Wednesday, March 08, 2006
Iraq and Vietnam: two Perspectives
Iraq through the Prism of Vietnam by General William Odom, retired
Foreign Affairs: Seeing Baghdad Thinking Saigon by Stephen Biddle
One of the areas of debate between those who believe that military action in Iraq may still be successful and those who believe that we're stalemated in a pervasive quagmire is how closely the situation in Iraq resembles the war in Vietnam.
Most of these debates devolve into useless exercises of looking at some meaningless issue and showing that objectively Vietnam is like Iraq or objective it's not like Iraq. For instance, it might be interesting that Vietnam has jungles and Iraq does not, but it might not be particularly relevant. However, in the course of such debates or even seperate from such debates sometimes there are reasoned opinions on how Iraq and Vietnam either do, or don't resemble each other. In that regard I found two articles discussing Iraq in the context of Vietnam that I like. They tend to shed some light on the analysis rather than troop levels, military tactics, and population. They discuss things at the strategic level, and quite frankly they both might be right. That is, Iraq and Vietnam share some important, relevant characteristics in many instances and in many instances they may not. More important, it might be extremely important to know what those similarities and differences may be.
Retired General William Odom, former head of the NSA under Ronald Reagan, argues that Iraq and Vietnam have many similarities. Odom breaks down the conflicts into three stages and discerns that our actions in Iraq are following the same pattern of evolution that occurred in Vietnam.
Stephen Biddle is a Senior Fellow in Defense Policy at the Council on Foreign Relations. Stephen Biddle argues that there are some important differences between Vietnam and Iraq and that policy makers need to be cognizant of them and take advantage of them. So far, the existing strategy, according to Biddle, is woefully misdirected.
They're both good reads.
Foreign Affairs: Seeing Baghdad Thinking Saigon by Stephen Biddle
One of the areas of debate between those who believe that military action in Iraq may still be successful and those who believe that we're stalemated in a pervasive quagmire is how closely the situation in Iraq resembles the war in Vietnam.
Most of these debates devolve into useless exercises of looking at some meaningless issue and showing that objectively Vietnam is like Iraq or objective it's not like Iraq. For instance, it might be interesting that Vietnam has jungles and Iraq does not, but it might not be particularly relevant. However, in the course of such debates or even seperate from such debates sometimes there are reasoned opinions on how Iraq and Vietnam either do, or don't resemble each other. In that regard I found two articles discussing Iraq in the context of Vietnam that I like. They tend to shed some light on the analysis rather than troop levels, military tactics, and population. They discuss things at the strategic level, and quite frankly they both might be right. That is, Iraq and Vietnam share some important, relevant characteristics in many instances and in many instances they may not. More important, it might be extremely important to know what those similarities and differences may be.
Retired General William Odom, former head of the NSA under Ronald Reagan, argues that Iraq and Vietnam have many similarities. Odom breaks down the conflicts into three stages and discerns that our actions in Iraq are following the same pattern of evolution that occurred in Vietnam.
Stephen Biddle is a Senior Fellow in Defense Policy at the Council on Foreign Relations. Stephen Biddle argues that there are some important differences between Vietnam and Iraq and that policy makers need to be cognizant of them and take advantage of them. So far, the existing strategy, according to Biddle, is woefully misdirected.
They're both good reads.
# posted by Strange Anomaly : 3:39 PM
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I wonder why more people don't discuss the possibility of dissolving the state of Iraq and creating a Shiiteistan, Sunnistan, and Kurdistan. After all, Iraq was a construct of the British, why can't it be deconstructed? Why is it SO important that these three groups work together to make Iraq work. I think it's nearly an impossible task, and alternatives should be discussed. I understand Turkey doesn't want to see a Kurdish State, and there are probably dozens of other arguments against dissolving Iraq, but what's the alternative?
There have been discussions about partitioning Iraq into 3 seperate countries, one for the shia, one for the sunni and for the kurds. Take a look at this article which discusses a proposal in some detail. http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=1310
However, there have been various objections to such a proposal. The first objection is that a Sunni state would have very little in the way of oil resources necessary to sustain it. The oil rich regions lie in Kurdish or Shia control territory. The other major objection, which you identified is that Turkey, which has a large Kurdish population to the South, would object to the formation of a Kurdish state because it might induce the Kurds in Turkey to push for some sort of independence along the southern Turkish border.
You're right, it is hard to imagine how this will come together as a country.
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However, there have been various objections to such a proposal. The first objection is that a Sunni state would have very little in the way of oil resources necessary to sustain it. The oil rich regions lie in Kurdish or Shia control territory. The other major objection, which you identified is that Turkey, which has a large Kurdish population to the South, would object to the formation of a Kurdish state because it might induce the Kurds in Turkey to push for some sort of independence along the southern Turkish border.
You're right, it is hard to imagine how this will come together as a country.
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