Friday, April 02, 2004
Juan Cole
“Deaths of Americans in Fallujah: In revenge for Sharon's Murder of Sheikh Yassin?
There is increasing evidence that the brutal attack on the American security guards in Fallujah, and the desecration of their bodies, was the work of Islamists seeking vengeance for the Israeli murder of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. Leaflets found at the scene said the operation was in the name of Yassin. al-Hayat reports in its Friday edition that responsibility for the attack has been taken by a group called Phalanges of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. The group said the deaths were a "gift to the Palestinian people."
You put yourself in the shoes of an American military commander in Fallujah. He treats with the local clan leaders and Sunni clergy. He tries to get them on the side of the US. He faces hostility, but he is making some progress. And then Ariel Sharon sends US-made helicopter gunships to Gaza and has them fire missiles at people coming out of a mosque, killing 8 and wounding 24. One of the dead is a half-blind paraplegic Islamist named Sheikh Yassin. He could have easily been arrested, and had been in the 1990s. But he was incinerated in a piece of state terror instead. And all of a sudden the people of Fallujah in Iraq are pointing their fingers at the American troops and saying, 'you did this. You gave Sharon the green light.' And all the commander's hard work in building bridges collapses over night. And four US security personnel are dead, and 5 US troops are dead, and the fighting flares up. Thanks, Prime Minister Sharon. Thank you very much.”
The pretext for killing the Americans might have been Yassin’s killing. However, to say that this motivated them to target those Americans is just plain silly. The rebels in Fallujah have been gunning for Americans all along and had the Yassin killing not taken place they still would have been targeting them.
That said, did the Yassin killing undermine, if only somewhat, American efforts in Fallujah? Undoubtedly it did.
Switching gears, as to the so called Mogadishu effect, first let me say that people seem to misread Clinton’s motives for pulling out. As Samantha Power pointed out, the vast majority of Americans (74% if I remember correctly) supported the US continuing on in Somalia after Mogadishu and this represented an 8% spike. Seeing the bodies of dead Americans dragged through the streets, naturally enough, made many Americans blood boil and they wanted to see some “skinnies” killed in reprisal. The reason Clinton pulled out is that the optics of the operation had changed. The focus had shifted from stopping famine to the battle between Mohammed Farah Aidid’s guerrilla’s and the US. In the long term, Americans would come to question America’s reason for being involved in what was bound to be a protracted guerrilla campaign for a place that had little strategic value. What is more, there was very little upside politically. The more successful they were in defeating Aidid the more responsibilities they would have to take on and so the more tied down they would become. Where Clinton erred, politically, is that the optics of pulling out before dealing Aidid one last blow was not good.
As for Iraq, Bush obviously has to stay the course; he has too much resting on Iraq politically not to. However, Fallujah does hurt. Being able to cite polls detailing just how pleased Iraqis are to have Saddam gone and how hopeful they are about the future is nice, but polls are not tangible. http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/GoodMorningAmerica/Iraq_anniversary_poll_040314.html
People are more apt to judge the Iraqi mindset from what they see on TV and what they see is a bunch of young Iraqi males treating the bodies of American soldiers (private soldiers) like an out of control two year old treats his sister's doll and dancing around like a bunch of circus monkeys. People are certainly going to want revenge, but if this is repeated several times some are going be saying “lets get out of there. If civil war erupts, so what. A few dead Iraqis are alright with me.”
As a closing note, what Juan Cole forgot to mention is that the dehumanizing pictures coming out of Fallujah give Sharon, a la 911, the ability to strike Palestinians even harder. If the pretext for the attack is widely determined to be revenge for Yassin’s killing, the Palestinians, a la Arafat on 911 giving blood for the victims, would do well to distance themselves from the attack.
“Deaths of Americans in Fallujah: In revenge for Sharon's Murder of Sheikh Yassin?
There is increasing evidence that the brutal attack on the American security guards in Fallujah, and the desecration of their bodies, was the work of Islamists seeking vengeance for the Israeli murder of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. Leaflets found at the scene said the operation was in the name of Yassin. al-Hayat reports in its Friday edition that responsibility for the attack has been taken by a group called Phalanges of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. The group said the deaths were a "gift to the Palestinian people."
You put yourself in the shoes of an American military commander in Fallujah. He treats with the local clan leaders and Sunni clergy. He tries to get them on the side of the US. He faces hostility, but he is making some progress. And then Ariel Sharon sends US-made helicopter gunships to Gaza and has them fire missiles at people coming out of a mosque, killing 8 and wounding 24. One of the dead is a half-blind paraplegic Islamist named Sheikh Yassin. He could have easily been arrested, and had been in the 1990s. But he was incinerated in a piece of state terror instead. And all of a sudden the people of Fallujah in Iraq are pointing their fingers at the American troops and saying, 'you did this. You gave Sharon the green light.' And all the commander's hard work in building bridges collapses over night. And four US security personnel are dead, and 5 US troops are dead, and the fighting flares up. Thanks, Prime Minister Sharon. Thank you very much.”
The pretext for killing the Americans might have been Yassin’s killing. However, to say that this motivated them to target those Americans is just plain silly. The rebels in Fallujah have been gunning for Americans all along and had the Yassin killing not taken place they still would have been targeting them.
That said, did the Yassin killing undermine, if only somewhat, American efforts in Fallujah? Undoubtedly it did.
Switching gears, as to the so called Mogadishu effect, first let me say that people seem to misread Clinton’s motives for pulling out. As Samantha Power pointed out, the vast majority of Americans (74% if I remember correctly) supported the US continuing on in Somalia after Mogadishu and this represented an 8% spike. Seeing the bodies of dead Americans dragged through the streets, naturally enough, made many Americans blood boil and they wanted to see some “skinnies” killed in reprisal. The reason Clinton pulled out is that the optics of the operation had changed. The focus had shifted from stopping famine to the battle between Mohammed Farah Aidid’s guerrilla’s and the US. In the long term, Americans would come to question America’s reason for being involved in what was bound to be a protracted guerrilla campaign for a place that had little strategic value. What is more, there was very little upside politically. The more successful they were in defeating Aidid the more responsibilities they would have to take on and so the more tied down they would become. Where Clinton erred, politically, is that the optics of pulling out before dealing Aidid one last blow was not good.
As for Iraq, Bush obviously has to stay the course; he has too much resting on Iraq politically not to. However, Fallujah does hurt. Being able to cite polls detailing just how pleased Iraqis are to have Saddam gone and how hopeful they are about the future is nice, but polls are not tangible. http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/GoodMorningAmerica/Iraq_anniversary_poll_040314.html
People are more apt to judge the Iraqi mindset from what they see on TV and what they see is a bunch of young Iraqi males treating the bodies of American soldiers (private soldiers) like an out of control two year old treats his sister's doll and dancing around like a bunch of circus monkeys. People are certainly going to want revenge, but if this is repeated several times some are going be saying “lets get out of there. If civil war erupts, so what. A few dead Iraqis are alright with me.”
As a closing note, what Juan Cole forgot to mention is that the dehumanizing pictures coming out of Fallujah give Sharon, a la 911, the ability to strike Palestinians even harder. If the pretext for the attack is widely determined to be revenge for Yassin’s killing, the Palestinians, a la Arafat on 911 giving blood for the victims, would do well to distance themselves from the attack.
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