iraqi military we are working with at this time. What choice is there?

[twilight_sailing]

15. The Soviets fought Afghanistan.

We supported Afghanistan.

But we, the American Armed Forces, were not part of the fight.

We didn't "leave" anything there. We gave it to them.

[blm]

16. They also left their support equipment - I remember it quite well as I was engaged

on issues reTaliban many years before 9-11.

[sam sarrha]

3. because of the water in the 2 rivers.. irrigation.. water was the Oil of antiquity

[TexasProgresive]

4. Present day Iraq is not 5000 years old

It is a British construct put together after the fall of the Ottoman empire. The only way for Iraq to hold together is for it to be unified by threats from without and to have an iron fisted strong man at the helm. That's Saddam's Iraq.

That being said, after Desert Storm the Iraqis rebuild a lot of destroyed infrastructure despite the draconian sanctions. I remember a local Iraqi engineering firm offered to bid on rebuilding a bridge but wasn't allowed to bid-Halliburton or KBR got it as a no bid for 100 or 1000 times the Iraqi firms bid.

[Squatch]

8. Um...Iraq, as a country, is only 70+ years old

[Ms. Clio]

18. There was a culture area known as "al-Iraq" long before the modern nation-state

[enki23]

9. well, they sure as hell didn't do it peacefully

and, as others have pointed out, Iraq did no such thing.

[madokie]

10. it was fear, they knew georgie was coming sooner or later

and they really tried to stay ahead of him, but time, well it just caught up with 'em

[Big Sky Boy]

12. It was fear -- but not fear of Georgie

Historically, the only form of government that has ever worked efficiently in Babylon, Persia and now modern day Iraq is a strong monarch or dictator.

He who rules with an iron fist is able to keep a lid on dissent. Remove the lid from that pressure cooker and you pretty much have what we have today.

Bloody, ruthless and unappealing... but stable. Even Kofi Annan recently commented that he understands why many Iraqis may believe they were better off under Saddam. They may not have liked it much, but at least they didn't have to worry when their children went to school whether they would ever see them again.

[Ms. Clio]

17. oh, what a load of Orientalist bullshit n/t

[Odin2005]

20. That was a strong argument agaist Big Sky Boy's post... NOT!

:eyes:

[Ms. Clio]

21. Okay

and I should care what YOU think, why?

You don't even know what Orientalism is.

[Odin2005]

19. Yep, "Oriental Despotisms" or Hydraulic Monarchies"

Civilizations based on irrigation from rivers often ended up becoming controled by tyrants that considered the entire state and it's people as his personal property.

[Ms. Clio]

22. Yeah, that's the whole of human history, right there

asinine.

[The Stranger]

11. The government Chimp installed is a collaborator in the occupation and needs protection.

It will always be in favor of a U.S. presence because it owes its power over the rest of the Iraqis to its collaboration in the occupation of the rest of the Iraqis.

[dysfunctional press]

13. those were mostly pre-industrial times...

before petroleum had value.