Saddam Hussein has been captured. He was, appropriately hiding in a six-foot-deep hole in the ground. He looks like Bad Santa. Oh happy day. More links to reactions around the blogs:
Viking Pundit.
A small victory.
Tim Blair.
Jeff Jarvis.
You should read the entries previous to and after the links as well. And they have links as well -- especially Jeff Jarvis, who has links to many Iraqi blogger reactions.
And if that wasn't enough happiness for one day, I also found out that iowahawk finally drank the Koolaid and got his very own blog! Hooray! (Iowahawk's comments have leavened many comment threads on LGF, Tim Blair, and elsewhere with wit and intelligence. Hey that's a pretty good writeup on just one cup of coffee...)
Me? It's raining and chilly but I have this sudden urge to get out of the house. Laters.
Update: The word from Omar in Iraq:
It's the justice day.
I'm speechless.
I'm crying.
The tyrants' hour has finally came. I went down to the streets to share the joy with my brothers. This is our day, the day of all the oppressed and good people on earth.
Tears of joy filled the eyes of all the people.
Saddam, the coward, hides in a hole, shaking in fear from being captured.
Not a single bullet was fired, without any resistance, God, he was even cooperative! The mighty tyrant, who exploited all our country's fortune for his personal protection, surrenders like the cowered I expected him to be.
Yes, he should be prosecuted in Iraq. We will not allow anything else.
(Via Cold Fury.) I had to post this to Andrew Olmsted's* faint praise of Hesiod's cynical commentary on how this capture will allow Ba'athist terrorists to say they are now "fighting for freedom" or some such nonsense. Okay, Hesiod, I guess we should have left Saddam in his little hole, with maybe a stern lecture. Asshole. (No link to Hesiod; you can get to his spew from Olmsted's* site it you want.)
I've opened comments. Have a party.
*Spelling corrected.
I had to run around town yesterday, which in my present carless state (hinty hinty) means utilizing Orlando's fine public transportation system. The result is I am still feeling pretty wiped out, though I think that has partly to do with the fact that I think I have a sinus infection. (Unless it is that Deadly Killer Flu that is going around, yay.) Anyway, I had wanted to do at least a daily post thing on le Blog, but that isn't working out. Could it be, as this person sneers, that <SCREAM>Warbloggers</SCREAM> haven't had much to say lately because we (the Collective! You will be assimilated!) are afraid to "admit" the War Is a Failure™? Shyeah, right, you wish. (Dig Dipnut's replies in the comments and then this post.)
Apropos of this, I think that the thing that hurts antis the most re the Turkey Incident is the fact that this was how Bush was received by the troops in Iraq. For those too lazy to link, here's a sample:
Soldiers were hollering, cheering, and a lot of them were crying. There was not a dry eye at my table. When he stepped up to the cheering, I could clearly see tears running down his cheeks. It was the most surreal moment I've had in years. Not since my wedding and Aaron being born. Here was this man, our President, came all the way around the world, spending 17 hours on an airplane and landing in the most dangerous airport in the world, where a plane was shot out of the sky not six days before.
Dang. I happened to catch that scene on the teevee Evening Snooze. I know that if I was an anti I'd want to stab myself at the sight of all those soldiers cheering like mad, as opposed to the polite but cool (come on, let's admit it) reception Senator Clinton received.
Anyway, today is Pearl Harbor Day. Charles Austin has a new post up about it that you should read; Michele wonders if September 11th will be remembered the same way -- or forgotten the same way. All I can say is it would be nice if the band of psychos that currently have control of the Muslim world* could be dissuaded from their current course with less force 'n' violence than we had to use on the Japanese.
*This "band of psychos" is to be understood to consist of a small subset of the main bulk of Muslims who are, we are told, gentle, peace-loving, flower-gathering, pretty-thing-making, hobbitlike creatures or at least they are human just like you and me! I say this in a no-doubt futile effort to stave off the inevitable "Muslims Love Their Children Too" pop hit song by Sting or someone like that. Allah forbid.
Update: and here's an interview with someone who was at Pearl Harbor on that day, courtesy of the Lakeland Ledger.
Second Update: here's another commentary on Pearl Harbor/September 11th by Vicki of Liquid Courage.
PS: now, shitty as I feel, I think I'm going to have to walk to the store for some stronger cold medicine. Laters.
Say, why did we invade Iraq? After all, those people were no threat to us! For instance, the people in these mass graves talked about here: they certainly weren't threatening us. Troops out of Iraq now!
(Via VodkaPundit.)
Oh -- and by the way, this post was an example of sarcasm. I have inserted this disclaimer on the advice (gleaned from Stephen Green's comment thread) of James Lileks. as a further enhancement to the cause of spreading understanding to all the idiots Concerned Readers™ out there, I will also say that Stephen Green's post meets with 100% Speenville Approval.
Zeyad has a few things to tell you.
Update: and here's a new Iraqi blogger, Alaa, who was inspired by Zeyad's blog to start one of his own.
The Angry Left is stuck in the MAD era. What a sad place that is to be. No wonder so many of them seem to have learned their political philosophy from watching Frankie Goes to Hollywood's "Two Tribes" video. ("Puppets! Puppets will get the people on our side!")
Before I start posting my oppressive, fascist opinions I have to run off to the store for some necessities. In the meantime, read this column by Jake Ryan, who was injured in last year's terrorist attack on Australians (and anyone else near them) in Bali. Then ask yourself (if you are one of the doubters) if there is any other way to stop terrorism than, well, stopping terrorists. (Via Tim Blair.)
In this article on the so-called "neoconservative cabal," Joshua Muravchik reminds us of the way we were, and why it changed:
But this brings us back at last to the question of the neocons' alleged current influence. How did their ideas gain such currency? Did they "hijack" Bush's foreign policy, right out from under his nose and the noses of Richard Cheney, Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld, and Condoleezza Rice--all members of the same team that, to hear the standard liberal version, was itself so diabolically clever that in the 2000 election it had stolen the presidency itself?The answer is to be found not in conspiracy theories but in the terrorist outrage of September 11, 2001. Though it constituted a watershed in American history, this event was novel not in kind but only in scale. For roughly 30 years, Middle Eastern terrorists had been murdering Americans in embassies, barracks, airplanes, and ships--even, once before, in the World Trade Center. Except for a few criminal prosecutions and the lobbing of a few mostly symbolic shells, the U.S. response had been inert. Even under President Reagan, Americans fled in the wake of the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut, then the largest single attack we had suffered.
Terrorism, we were told, was an accepted way of doing politics in the Middle East. More than a handful of the regions governments openly supported it, and the PLO, an outfit steeped in terror, was the poster child of the Arab cause. Any strong response to this scourge would serve only to make the people of the region angrier at us, and generate still more terrorists.
On September 11, we learned in the most dreadful way that terrorists would not be appeased by our diffidence; quite the contrary. We saw--they themselves told us--that they intended to go on murdering us in ever larger numbers as long as they could. A sharp change of course was required, and the neoconservatives, who had been warning for years that terror must not be appeased, stood vindicated--much as, more grandly, Churchill was vindicated by Hitler's depredations after Munich.
(Via Damian Penny.)
Frank of IMAO has a very good idea on a way to counteract all the negative "news" the prop media is emitting about doings in Iraq.
It's too high if these people are the ones who have to be abandoned. It makes me furious to read whine after whine from anti-war fools who claim that we never should have invaded Iraq. There are a lot of "never shoulds" when it comes to US doings with Iraq, but this particular invasion isn't one of them. But the antiwar contingent isn't really interested in Iraq or its people; they are too obsessed with their ridiculous, one-sided battle with a president they hate because (fill in the blank with some stupid, trivial reason). The Iraqi people and what they want matter not at all to the peace-at-any-price crew; in fact, happy, prosperous Iraqis give them one less victim to use as a prop for their bloated egos.
No, I don't much like pacifists these days. It's real easy to sit there on your ass and piously proclaim your disapproval of nasssty, dirty war and violence. Making speeches and forming Committees to Frown Sternly at Naughty Dictators are much easier than actually going into the places where the naughty dictators are; you don't have to get your hands dirty, and the press loves you because they get free coffee and donuts, and don't have to get shot at. Freedom of speech isn't a substitute for the necessity of action, but you won't hear that from the moralizers preaching on the sidelines.
Article via Random Jottings.
Concerning this story about a US Army Muslim chaplain being detained for possible spying:
Yee left the Army for Syria, where he received religious training. He returned to the U.S. military soon after.
(I also commented further here.)
Update: via Kathy Kinslet, this article in the Washington Post, which has further details Yee's conversion to Islam:
He converted to Islam about the time he served a stint in Saudi Arabia after the Persian Gulf War. After quitting the military, he spent four years studying Islam in Damascus, Syria, and returned to the United States a trained imam.
And we know what sort of Islam is practiced in Saudi Arabia. It's getting more and more difficult to ignore that imam behind the curtain...
These US Army veterans have made this kind offer to our Islamofascist friends.
(Via Apostablog.)
Meryl Yourish fact-checks Reuter's ass. Again.
What is this all this moaning about how "graphic," and "shocking" and "disturbing" the photos of the people falling off the World Trade Center are, and how we "shouldn't show these images" on teevee or on the internet or anywhere, because it is all somehow "too upsetting." What utter b.s. I don't remember all this fussing and fuming last year. Why is it suddenly too disturbing now?
Bjørn Stærk on the tendency by many Europeans to ignore or downplay the terrorist threat in their own countries in favor of trendy anti-Americanism:
Part of the problem is the investment we've made in the idea that the Americans had it coming, or at least are only making the problem worse by fighting back. This makes it even more difficult to swallow that we too are targets. The implications are too shattering for our worldview, so we take the easy way out, and downplay the danger. The terrorists will be more than willing to allow us this illusion - up to the very moment they strike.
Yup.
Well. Instead of saying anything about September 11th I ended up not saying anything at all. Except.... I'd like to thank Greg Hlatky for posting the quote that is now featured in my header. I think I used to have it up there, but I had forgotten about it.
And here is this from Richard Bennett's entry today about his memories of that day:
I've seen a lot of the world outside the United States, living in Libya as a child and in India, Singapore, and Malaysia as an adult, and I've seen a lot of politics as a former lobbyist in Sacramento, but this was beyond politics. It was also beyond the usual goofy fanaticism of the Muslim religion with its call to prayer five times a day, its strict dietary rules, its fear of women and its maniac fasting month when people sit on the curbs in Malaysia with bags of fruit juice in their hands waiting for the Imam's call to break their fast at the official sunset. This was insanity and a viciousness that breaks all the human boundaries around conflict and war and aggression. This was a direct attack on perfectly innocent people who had no stake in the governance of the Middle East, no responsibility for the backward condition of Arab states shackled to outmoded values by corrupt mullahs and political leaders mis-educated in Western universities suffering under the burden of fashionable ideas long ago and no interest in oppressing their counterparts halfway around the planet. This was beyond all of that, a new standard of bad behavior that could only be captured in old-fashioned words like "evil".
Yes.
Update: what marc said, especially this:
I may not entirely like the way the war is being fought, but there is a war going on. One declared upon us. You can pretend it isn't or doesn't have to be there, but don't give me a surprised look should the gun ever come to your head. The choice is not between fighting this war the way it is being fought now or walking away. The war will be waged by them whether we fight back or not. The division of with us or with the terrorists was not made by the President, merely acknowledged. The terrorists are the ones who divided up this world. So you're damned right I'm going to be angry. I'm angry that I've been marked for death along with everyone else in this world. Not subjugation, but death. I'm angry that when they attack, my death is the goal, not an unfortunate part of getting their target. I'm angry that I am that target, not because I'm special or that my name is on some list, but because I exist. I'm angry that should these people manage to kill me, someone else they want dead will shake their head and try to blame me in the shameful hope that their tsk-tsking somehow protects them.
Apparently there was some sort of PBS show on the World Trade Center, that was stuffed with useless commentary from the usual pack of fools. In her commentary on the piece, Sheila says some very wise things about the value of anger. Sample:
We need to remember. Not to dwell, not to sink into victimhood, cherishing our wounds. No. We need to remember, because we will need our anger to get through the tough times ahead. We will need to remember what was done to us, in order to face the challenges. Are we up to it?
Read the whole thing. (Via Give War a Chance.)
Once again, the rumor (long debunked) that Bin Laden family members were ferried "secretly" out of the country while the post-September 11th flight ban was still on is oozing back into the light, here, and in the comments here. This really pisses me off.
You know, it hasn't been even two years. They are still burying people killed in the attacks -- or at least burying what they can of them. Another videotape of planes going into the Towers has surfaced. It is still clear, at least to me, that Americans had war declared openly on them by power-hungry totalitarian fanatics, and we can't afford to go back to our previous stance of "Oh, they are just blowing off steam, ignore them, they are only foreigners." But some people would rather focus their rage on the victim, because that victim was us. This stance of -- I don't know what to call them, blame-the-victimers? -- reminds me of the attitude of wife-beaters towards the spouses they have just battered: "It's your fault, you made me angry. I wouldn't hurt you if you didn't make me angry."
Ilyka Damen is tired of seeing/hearing/reading the same old idiot arguments, and is suffering from a case of Blogger's Burnout. So am I, which is why I haven't been posting much lately. Yesterday's headline in the Orlando Sentinel concerning the terrorist bombings in Baghdad and Jerusalem were almost as large as the ones for (I think -- I never was able to get my hands on a copy of that day's edition) those for World Trade Center attack front page articles. All I could muster up was the thought: "Gee, didn't know they cared so much," and weak irritation at the usual whinings about how this will mess up the "road map" -- which I believe refers to the latest appeasement peace plan, not AAA's newest Middle East travel edition. Whatever. Palestinian pals, Castro cuddlers, Saddamite sycophants, Islamist loon lovers -- it is pointless to argue with them, and by now you know what I think of the lot. (If you don't, consult the archives.)
Via the comments to this post, a news report on the capture of an Iraqi general -- by a soldier named Heather. You don't mess with Heathers, man.
Don't mess with a man who knows how to make an outline. Steven Den Beste has the plan. (This also heralds the return of that Hesiod Theogeny (sic) guy. Hadn't heard from him in a while. Oh joy.)
To continue: this assessment of the War on Terror's "root causes" and goals will strike those people who think in terms of Big Bully USA vs. Small, Weak, Helpless (if Terrorist-Harboring) Nations as lacking in elements conducive to feelings of warm fuzziness, but such is life.
David at Cronaca comments on reports that British forces in Iraq, whose "friendly" cloth caps and lack of "intimidating" body armor had been contrasted favorably with the scary, brutish American forces, have been taking casualties. He is wondering when the anti-flak-jacket folks are going to make note of this unpleasant side effect of dropping your guard in a war zone. Well, let's listen:
Crickets chirping.
Oh well, I'm sure they are busy typing up retractions. Yeah.
The Marsh Arabs are reclaiming their land:
HAWR AL HAMMAR, Iraq -- It's 100 degrees at noon, the hour when the sky itself seems to melt into chrome-colored lakes--rippling pools that shimmer like mirrors in the vast salt pans of southern Iraq. These days, however, those liquid sheets of light are no mirage. They are real water--and one of the most poignant symbols of liberation since the fall of Saddam Hussein.
"This will bring back the fish, the birds and the animals," said Jawad Mutashir, a grizzled Marsh Arab who came to watch, for the pure joy of it, water from the Euphrates River gurgling back into the long-dead swamp that had been his ancestral home.
Bands of impoverished villagers upstream had cut the levees that Hussein built expressly to destroy Iraq's sprawling wetlands. Unshackled for the first time in years, the Tigris and Euphrates rivers were now refilling thousands of acres of dry marsh.
"Thanks be to Allah for giving our water back!" declared grinning old Mutashir, one of thousands of nomads displaced by Hussein's cataclysmic reclamation projects. His dingy robes flapping about him, he hugged himself with his scrawny arms and added, "Thanks be to George Bush!"
More than two months after Baghdad fell to coalition troops, an extraordinary act of cultural defiance is unfolding almost unnoticed on the burning plains of southern Iraq.
I'm sure someone somewhere will spin this to say that the Bush Junta™ is really doing some dastardly thing by allowing this to happen (all those poisons Rumsfeld sold to Saddam Hussein are going to leach into the marshes and turn all the Marsh Arabs into three-eyed mutants!). Or else the critics will say that Bush is cursing at the happiness of the Arabs there and trying to come up with ways to cover the marshes with Ooooiiilllll.
(Via Instapundit.)
Salam Pax has new stuff up. Interesting. (Blowspot™ is working today. Visit while you can.)
Via Jeff Jarvis.
Oh look -- it seems that Saddam-offspring Uday has surfaced, sorta, and wants to cut a deal. See, he's afraid (in traditional spawn-of-evil-leader fashion) of his own people getting hold of him. But gosh, we don't seem to be too interested. I'm afraid that this time my atom-sized violin doesn't want to be bothered to play a sad tune for his plight. (Via Lt. Smash.)
In this post I expressed my ire at what some of the Balinese widows of last year's terrorist attack on their island were being put through. But there is good news -- they have some help. Read the last comment in the post and check out AdoptA.
Concerning the discussion of what sort of music to "break" Iraqi POWs, I think that we shouldn't try soppy pop music that makes the normal red-blooded American sick to his or her stomach. In my admittedly limited experience (one trip to Europe, watching those European music awards shows on cable teevee, going to Vietnamese restaurants here in Orlando, seeing those endless commercials for the inexplicably beloved Nana Moskouri's "hit songs" collections) the Whole Rest of the World has a bottomless appetite for soppy pop music (such as the songs in this list, especially ones like "Sometimes When We Touch.") I'd try some Death Metal instead -- maybe some Cannibal Corpse or Malevolent Creation. Yes, those are real bands.
I forgot to add: the year I went to Europe (1981) there was no excape in any country I went to from ABBA's "Fernando" (the last on Iowahawk's list). Everywhere we went that song was playing on some loudspeaker system somewhere. Even Scotland.
The recent World War II Remembrance Day ceremonies in the Netherlands were disrupted and desecrated by Moroccan youths. Here's a portion of an account by Peaktalk on these incidents:
I wanted to share this with you as Dutch newspapers last week reported that Moroccan youths had disturbed a number of these ceremonies throughout the country earlier this week. In one instance by throwing eggs onto participants and in another by playing football with the wreaths. The absolute bottom was reached when during the ceremony in one of Amsterdam’s suburbs a number of these youths shouted “we must kill the Jews”. This under any circumstance is a grieving and depraved comment, but to shout it out in a city from which 100,000 Jews disappeared never to return during the most sensitive of commemorations is beyond belief and it was no doubt perpetrated on purpose. I am not writing this as yet another piece seeking to provide further evidence of the ever growing levels of anti-Semitism Europe, although that would certainly warrant a post on this site. What happened last week goes well beyond anti-Semitism.
Via Dilacerator, who says incidents like these are being covered up.
The American Imperial Cultural Hegemon continues its invasion of the pristine sands of the Middle East! Oh the humanity! When will it end, when????
Concerning the recent bombings in Morocco, I have been reading here and there (most recently in the comments to this post) some expressions of astonishment that Belgian interests were apparently among those targeted, since Belgium is currently pursuing efforts to set up some sort of international kangaroo court with which to try upstart Americans "war criminals" like General Franks. Of course this astonishment has a sarcastic edge; I don't think that many people, at least on the pro-war-against-terrorists side, are really surprised that Al Qaeda & Co. are not telegraphing their attacks according to who is currently attempting to appease them, or whatever it is the Belgian contingent thinks it is doing with its "antiwar" posturing. At the risk of repeating myself, these terrorists are Arab supremacists, and they care not a whit for the good opinions and peace offerings of Western infidels. If such antics momentarily give their cause a boost by diverting American/allied efforts against them they are fine with that, but it makes no difference to them in the long run, because as far as the terrorists are concerned we are all worm food. And they just might put their "appeasers" up against the wall first, just on general principles. No one, even evil sons of nazis, likes people who betray their own.
This isn't deep wisdom: I figured all that out about five minutes after the World Trade Center was attacked. I'm not going to make any claim to being a Big Brain either: I garnered my deep wisdom by sitting on my ass reading mostly junk like science fiction and fantasy, watching crap movies on tv, and occasionally talking to my fellow clueless humans. I am not particularly well-traveled: I've been to Europe exactly once, over twenty years ago. I learned that they sure do love soppy pop music there, and everything is uphill except in the Netherlands. I've been to college -- in the parlance, I have "some college" education. I may never finish, because there is one thing I now know and that is that you don't go to college to get educated. Maybe that is why all these eggheads with their PhDs in PoliSci and Sociology are so solid between the ears about this little Islamofascist problem: they actually thought they were learning something while they were being filled up with the latest kewl theories. Then again, I could be wrong. Maybe all the terrorists want is a hug.
It was in Morocco this time -- in Casablanca. That's ironic, in a way. I just happened to catch the story on CNN when I came in and turned the tv on. The Arabs are pissed -- at Al Qaeda & Co. The Islamofascisti continue to shoot off their own feet, dig their own grave, hoist themselves by their own petard, and so on.
They were just yammering on CNN or something about the recent terrorist attacks in Riyadh. Jesus, who cares what the group that did it calls themselves? Let's just drop all this "was it Al Qaeda? Or some other (insert some Arabic phrase)?" nonsense and call them something generic, like "the usual bunch of cretins." And their motives are no big mystery; I am sure I know why the cretins blew up stuff in Saudi Arabia this time. They want to get rid of all the Westerners there, and then all the rest of the foreigners, Muslim though all those Indians and Indonesians and Malaysians might be. The Usual Bunch of Cretins are Arab supremacists just like the Nazis were "Aryan" supremacists. They are just another flavor of terror pie, like Bin Laden and his Taliban crew, and that joker we just kicked out of Iraq. It's all from the same shelf of fly-specked, half-baked goods.
Despite his reputation in certain quarters as some sort of rightwing ranter, Glenn Reynolds rarely seems to get really mad. Here's a rare example of anger from the Instapundit:
HERE'S THE LATEST on jailed Iranian blogger Sina Motallebi. He's accused of selling "depraved" videos -- of weddings.
Note to Iranian mullahs: you're utterly pathetic. You are neither feared, nor respected for your piety. You're just a joke, in the eyes of the world and, these days, your own people.
Go to the link in the quote and you'll see his anger is more than justified. Stupid mullahs.
Years of Pain, And the Words To Describe It -- Hidden Writings Portray Life as Enemy of Hussein:
But now Hussein was gone and Samarrai's manuscripts were in full view. They spilled from manila folders piled high on wooden shelves where space had been cleared for their welcome. When Basra fell to British forces on April 7, Samarrai felt safe enough to thumb through an entire work without fear. When the Baghdad government collapsed two days later, he saw what looked like deliverance and reunited his works in plain sight.
(Via Random Jottings.)
I was thinking about WMDs (no -- really!) and then this post at Mr. Helpful's blog caused some of the random thoughts I had coalesce into something more or less coherent, considering my lack of expertise in this area and in all areas military, strategic, and political. Well, I guess that is why he is Mr. Helpful.
Like many people, Mr. Helpful is antsy about the US finding the big bombs and stuff. But -- I am not going to go on here about the size of the country and so forth -- it has been done to death. On the other hand, I think a lot of people are losing sight of the fact that this war was touted as a "pre-emptive" war. In fact, that was one of the real big bitches against it. "'Pre-emptive'!" a lot of critics shrieked. "Who does Dubya think he is -- God? Our parents?" That second criteria being even more evil than the first. But I am getting off the track here.
The idea that we were invading Iraq to prevent Saddam from developing/assembling an arsenal of weapons of mass destruction that he was specifically directed not to do by the sacred overlords of the United Nations (whom everyone pays lipservice to but no one obeys) was one of the criticisms against the war -- the idea that it was presumptuous, that we had no right, and so on. I am not going to go into the social ramifications of that attitude tonight. I am going to address the idea that the critics (I'd call them the antiwar contingent, but they are not all of that, nor are they wholly of the left) have now dropped that idea -- a sensible tactic, since the invasion is now a moot point -- and are now into the idea that we must now find WMDs inside Iraq to justify the war. I have actually even seen it postulated (see the comments) that the lack of such WMDs are grounds of impeachment of President Bush. Of course that idea is laughable on its face.
But to find WMDs -- there is the rub. Where are we to begin? Hussein had a whole country, of some size, to play with, for at least a dozen years. In Mr. Helpful's comments I said (in some less detail) that if I were an Evil Overlord like Saddam Hussein, and my most hated enemy was simultaneously massing armed forces off my borders while talking the aggressive talk to the world concerning moi (l'état, c'est moi), and had I already had assembled at least a small arsenal -- even one nuclear warhead -- of WMDs, I would not have pussyfooted around and waited and played with Hans Blix's head the way he did. Rather, I would have wasted no time in launching a warhead containing some deadly agent -- plutonium, smallpox, poisonous gas, whatever -- at some nearby place; Kuwait, most likely. (And before any of you even think of dragging out that old dead horse about Arab solidarity or any such nonsense please remember that Saddam Hussein has shown no more compassion or caring for his fellow actual Arab brother than he has for the Kurdish women and children he had gassed just so he could make sure his human spray killed people dead like the label said. He was in all ways a traditional Arab chieftain -- a thug to whom his underlings were no more than cannon fodder when the chips were down, up, or in a drawer.)
If I were an Evil Overlord like Saddam, I'd have nuked Kuwait City the moment I heard the war talk start. Saddam was delusional and evil, but he wasn't entirely stupid. He knew as well as I, a part-time auto insurance agent, that once you showed the world that you have the Bomb, you were guaranteed the kid glove treatment for life. Look at North Korea.
So no, I don't think we are going to find any WMDs. I think that we are going to find parts of WMDs. I think that we are going to find a stash of cesium some-number here, a crate of vials of anthrax there. I think we are going to find "baby milk" factories with warehouses full of mysterious metal tubes that are rather larger than even elephant baby bottles; I think that we are going to find caves with partly assembled rocket launchers that were only missing the pertinent part to be completed. And that is going to be only the tip of the iceberg. And we will find that certain countries (whose names begin with F, G, and R) were in it up to their elbows. In fact, I think that we have started to find these things out, but that they are being kept until a really devastating dossier of evidence has been developed. That seems to be the Dubya methodology.
I will say this. I think that the UN inspector shenanigans helped somewhat. I think that all that nonsense distracted Hussein enough, and scared enough potential sellers of deadly shtuff, that he was prevented from realizing his wet dream of building a nuclear weapon. (I think he fell back on poison gas as a sloppy second, but the big bangflash nukes were his one true desire.) So I think they were useful idiots in this endeavor. Or were they? Sometimes I wonder if UN incompetence and intransigence is entirely the truth of the matter. Maybe all of this -- the posturing of Chirac, the UN's maneuverings, the blatherings of Schroeder (anyone else have visions of some short blond kid at the piano every time his name is mentioned?), the treachery and the buffoonery -- was all an elaborate ruse, a ruse pulled on Saddam Hussein. Then again, I am not so sure pols are that smart -- my intellectual (now there's a word I'd like to steal back, if I wasn't so sure it wasn't as gutted as a Honda Prelude that's been in the chop shop for a month) side rises up against the notion that there wasn't a lot of dumb luck on our side this time, and we just happened to catch the Euroleaders and the Arabs in a particularly stupid part of their career.
Some people have taken the president to task for his plane-flying stunt. From the tenor of the remarks I sense some vestiges of the "liberal" attitude that the military is, in a sense, something to be looked askance at. I did not say that these guys are anti-military, merely that the anti-military attitude that has poisoned the country since the sixties has colored their perception of this event. Here is a quote that may change their minds, or at least remind them of something that they may have forgotten or discounted in their worries that the president's actions were too "third world" (to whom I wonder?).
As for myself, I ignored the whole thing until it was safely over, because I am a big worrywart and I was afraid something would go wrong and there would be a disaster and I could not stand the thought of the media orgy of hysteria that would ensue. It was bad enough when that Kennedy sprog crashed his plane in the ocean. And when Reagan got shot (and not even killed)? Don't remind me.
Bleeding Brain has a solution to the Belgians and their support (or coercion) of some Iraqis' little "putting General Franks on trial for warcrimes" game:
The carpet bombing of Brussels followed by the carpet re-bombing of Brussels and finally, a targeted bombing of Brussels to knock down any stubborn spires that remain standing.
Sounds good to me. I've already been there, and my dad went about three years later. When I was there, everything was the fuck closed because of some Saint Wipe-Arse day (it was Tuesday). When my dad went, again everything was closed because of some Saint Wipe-Arse day. And then they lost his luggage on the train from Brussels or Antwerp or wherever the hell it was, so he had to arrive in Copenhagen (or wherever, some other Euro-ville) stinky and wrinkled. Blow 'em off the map if they squeak.
(Via Acidman. There, I'm reading!)
I'm late getting to this (thank Steve H. for pointing the way for me): Tobacco Road Fogey has an entry about the looting, and why, due to the other strategically important venues surrounding it, the museum wasn't exactly top priority.
No, I will not stop harping on this.
Uday Hussein liked to play around with a real iron maiden. (Side note: hmm... I wonder if this revelation was why one of the area rock stations was playing "Number of the Beast" last night.)
Via Tim Blair.
This is the most detailed answer I've come across so far:
The Americans have a ready answer. “We were fighting the whole time,” Captain Jason Conroy said, wiping his brow as he guarded the museum gate. “For four days we were taking machinegun-fire and rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) from these buildings around here. They had a bunker around the back of the museum with a cache of RPGs. Guys were running out of that alley, firing Kalashnikovs at us.When we shot them, they threw out hooks, dragged the bodies and guns back and came at us again.”
After four days of intense street battles with Saddam’s Fedayin and Special Republican Guards, Captain Conroy said, his company of Abrams tanks and armoured vehicles was ordered north on April 15 to destroy an anti-aircraft gun.
“When we got back the next day, everything was already on fire here and the press were here asking us: ‘How come you weren’t in the museum three days ago?’ I said: ‘If you guys had been here three days ago, you would know why.’”
This won't be enough for people, though, who think that the US military is possessed of supernatural powers that they refuse to use simply out of sheer meanness.
(Via The Ghost of a Flea.)
I like this post on Random Jottings, especially this passage referring to the sniping and the backbiting and so forth engaged in by the "left" or whatever the anti-change, pro-status-quo contingent is to be called these days:
I've been totally disgusted by the way lefties have pounced on any mistake or hesitation by our forces, without even a pretense of making "constructive criticism," or a pretense of feeling joy and pride for the liberation of Iraq. But really the situation is like that optical illusion where you squint and the goblet turns into two faces. I should be feeling sorry for those poor pathetic goops. Their poverty is so patent. They are like hungry dogs under a banquet table, snapping at any crumbs that fall. They have no plans, no visions, no dreams, and not the least inclination to do anything positive or creative. All they can do is watch the magician perform, and hope that he drops the ball, or fails to find a rabbit in his hat.
[INSTAPUNDIT VOICE] Indeed. [/INSTAPUNDIT VOICE]
Update: Example No. 1. Example No. 2.
This will break many hearts: U.S. troops cringe as they crush classic cars in Iraq:
Dozens of classic cars owned by Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and other Baath Party leaders were among the choicest selections for looters in Baghdad. But U.S. concerns that the cars could be used in suicide bombings or roadblocks has resulted in orders to have them destroyed.
..................
The decision to destroy the cars was a painful one for many soldiers.
"I love cars. It was hard to see a Bel Air destroyed," said Pfc. Raul Carbajal, a 20-year-old from Chicago.
I am waiting for the first article or comment from someone comparing this destruction and the emotional response of the soldiers to it to the American (but not that of British or Australian or any other coalition members) "callousness" towards the Iraqi's destruction of their own museums and libraries. Feel free to post a link if you come upon one.
(Via Colby Cosh.)
Rachel Lucas links to a story that she says people against this war should read. Yes, they should read it. I wonder what excuses they will come up with to make the Bad Reality Stuff go away then. Well. I'm sure they'll think of something. But I can't.
We have finally got our hands on notorious Palestinian terrorist Abu Abbas. Guess where we found him? Oh, but there are no ties between terrorist groups and Iraq...
I like Tim Blair's suggestion of what to do with him. But I would add sharks.
Michele is tying all her posts on this together. She also links to this post (for April 14th, 11:58pm -- you know, Blogspot). And I have found some pictures of the missing treasures. They are certainly very pretty and obviously important pieces of work, and if they were left in glass cases or even in vaults in the museum where people could get at them then I am the Queen of Thailand. Of course, I could be wrong, but I don't think so. As we have already seen, there are people who would put precious antiquities (especially pretty ones made of gold) before anything else, and I don't think they are all on this side of the globe.
Update: Instapundit has a link to this excerpt from Kanan Makiya's war diary. He's in Kuwait, talking by satellite phone to some friends in Baghdad:
One friend told me that the looting of the National Museum--something that cut deeply into me--was the work of newly deposed Baathist officials, who had been selling off our patrimony as they saw their days were numbered. As the regime fell, these (ex-)Baathists went back for one last swindle, and took with them treasures that dated back 9,000 years, to the Sumerians and the Babylonians. One final crime perpetrated by Saddam's thugs.
Interesting.
For a more level-headed discussion on the looting of the museum in Baghdad, go here. Dr. Weevil links to this very useful site, which has some more details:
halls with still-intact display cases (objects removed for safekeeping before the war started); the big orthostats and lamassus still there with their protective sandbags; some objects were taken to a safe haven under the supervision of US troops shortly after their arrival in Baghdad on Wednesday.
It looks as if the hand-wringers and civilization-mourners were a little premature. But I am sure that it is still too soon to know what really went on. And I am sure that there will be no letup in the condemnation of Bush and the coalition forces for not making the place a top priority.
That being said, I'll say another thing. The discussion elsewhere seems to have bogged down in a round-robin game of What's More Important, live people or dead artifacts? I have played the game as well, but it's a diversion from the crux of the topic, which is: has anyone noticed the curious fact that no one seems to have entertained the notion that American troops (and, by proxy, the other members of the coalition forces) would even think of looting the place themselves? Throughout history, conquering nations have looted the places they conquered. But that is not what is happening here. Instead of the coalition forces being the looters, the country's own citizenry is doing the looting. But I haven't heard that used as a point of praise for our forces, or even for modern Western civilization in general. It's as if it was not only expected of us to act that way, but as if it wasn't even worth mentioning, like breathing. That's nice, and says scads about us as human beings -- but it also hints that we are taking ourselves too much for granted and not giving ourselves credit. Too much self-effacement can tip over into a kind of proud refusal to admit to the possibility that we can be weak. That can't be a good thing.
Update: looks as if I was wrong -- this insane article, entitled Was Saddam Right? Are Americans the New Mongols of the Mideast?, makes this claim:
[...]like the Mongols,