Newseek: Pentagon Considers "Salvador Option" in Iraq

[DanS]

No, I'm not missing the point, Ted. We don't know if there is going to be any leeway given. We don't even know if this Salvador option was discussed and immediately dismissed. The article is very vague on many scores.

Suffice it to say that the Iraqis will have to figure out a way to bring the minority to heel, or to break up the country trying. The process is already violent.

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Dan makes a good point. We really don't know what the Pentagon is considering so the author is writing an article either upon his own guess or upon other peoles' guesses. This seems to be a storm which has outpassed reality.

If it really is just the Pentagon discussing this, from the bottom up, I give them the benefit of the doubt.

However, if this is being pushed down from Defense, I am extremley skeptical.

Nowadays I prefer to error on the side of caution.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Oerdin
This seems to be a storm which has outpassed reality.

Ya think?

[Drake Tungsten]

This thread just serves to remind me of how truly sick I am of hyperbole. May it die soon...

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by DanS


Suffice it to say that the Iraqis will have to figure out a way to bring the minority to heel, or to break up the country trying. The process is already violent.

Even if you threw out the moral part of those death squads, there is not enough political capital available to do it anyway.

The very fact that even a discussion of it raises this kind of furor should be a hint of that.

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
This thread just serves to remind me of how truly sick I am of hyperbole. May it die soon...

Me too.

Like claims of weapons of mass destruction.

[Ramo]

There have been no informative posts in this thread. You must have been thinking of another thread.

This thread started out with an article based upon several layers of supposition. We have no idea about what is actually being discussed on the whole at the Pentagon, and even if we did catch a sliver of the deliberations, it's just a sliver of information from a particular point of view.

In Washington, the side that is losing an argument goes and blabs to the press to change the dynamics of the internal discussion. In the absence of better information, I'm forced to dismiss this article as entirely self-serving, even if some of the details are correct. For instance, we know that inclusioon of "sympathizers" in the target list changes the tenor of the public case entirely. Maybe this was contemplated and dismissed, but a special forces training package is being prepared that some of the Army administrators don't like. They throw "sympathizers" into the public discussion and voila.

Once again, there is some corroboration in the article:

Shahwani also said that the U.S. occupation has failed to crack the problem of broad support for the insurgency. The insurgents, he said, "are mostly in the Sunni areas where the population there, almost 200,000, is sympathetic to them." He said most Iraqi people do not actively support the insurgents or provide them with material or logistical help, but at the same time they won’t turn them in. One military source involved in the Pentagon debate agrees that this is the crux of the problem, and he suggests that new offensive operations are needed that would create a fear of aiding the insurgency. "The Sunni population is paying no price for the support it is giving to the terrorists," he said. "From their point of view, it is cost-free. We have to change that equation."

But anyway, please continue dismissing it out of hand, and insisting that this article is not "informative."

Incidentally, why do you think the Pentagon guys are calling this plan the "Salvador Option?"

[DanS]

We don't know the extent of the discussions, who was discussing what, the formality of the discussion, etc.

ncidentally, why do you think the Pentagon guys are calling this plan the "Salvador Option?"

Parse the article carefully. It doesn't say who is calling it the Salvador Option.

[Ramo]

It'd be a little hard to get the story without anonymous sources.

The guy I quoted above for instance, appears to be an advocate of the policy. If he were a critic, one would expect him not, you know, trying to justify the policy.

[techumseh]

The alternative to the "Salvador Option" was to have been "free and fair" elections. Aljazeera's take: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exer...1&idPageImage={0D1960E4-DE79-4356-A875-2183191478A2}

[DanS]

No, you're assuming that he's advocating the harshest policy. The article does not state that he supports a so-called Salvador Option.

[Ramo]

He's clearly advocating collective punishment, which is part of the "Salvador Option" (specifically, what makes it so objectionable).

[Agathon]

It's a sad fact that giving the place back to Saddam to run would probably lead to less death and dismemberment than any other course of action.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by techumseh
OK, I missed that one. Sorry. I still think mods who close threads should have the courtesy to respond to PM's.

I even posted a link to the first thread in my message.

[Chemical Ollie]

Originally posted by Agathon


The US needs an anti-fascist league. Even the Libertarians are starting to worry big time (you can tell, they've been quoting []The Nation[/i] with approval).

How about the AUAF (Apolyton Union of Anti Fascists)?

Anti-fascists are just another kind of fascists. I really mean it. We have them here in Sweden, and they are as violent as the fascists they oppose.