Iraq

This week's been big in announcements of Iraq-related events. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki announced 2,500 inmates would be released to help reconcile various sects within Iraq. Yesterday nearly 600 inmates of the 2,500 were released. I see this as a step forward in healing the wounds Iraq suffers from, but it won't solve the problem. You have to get to the causes of fundamentalism and extremism: people deserve better lives for what they work for; they deserve to be treated like equals and not have foreign powers coming in and telling them that they're running not just their government (which they usually don't have a hand in), but their society all wrong. And it's not just "you're doing it wrong, so we're here to help", it's "you're doing it wrong, so we'll do it for you how we see fit". It's not fair to a people to have a superpower come in and try to change the way your society functions via force. It's not fair and it doesn't work. Iron handed tactics only drive more people towards extremism: it's human nature.

The other big news is a timetable from the new Italian government, led by Prime Minister, Romano Prodi, issuing a timetable for withdrawl of Italy's troops from Iraq by the year's end. There are currently around 2,700 Italian soldiers serving in Iraq who will be returning to their homeland before the year's end. However, in my mind this raises a question: who is filling the gaps in Iraq's security arrangements? Believe me, I'm no fan of the war, and have opposed it all along on ideological and socio-political grounds, but I also don't believe that Iraq's security forces are ready to take over. In fact, I don't think Iraq's security forces really constitute any such thing right now.

I am a big believer in allowing Arab countries to assist patroling in Iraq. I say Arab countries because Turkey and Iran have too many interests in Iraq right now -- the Kurdish and Shiite situations respectively -- to act fairly in Iraq. And maybe I am wrong in that belief, maybe there are Arab countries who have similar conflicts of interest in Iraq; in fact, I know there are, but there are also many nations in the Arab League, and Arab League peacekeepers would therefore be a diverse group of international peacekeepers. Maybe allowing its neighbors -- any of them -- to police Iraq is a bad idea, but it's bound to be better than flooding the country with white soldiers from Christian nations which fundamentalists can paiunt as crusaders and target, right? Even a fully international U.N. peacekeeping mission would be better than the current situation, but any of the above proposals would require the conservative administration and Congress of America to come down off of their collective high horses about America's moral and political superiority and give up their dreams of American hegemony.

We can create a stronger, more globalized community if we work together with other nations in the best interests of the human race instead of working against everyone in the best interests of a national administration. But we'll see, maybe I'm wrong and the Iraqi security forces will ultimately turn out to be mostly competent, above corruption, and well-trained.

But I wouldn't hold my breath. Man do I get off-topic sometimes. Oh well, later guys.

Peace.