Alternative Iraq

[muckefuck]

In his journal, fengi laments the dearth of mentions of the War in Iraq on this, the tenth anniversary of its commencement. I was going to let it slide because, frankly, I don't have anything interesting to say about it, and I doubt the majority of my flist do either. Most of the commentary I have seen is rather light on content, or focuses on the stateside effects of the war.

But there is one thing about which I wonder what opinions people have and that is: What do you think Iraq would look like today if the US and its allies had not invaded a decade ago? Who would be in power and with what sort of legitimacy? What would its domestic situation and foreign relations look like, who would be better off and who would be worse?

If someone has links to informed articles addressing this (whether you agree with their conclusions or not) please share them.

Comments

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

I can find almost nothing to agree with in that opinion piece, particularly this paragraph:

For a start, many tens of thousands of ordinary Iraqis would still be alive, as would several thousand troops from the coalition countries. The terrorists born from the resulting anger and grief would not be about their deadly work. Indeed, without the oxygen of Iraq feeding their bitter fires and with the US and more western allies having focused on Afghanistan and the border regions with Pakistan, al-Qaida may be clinging to diminishing relevance in those barren hills. Muslims worldwide would not have been provoked to take a stand against all things western. America would not have sacrificed its principles relating to torture and the Geneva convention, and may not have lost its diplomatic credibility.

The sentence "Muslims worldwide would not have been provoked to take a stand against all things western" packs so many fallacies into one short statement that I can hardly even begin to extract them all.

I also love his touching faith that America would otherwise never have "sacrificed its principles relating to torture". Where exactly does he think the prisoners in Gitmo came from?