The Warden Collection (merged thread)

[AmericanPride]

However, I will argue against your ideas that sustainable democratic governance is not created through active division of the population. I believe that democracy is easier to achieve where there are bonds that hold the target population together. The idea of power sharing is easier to accept where there is not already a strong distrust. There is trust among homogenous groups. I believe that democracy is actually easier to achieve in a homogenous population than in a sectarian one. I believe the research on the matter will back me up. Again, see http://warontherocks.com/2014/05/dem...obayashi-maru/.

The "bonds" do not necessarily have to be cultural or ethnic. This is a narrative imposed on the majority on the minority to justify the exclusion of the minority from the political process. Those in power do not want to share and deliberately create filters through which to distribute power - this often comes down to ethnicity, religion, race, and so on. The power of a democratic society is not created by its homogenieity but through its plurality in which all groups (or alliance of groups) have similar levels of power and access to power. This is why successful power sharing agreements distribute power rather than separate those seeking it.

Maliki's refusal to share power is invitation by other groups to contest it. The problem is complicated because the most empowered opponents have been so radicalized by the trauma of the War in Iraq, the Arab Spring, and the War in Syria, that the two sides are light years apart in their political positions. Our policy in Iraq and Syria has more or less propelled Al Qaeda from a marginal terrorist threat to one of the most robust movements in the Middle East in decades. It was not sectarian differences that created this problem, but the many years of violence and instability by our failure to create a stable government in Iraq in 2003.

[TheCurmudgeon]

Our policy in Iraq and Syria has more or less propelled Al Qaeda from a marginal terrorist threat to one of the most robust movements in the Middle East in decades. It was not sectarian differences that created this problem, but the many years of violence and instability by our failure to create a stable government in Iraq in 2003.

I disagree in general, but this comment I find odd. The key players now, ISIS, are not AQ. They have deliberately separated themselves from that organization, which probably had it height of power in 2006 and has been on the decline ever since. I am not sure our policy (other than our occupation of traditional Islamic lands) has done much to alter that groups opinion of us.

We might have been able to create a stable government in Iraq, but it would not have been democratic. The odds against that were 1725 to 1, and estimates were that it would've taken 50 years of active support. I think it was a pipe dream that we could recreate the middle east in our own likeness. Worse, it was not even a well thought out pipe dream. It was stupidity on the highest level. A massive waste of blood and treasure. The best thing we did was leave that country. It is folly now to think that we are going to save it.

We destroyed Iraq. Humpty-Dumpty cannot be put back together again. Perhaps we only accelerated what would have happened eventually. I cannot say. But I think that better tactics in targeting or a more effective aerial bombing campaign is not going to fix the political realities on the ground.