What is "containment"?

[GePap]

One of the most debated things about the Iraq issue is, has containment worked with Saddam Hussein or not? The problem I see is that one of the answers given, that is has not, fails to iunderstand what containment is about.

So, what does it mean to contain? It means to keep something inside, pent up, bottled up, so forth and so on. Anyting tht does not spill out is contained, anyting that does spill out is not. Simple enough, correct? The problem now a days, of coruse, it is that the real meaning of containement has been warped.

Many people say containment of Iraq has failed. Why? Cause he has not disarmed. Seems siple enough you might say... but what does Saddam disarming have to do with containement? The US contained the Soviet Union for 40 years., and not a single time during this process did the Soviets take any step towards any sort of disarmament, in fact, they just got bigger and bigger, in terms of military capability. The US might have outpaced them but the Soviets in 1983 could do thing they could nto in 1973, and all of that while contained.

Containment is about keeping something bottled up: fundamentally, what is in the bottle is meanigless: whether the stuff is red, or blue, disarmed or not, good or evil it matters not: containement is to be measured by whether it is, or has gotten out, of the given box. Now, this may sound callous, may sound amoral, but that is what containement is, simply a strategy, a means, for dealing with an issue you have.

Containement has worked with Saddam Hussein. For 12 years he has stayed in his box, and if the situation is continued, he would stay in said box. What about his refusal to disarm, you ask? Well, that is not an issue of containment. Seeking to reform and change the regime as the ends is not an act of containment: containment would seek disarmament only as a means to ensure you can keep someone in the box. If you disarm someone enough to make them weak, or conversely, you are strongh enough and your commitment to neighbors is strong enough so that the other side will not attempt to break out of the box, then the policy of containement worked.

Now, I do not write this to convince anyone about whether to go to war or not: lord knows it won't, but next time you argue about why we have to invade, don't say "containment failed", because that is wrong. Containment worked, has worked, and for all intents and purposes will continue to work. If you want to argue that containment as a policy, being amoral and uncaring, is wrong, fine, you may have some great arguments there, but saying that containement is wrong is not that same as saying that containement does not work.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Re: What is "containment"?

Originally posted by GePap

Containement has worked with Saddam Hussein. .

If the deaths of hundreds of thousands of children is "working", that is.

[GePap]

Half the population of Iraq dying or not means nothing to whether containement works. Sanctions are not necessary to containement. Sanctions are a means of trying to force reform from the regime, which as I stated in the opening, is an aim beyond containement. As long as Iraq is dettered from ever trying to expand territorially, or undermine violently the governments of its neighbors, with or without sanctions and no flight zones, then Iraq is contained.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Ain't we all?

[PLATO]

GePap, if one has knowledge that containment is about to fail, does this change your argument? I'm not trying to imply that anyone does...just a question.

Next, if pressure inside a container continues to rise, at what point do you say that containment has failed? At the point where stress begins to deform the containment or at the point of explosive rupture?


If you were in a room where there was a containment vessel whose rupturing would kill you, you had limited knowledge of the forces inside, and had seen some evidence that the pressure was rising (perhaps not enough yet to be dangerous, but remember your knowledge is limited), would you personally feel comfotable staying in that room??

Honest answers please.

[DanS]

We know that he isn't contained because he keeps funding suicide bombers in Palestine and Israel. However, I sense that isn't sexy enough for you, so let's just say that we don't know whether we have successfully contained him or not.

(1) Just because we can't see that anything has happened yet, doesn't mean it isn't in the works. For instance, he already could have passed technical knowledge of some WOMD to terrorists. Already, he has harbored a few terrorists, and the Afghanistan camps were full of documentation on WOMD, so it doesn't seem like a big stretch here.

(2) Just because we can't find what we are supposed to have stopped him from obtaining or making, doesn't mean we have successfully stopped him from obtaining or making it. Yes, this is Rummy's "absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence."

Overall, containment assumes that the policy will be pursued evenly to its conclusion--i.e., it is sustainable. So that means that both Hussein throwing inspectors out of the country and the US/UK having 200,000 troops on his doorstep are equally not in keeping with a containment strategy. If containment assumes 200,000 US/UK troops in theater, then it's not containment, because we aren't going to keep up the pressure at those levels. Once April hits, those 200,000 troops vanish.

[GePap]

Several point:

1) DanS: containment does not need a conclusion. Containment is a strategy for dealing with an issue. As long as you feel the cost?benefit ratio of containment is better than the cost/benefit ratio of trying another strategy, you follow it. We contained the SU for 40 years. We have been doing Iraq for 12. Has the US run out of time or something? As I said, no fligth zones and sanctions are not necesary to contain Iraq. We ahve contained North Korea with 37,000 men for 50 years because those 37,00 men are a symbolic tripwire. How in the world is Iraq all of a sudden so much more powerful than North Korea that we need 200,000 men in theater indefenitelly. a efw thousand inKuwait and SA would do, to show the continued US commitment to go to war to defend them. That by itself is enough to detter Saddam. Again, disarming Saddam is a goal, but a goal that goes beyond containment. What you are talking about is regime reform, not regime containement.

2)PLATO: containement fails when the thing in the bottle breaks out, and you are unable to put it back in. If Saddam invaded Kuwait, Turkey, SA, or Jordan tommorrow, then you could say that containment failed since Iraq did not think our commitment to defend these states was enough to keep them from attacking them. Since Iraq shows no signs of doing anyting to invaded anyone. I am sure the leadership in Iraq knows that if it tries, they would loose badly (no one thinks Iraq would ever win a war: if people complain, is because they think the Us won't stay the course. That says nothing about Iraq, only speaks to the level of trust someone could place on US pledges), and thus, they don't try, even with WMD (everyone states that NK alread has a couple of nukes. Why haven't they invaded the south already? We have many more WMD's, and that is why containment works)

3) As for your annalogy, PLATO. As I said, one continues the strategy of containement as long as you think the cost benefit ratio of continuing it outweights the alternatives. If I felt that containement no longer worked with Iraq, i would support a different strategy. I don;t think at this point that the bottle of IOraq is anywhere at the stage you make it out to be, and hence I do not support a risky set of new strategies with dubious claims about their cost/benefit.

[DanS]

As I said, no fligth zones and sanctions are not necesary to contain Iraq.

How can you know this? It's just an assumption. Even with no-flight zones and sanctions, we cannot be assured that he is contained.

We ahve contained North Korea with 37,000 men for 50 years because those 37,00 men are a symbolic tripwire.

Own goal. NK is faced with 600,000 troops from South Korea as well as the 37,000 American troops. You've got to be baked if you think we are going to sustain that level of force in the Middle East.

[GePap]

We have contained NK without either, we contained the SU without these things either. What makes Saddam different?

As for the "own goal", you stated we needed 100,000 men in the gulf, which I stated was false. We don't even need 30,000 men,since Iraq is a much simple military nut to crack than NK. Everyone expects this war to be a month at best, which lead me to believe that the military power of Iraq is far less than that of North Korea, and hence why "force" is so faintly discussed when it comes to Pyiongyang. The US, before this current build up, had what? 10,000 troops in the region? That was sufficeint to detter Iraq for an entire decade, and it would be enough for many more, give the obvious difference in capabilities between our forces and theirs, growing yearly, and the fact that SA and Kuwait are far better armed today than in 1991. The only set of sanctions needed for Iraq is a ban on the importing of sophisticated weapons systems

[H Tower]

containment can also mean keeping things in. And if you say that Saddam and all the problems he creates for the world have been kept within his country, then I would have to call you a liar.

[DanS]

That was sufficeint to detter Iraq for an entire decade

Again, you make a huge honkin' assumption. Who says he has been contained? You?

Do you remember Clinton doing the same as Bush in '98, but backing off at the last minute and just bombing the sh!t out of the place? That's "containment"?

[GePap]

The problem is that so many people assume that Iraq fully disarming is vital to conatin it: that somehow an Iraq with any WMD is some wild tiger who will try invariable to control the whole ME, and that the US will be unable, for domaestic political reasons, to do anyting about it, which is why we keep having these Iraq crisis. What I pointed out int he first post, is that disarmament is not necessary for containement to work, containement meaning induring that Saddam does not invade any of his neighbors or threatens any vital Us interests. As long as the US show s afirm commitment, has some force in the region capable of hurting Saddam and wich acts as a trigger that automatically raws the US in, then containement works. That leaderships in Washington have gotten "containement" and disarmament mized up, well that's not my issue.

containment can also mean keeping things in. And if you say that Saddam and all the problems he creates for the world have been kept within his country, then I would have to call you a liar.

What probelms does he create in his own country that radiate? How many Iraqis have you seen among members of Al qaeda? Somehow, the ranks of muslim fundamentalists seem short on Iraqis. So againl please point out what troubles for the world he has created since 1991.

[DanS]

containement meaning induring that Saddam does not invade any of his neighbors or threatens any vital Us interests

Threatening vital US interests is an incredibly low bar post-9/11.

[GePap]

That, my friend, is the problem I see with this. I don't think the bar is trully lower. 19 men were able to turn 4 airliners into huge cruise missiles: that is an incredible thing to do, with horrific consequences for thousands, but that act itself, if showing us what good solid planning and imagination (and a lack or morality or compassion) can do, does not invalidate the real world. It might scare the crap out of us, but nothing more.

[PLATO]

3) As for your annalogy, PLATO. As I said, one continues the strategy of containement as long as you think the cost benefit ratio of continuing it outweights the alternatives. If I felt that containement no longer worked with Iraq, i would support a different strategy. I don;t think at this point that the bottle of IOraq is anywhere at the stage you make it out to be, and hence I do not support a risky set of new strategies with dubious claims about their cost/benefit.

How do you determine the cost benefit ratio? Containing the SU cost hundreds of billions of dollars, not to mention the opportunity costs of millions of careers. This was at the cost of saving millions or billions of lives. Good trade.

Containing Iraq will cost far more than regime change. You are talking about not only the US, but the countries in the region maintaining sizable forces for what 20-30 years (even longer if Uday comes to power). The potential for loss of life can only go up if Iraq continues to pursue WMD. Taking action now reduces the overall dollar cost and limits the potential loss of life. If it is a true cost benefit argument then I maintain this is a case for war, not against it.

What probelms does he create in his own country that radiate?

Paying families of suicide bombers. Generally contributing to the problems in the middle east and refusing to be part of the solution.

I am sure the leadership in Iraq knows that if it tries, they would loose badly

Twice in the last twenty years it has thought otherwise.

Sanctions are not necessary to containement

They are when items to build wmd are on the list. Iraq was definately building componets of wmd before sanctions.

We ahve contained North Korea with 37,000 men for 50 years because those 37,00 men are a symbolic tripwire.

Until recently, DPRK was adhering to international law as well. Now that there is a question of weather they will continue to do so has elevated this to a crisis point.