Canker gives us a window on the British view of Iraq and Afghanistan

A new member of Joshua's Army from across the pond, Canker, earns a commendation and a mention in dispatches today for sending me two very instructive British items which give a clear view of what a lot of people over there are thinking about the UK involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq.

(By the way, check out his fine blog at Canker..well worth the detour, as they say!)

The first item is in the Independent, in what Canker describes, aptly as `one of our nastiest papers'. In `A bloody choice: Iraq or Afghanistan? Britain must choose', the writer, Raymond Whitaker, uses the leaked new Ministry of defense report I mentioned in my article on Musharraf and makes the point that, in view of the carnage going on and Britain's limitations, a choice is going to have to be made between the two fronts - Britain cannot continue to fight on both.

In the other item, from Richard at EU Referendum makes the same point, dealing mostly with Afghanistan and quotes British soldiers as almost despairing - because their efforts seem to be futile.

Actually, with a few tweaks, I agree with both of their positions...not only for Britain, but for the US.

There tends to be a lot of talk, both in Britain and America about the old alliance being outdated and slowly coming apart. And polls in Britain seem to indicate that Tony Blair is not exactly popular for following Bush into Iraq and Afghanistan and associating himself too closely with Bush's policies.

Admittedly, there's a percentage of marxists and left wing loonies in both nations..but not nearly enough to account for the dissatisfaction with the way this war's being handled.

Here's the way I see it, and it took me quite a while to get to this point and realize just how badly the Bush Administration and Tony Blair's government had essentially taken brilliant military victories and turned them into something very different.

Both the American and British peoples,when it comes to war, are capable of great effort and sacrifice - as long as they see progress being made and have confidence in their leadership. Also, in my opinion, neither has much patience with settling into a defensive war of attrition and simply absorbing casualties with no obvious progress.

That's exactly the kind of no win situation our current leadership has led us to.

The problem in Afghanistan and Iraq are quite similar. For one thing, we do not control the borders in either country.

In Afghanistan the Taliban are perfectly free to cross over from Pakistan with impunity and attack our troops, then flee back across the border with impunity, recruit resupply and attack again and again...not to mention undermining our support among the Afghan population by terrorism against soft civilian targets. Thanks to our `ally' Musharaff and the deal he recently made with the Taliban to make it official and grant them freedom from any fear of impedance by the Pakistani government, this problem is going to get even worse, and the attacks will get even more blatant.Any wonder the Brits facing this have gotten more impatient and worried as time goes on and nothing changes?

We haven't a prayer of victory in Afghanistan as long as we cling to the fantasy of Pakistan and Musharraf as an `ally' and allow this situation to continue.

In Iraq, it's even worse.

As in Afghanistan, we don't control the borders. Iran and Syria have taken full advantage of the fact that the Bush Administration refuses to act forcefully with them..and more importantly, we couldn't have done more to allow Iran to call the shots there if we had planned it.

To start with, we rushed the Iraqis into an election and `nation building' before they were ready, and before we had even secured the country..less than two years after deposing Saddam. And to top it off, we allowed Shiite politicians associated with our enemy Iran to run in the election and take control. Both Maliki and his predecessor, Jaafari, spent the Saddam years cuddled up with the Mullahs in Iran.Any wonder that Islam and tribalism trumped democracy? And that Iran pretty much calls the shots for the Shiite parties ?

To add to the mix, we allowed Iran to arm, train, control and equip the Shiite militias like the Badr Force and Moqata al Sadr's Mahdi Army..which are now the muscle behind Maliki's Shiite Dawa party and take their orders from the mullahs in Iran.

And those orders are NOT to keep things quiet and allow the country to stabilize, especially when it comes to keeping the pot boiling to take the spotlight and pressure off the mullahs and their nuclear weapons program.

Any wonder that polls among the Sunnis and Shia in Iraq reveal we've pretty much worn out our welcome? Or, as I put it in a previous article, the best we can hope for from the government we've allowed to take power in Iraq is `Thanks, infidels for your time and money...now leave so we can bond with our jihad buddies in Iran.'

I think a large part of the dissatisfaction with the war in Iraq and Afghanistan in both the US and the UK is not based on anti-war or anti-military sentiment as much as it is based on dissatisfaction with the kind of leadership that allowed this no-win situation to occur.

What's more, I think that's a much more reasonable attitude in most cases than simply saying thing like `stay the course - complete the mission' when the course is obviously not working and the mission remains murky and undefined.

If our objective is to secure these two countries as a stepping stone to victory in the War on Jihad, then we had better be prepared to do what's necessary to attain those goals..and that will mean confronting the nations on the borders of Afghanistan and Iraq that continue to harbor, equip and support the jihadis, disarming/disbanding the Iranian controlled Shiite militias in Iraq, dropping the ridiculous rules of engagement that handcuff our forces in the two countries and ruthlessly dealing with sectarian violence and opposition to the NATO, and coalition forces in these countries.

It may even mean making some significant changes in the Iraqi government, and coming to a major `understanding' with them as to what we expect.


If we're not prepared to do that, we're simply wasting money and lives by continuing along the same path.