(Updated) Terrorist’s Death a Hollow Victory?
As Ed Morrissey well puts it over at Captain’s Quarters, we’ll have to wait for the official scorer before we can be sure that Abu Ayyub al-Masri, the successor to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as head of Al Qaeda in Iraq, has indeed been killed in a battle with other insurgents.
Iraq’s Interior Ministry claims that Al-Masri is dead, but its track record is piss-poor and it turns out the claim is based on so-called tribal reports and not a body ID. The official scorer, of course, is the U.S., but even if Al-Masri has been offed, it’s not time to open the champagne.
As Marc Lynch explains at Abu Aardvark:
If it is true, it would be great in terms of getting rid of someone responsible for a lot of the worst outrages in Iraq. Politically, however, the most likely effect will be similar to the Zarqawi hit. Like Zarqawi, Masri has been increasingly divisive in the insurgency . . . If he’s gone, it may be exactly what the insurgency factions need to repair their frayed ties and to refocus on fighting the American occupation rather than each other.
16 Responses to “(Updated) Terrorist’s Death a Hollow Victory?”
As long as Bush is in office, for liberals…inside of every silver lining there is a cloud.
“Hollow victory”? Why can’t anyone say: OK, this is a good one.
Would you say: “VE Day” was a hollow victory, as Roosevelt gave away the farm at Yalta, and Stalin was left occupying half the continent?
No. Stalin was left occupying half of Europe, and lots of atrocities were to follow VE Day…including the rape of about 10 million German women in the Russian occupied areas (there is a great book about this – “A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in the Conquered City” – a diary account of the immediate days following VE Day in Berlin).
Notice the rather significant conjunction — “If…may…” — in the above quote. Al-Queda has been blowing up locals sheikhs, assassinating others…what is the likelihood they will make happy with al-Queda now?
I imagine “if” Obama or Hillary are in power…the days of clear victories will return.
But as long as Bush is in office, there will never, ever, ever be a good day…or a good event for the United States.
Yes, over the years we’ve run posts about how this or that big Al-Queda figure was caught or killed but a lot of them turned out to be jumping the gun (no pun intended). Usually it takes a day or so before you get or don’t get confirmation from u.s. and other officials. We’ve run some big screaming headlines on someone being caught or killed. Shaun phrased it correctly. It sounds like it happened. But it’s still a bit too earlyto say it is an absolute certainty..
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To build on Joe’s comment and bundle it with Swaraaj’s post on the uptick in terror incidents, it is worth noting yet again that we will never know how the prosecution of the War on Terror would be going five-plus years on because of Bush’s insistence on fighting the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time.
But we can take a few guesses:
* The War on Terror would be ongoing even without the enormous distraction of Iraq with hot spots in Afghanistan, Thailand, the Philippines, Somalia and probably elsewhere.
* Al Qaeda would not have attained a foothold in Iraq and we would not have to have dealt with the likes of Al-Zarkawi and Al-Masri in that context.
* Roughly 3,000 or so Americans would still be alive, as well as many tens of thousands of Iraqis.
Sorry, Marlowe but that has nothing to do with it. If he is dead someone else will take his place and the bloodshed will continue. So far there has been no evidence that they will stop killing fellow Iraqis or Americans just because of internal disagreements.
As far as Bush is concerned, he is hopelessly incompetent as a commander-in-chief. He decided to take us to war in Iraq before we were really done in Afghanistan and now the Taliban is staging a major comeback. The people he trusted couldn’t do either job correctly and he refused to replace the primary architect of disaster until it was too late to dig us out of the hole they’d put us into in any reasonable time frame if it is even possible at all. Pardon me if I think that the only positive thing this administration could do is resign en mass.
I wonder how many of those who voted to reelect Bush would have done so if they knew what they know today.
Kim: as someone who voted for Bush and thinks he is a complete disaster, I’m still not convinced that I would like things any better if Kerry had won. Just because Bush has screwed things up doesn’t mean that Kerry couldn’t have made things far, far worse.
As for the ‘hollow victory’, I find it amusing that while the guy was alive (as was the case with Zarqawi, and is the case with Bin Laden), Bush and company are ridiculed for not being able to find and kill him… and once he’s dead, he’s dismissed as no big deal.
“Sorry, Marlowe but that has nothing to do with it. If he is dead someone else will take his place and the bloodshed will continue.”
But you have not addressed my question. Why can’t liberals ever say: “Ok, this is a good one.”
Every victory can be qualified as a hollow victory. I offered the classic example of “VE Day”. That was a great victory over Nazi Germany. It could be qualified as a “hollow victory” as it left Stalin in charge of half of Europe and countless atrocities to come.
This is all about Bush…and the need to spin EVERYTHING badly.
The usage in Swaraaj’s post — “April was the deadliest month this year for US forces” — is a classic example. This is commonplace in the MSM.
I challenge anyone here to find a similar usage in WW II.
Please consider the wording of this usage. There is no way this usage can EVER be positive, as one can simply alter the enddate of the tagline.
This was the deadliest of…the year…or the past six months…or the deadliest week of the past month.
To return to the killing of the al-Queda leader. Neither Jim nor Kritter have answered the question.
Why cannot liberals ever simply say: “This was a good one”?
“Yesterday was shite. Tomorrow will probably be shite. But this was a good one.”
Again, I say: As long as Bush is in office, there can never, ever be allowed to be “a good one”.
Here’s something good, and un-hollow:
“In post-Taliban recovery, Afghan infant mortality declines.”
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/04/27/news/afghan.php
Afghan Babies: + 40,000 to 50,000
al Qaeda: – 1
BTW: Happy May Day TMV!! And many more.
Ridiculed by whom? I’ve certainly never ridiculed Bush for not killing al-Masri. Nor have I seen anyone else do so. Most have no idea who the man is/was.
Now Bin Laden? Sure, I ridicule Bush for giving up on the hunt for him and especially for publicly stating he isn’t concerned with Bin Laden’s status.
I think the vast majority of Americans do as well.
But let’s lay off the straw man here. Much more and you’ll be getting agricultural subsidies.
Davebo, I think Stevesturm’s reference was more to Zarqawi on this point.
Zarqawi was, in fact, widely used by the Left blogosphere and the MSM to point out the incompetence of Bush at being unable to stop him.
Then, when killed by US forces, he was immediately minimized and the influence of his death immediately discounted.
(In fact, his death had influence…in that Zaqawi was the primary architect behind the decapitation videos of endless foreigners and innocents…a bizarre atrocity that ceased with his passing).
This is not a straw man argument. If one Googles for Zarqawi one can find numerous both of the “bashing Bush” phase, and then the “it doesn’t really matter…hollow victory” stage.
Marlowecan:
There are ample reasons for Bush bashing, but you are correct that Zarqawi was not one of them — but only to a point.
While asserting that it would go anywhere to hunt down Al Qaeda leaders, the U.S. shelved three successive plans to strike the northern Iraqi base of Al Zarqawi in 2002 and early 2003 because it would undercut its case for going to war against Saddam Hussein.
Marlowecan
Shaun beat me to it, but he is still right. Zarqawi existed in Iraq largely because Bush allowed him to for purely domestic political reasons.
And the fact that al-Masri so quickly replaced Zarqawi (as he too will be quickly replaced) supports the concept of a hollow victory.
Ask yourself, what’s changed in the grand scheme of things in Iraq with the deaths of either man?
Less violence in Iraq? Nope
More political will in the Iraqi government? Not noticably.
While I hope the guy is indeed dead, I’m not deluding myself into believing it will make any difference at all in the overall Iraq situation.
Davebo said: “While I hope the guy is indeed dead, I’m not deluding myself into believing it will make any difference at all in the overall Iraq situation.”
I agree, in that I don’t think it will make much difference as far as the US is concerned. It may be a sign that Iraqi insurgents don’t want al-Queda in Iraq…even to kill the hated shi’a. That would be a good thing in the long term.
Let me be clear:
Since the Iraqi government announced it was going on summer vacation, I believe the US must withdraw from Iraq…perhaps to the Kurdistan north! The US presence has clearly “infantilized” the Iraqi government…why do any lifting as long at the US will do it for them? The Iraqis must end this war, not the US.
But I would further argue that this death – if confirmed – is more reason for withdrawal. If the Sunni insurgency has decided to turn on al-Queda, it makes it very unlikely that the future Iraq will be a base for international terrorism.
It may have something to do that this whole shebang has shown that optimism and an excess of trust in authority has led to disaster after disaster, but maybe that’s just me. My general policy in war is “never believe anything until at least two weeks later,” and hey, I’ve been wrong a lot less than your side.
> This is all about Bush…
> and the need to spin
> EVERYTHING badly.
Absolutely. It’s becoming predictable here, not just in the mainstream (liberal) media and elsewhere in Web Play-Land.