Re: Post-Saddam Iraq?

From: Grant Callaghan (grantc4@hotmail.com)
Date: Mon 11 Nov 2002 - 16:33:26 GMT

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    >
    > > >----- Original Message -----
    > > >From: "Grant Callaghan" <grantc4@hotmail.com>
    > > With all the ail wealth in Africa, why didn't the African countries
    >rebuild
    > > Africa. South Africa managed to rebuild and Zimbabwe and Kenya. Why
    > > couldn't all the Muslim nations? It wasn't our money that was missing.
    >It
    > > was the fact that the people governing those countries did a lousy job
    >of
    >it
    > > and they found ways to fritter away the money that oil and other
    >resources
    > > brought in on wars and outright theft. How could we have prevented them
    > > from doing that?
    >
    >First of all, Africa was kolonized even the Northern Regions, like Libia
    >and Marokko. After the Europeans were gone those countries were left in
    >the hands of corrupt rulers I agree, but was the ruling of Italy better
    >than
    >!?
    >I doubt that ! Did Spain a good job in Marokko !?
    >IMO, those counties are still in transgression from authorative towards,
    >some kinds of democracies inbedded in the Islamistic religion.
    >
    >Kenya allows a lot of foreign investors, as South- Africa. Maybe you 're
    >right in saying that this have to do with religion, but than I wish to add
    >that
    >religion acts as a smothering (f)actor_ people are/ were not allowed to
    >express themselves otherwise than in ways indicated in the Koran, and
    >the former is not that keen on that !
    >We couldn 't prevent it ! Like I said above, the ways along we think
    >during centuries are that different that reaching any consensus demands
    >years of work !
    >
    > > How could we have prevented Saddam Husein from building palaces all over
    > > Iraq while he claimed his people were starving. Why isn't his oil money
    > > going to feeding and educating his people rather than maintaining the
    > > biggest army in the region? If America and Europe step in, that may
    >change.
    > > But the ony way it could have happened before was for the West to take
    > > over those countries and force a decent government on them. Something
    >the
    > > whole remainder of the world would be up in arms about as they are now
    >with
    > > Iraq and Afghanistan. You can lead a horse to water, as they say, but
    >you
    > > can't make him drink.
    >
    >Listen I am gonna make a bold statement here, if two guys could kill about
    >a
    >dozen people in a city like Washington and if the US/ the CIA is that keen
    >on removing Saddam from power why didn 't they hired a sniper and killed
    >the bastard with one shot !?
    >Oh yeah, the US was committed to rebuild Iraq !
    >There is a snag in this story !
    >
    >There is still an European/ American drive to kolonize, but instead of con-
    >quering whole nations we impose our values upon them !
    >Moreover, within the democracies all over the world differences are due,
    >not yet one culture is alike, more than one system runs underneath the
    >whole set of democracies we know today. Which one will we impose
    >on the Iraqi people !?
    >We musn 't take our model of universalism for granted !
    >
    >Kenneth
    >
    That's why I say the means we use will shape the ends we get. If we go in with guns blazing, the result will be one more quick and dirty war and the aftermath might be worse than the reality of today. We can dictate who is in charge of the country for a while, but we can't change Muslims into Democrats nor can we change the way people seek out a strong man to protect them from other strong men trying to take over their land. If they want our way of life, they can seek it. But trying to impose it on them will just get an equal and opposite reaction, as they say in physics.

    Cultural change takes time and effort on the part of people trying to change. If they don't want to change, they're not going to. We tried to impose a new culture on Iran using the Sha, but you can see how that turned out. We got that equal and opposite reaction.

    Cheers,

    Grant

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