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by moomin 393 days ago
But you see, this was a bigger crime than the invasion. Because it was ideologically driven on faith, no-one was looking at the actual facts. The US military could knock over Hussein, no problem, but no-one had any plan for what happened next. No state-building, not even a plan for how the civil service was going to work. Absolutely no plan to win over hearts and minds and not create the next generation of extremists. No-one checking prisoners were treated with respect.

The Iraq invasion was wrong, but the occupation was worse.
2 comments
arp242 393 days ago
I'm just explaining what the thought process was that lead up to the invasion.

But yes, I broadly agree with you. Although I'm somewhat sceptical you can do this kind of state-building imposed from the outside in the first place though. But if you must do it, then the way the US went about it was clearly the wrong way.

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throw310822 392 days ago
> I'm just explaining what the thought process was that lead up to the invasion

Are you sure you explained the thought process, or you just explained the justifications and the propaganda in support for a plan that had different purposes? Because of course if you need to convince an entire country (including its politicians and intelligentsia) to start a war, handwaving things such as "democracy", "domino effect" and spreading fears about WMDs is an obvious strategy.

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const_cast 392 days ago
The way you do it is covertly and from afar. You need the people to think they wanted their own revolution. It's what we do today and in the past across Africa. Soft-colonialism just works better.

Turns out, if you come in with guns and start making demands the people will hate you. And you need the people. The people aren't just the dudes living in a country - they are the country.

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moomin 393 days ago
I think your scepticism is justified. Reading about Germany invasion the 1950s suggests it didn’t go massively well there. But they didn’t even try.
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amanaplanacanal 393 days ago
If I remember right, Bush ran on the idea that the US should not do nation building. So I guess he was just being true to his values? Maybe he thought Iraq would self-organize into something better.

Just another example of hubris. Then he got re-elected, which still blows my mind.

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