The Complexity of Conflict and Suffering in the Middle East

[Dialectic]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Rjusjxu0GI&mode=related&search=

[Dialectic]

The important idea Wilber brings up here is that we not only have cultures and religions at war in this area, but that within those cultures and religions, we have three or four distinct phases of consciousness also battling for supremacy.

He cites Samuel Huntington's "Clash of Civilizations" when discussing the civilization blocks themselves. Keeping in mind that Huntington wrote largely from an ethnocentric conservative-republican stance, his analysis is nonetheless very, very useful.

In his book, he identifies nine major civilization blocks (his analysis focuses on the lower-left quadrant of intersubjective culture): Western, Latin American, African, Islamic, Sinic, Hindu, Orthodox, Buddhist, and Japanese. Regardless of whether we agree with exactly how he slices the pie, it's important to recognize that finding a way to meaningfully slice the pie is important, and this is as good a place to start as any.

So in the Middle East, we have three primary civilization blocks in conflict: Western, Islamic, and Orthodox, with probably minor African, Hindu, and Sinic presences as well.

What we also have, however, is major Red, Blue, and Orange structures of consciousness (in SD speak), or we can just say levels 3, 4, and 5: feudal/ power orientation, ethnocentric/ mythic membership, and rational/ capitalist/ realpolitik. There is also a growing Green/ level 6 presence, which enjoys discussing human rights, tolerance, pluralism, and justice, complicating things further.

You can very clearly see that there is no way any sort of stable federal/ democratic peace could be established in this mess. Level 3 warlords vie for power all over the country, and most militias are loyal only to particular sects and leaders. Level 4 religious authorities would love nothing more than to rule via Sharia law, and other ideas be damned (literally, in their minds), and Level 5 political, capitalist, and military presences are busy exploiting the entire place for all the resources it's worth. On top of this, Level 6 human rights groups are busy shouting at everyone to get along, treat everyone as brothers and sisters, and obey the law, which is completely useless.

The only "solution" I can see at this point, which is what should have been done at the beginning anyway once the decision was made to invade, is to bring in massively overwhelming, crushing military presence to put down, well, everyone. (This is what the neocons said they were going to do, and what Colin Powell definitely wanted to do, given that the decision had been made, and they somehow completely fucked it up, for reasons beyond me, seeing as they controlled every apparatus in the American governmental and judicial structure.)

Once a martial peace is established, America then has to put some sort of benevolent dictator in place who can slowly usher in economic and government reforms, all of which is backed by a strong military presence. Right now, Shia, Sunni, Kurd, and whoever else want nothing less than to see everyone else dead, and they all have to have their backs broken for any ruling structure to last.

[sab]

The only "solution" I can see at this point, which is what should have been done at the beginning anyway once the decision was made to invade, is to bring in massively overwhelming, crushing military presence to put down, well, everyone. (This is what the neocons said they were going to do, and what Colin Powell definitely wanted to do, given that the decision had been made, and they somehow completely fucked it up, for reasons beyond me, seeing as they controlled every apparatus in the American governmental and judicial structure.)

Once a martial peace is established, America then has to put some sort of benevolent dictator in place who can slowly usher in economic and government reforms, all of which is backed by a strong military presence. Right now, Shia, Sunni, Kurd, and whoever else want nothing less than to see everyone else dead, and they all have to have their backs broken for any ruling structure to last.

I'm always amazed at how our politicians feel they can usher in demecracy overnight and that everybody in a foriegn country will be ready for it. It took American a couple hundred years, civil wars, slavery, womens rights, prohibition, great depression, too many wars to count, and the list keeps going on before we had an established demecracy. How well it works is debatable but for the most part it has been successful. Bottom line, it took a long time to establish and is still going through growing pains.

I agree that martial law is the only way to get things under control, I mean there was a reason that Saddam was so brutal during his reign. That is the only type of force that certain groups would adhere to. The bottom line is it is war and you have to be willing to be nastier than your opponents otherwise you will always lose. If people are willing to strap bombs onto their chests well we have to come up with a way to be nastier.

For example, in the Vietnam War the most feared group of fighters wasn't the Viet or the Americans. It was special force Korean groups that came in, Why? Because the first time one of their groups was attacked they had their heads cut off and all the other gory stuff. The next time the Koreans attacked a group of Viet they did the same, except they also killed the women and children and did other things I won't write about. Not appropriate action?? Fuck that. At the end of the day when a Korean special forces troop was coming through an area everyone would either run away or surrender. This ,as terrible as it is, saves lives in the long run.

At the end of the day it will be impossible for us to win this war. The media has way too much power and they are the ones controlling it. We really want to win this war, take the 80billion plus dollars we are wasting, put up a wanted ad ---- Wanted - Very Nasty People to come in and clean up a country, no rules, BIG money --- and hire another army to come in and take care of it. Kick the media out, the western world can't handle the reality of war. Get China's blessing, have them toss some money in. Hire Vietmese, Cambodians, Laosians, and other armies that could use the money and clean the area up. BTW, I can't take credit for this idea, this came from a friend of mine over here. This will never happen.

The best Iraq can hope for is a complete civil war and at the end of it the people will be so sick of getting killed that they will take care of everything or just keep fighting for another 100 years, who knows.