The happenings in Iraq

It seems to be saying exactly what everyone else - except Blair - is saying now.

But regardless of whether the war was right or wrong, leaving Sadam in power would have been an awful thing to do in itself. He was a cruel and wicked man. Lesser of two evils? Maybe. But why should anyone have to settle for evil at all?

I think the West will gradually see that the only decent thing to do now is go back. Finish the job. It's a horrible thought, but anything less would be too unfair on the Iraqi people. We broke Iraq. We should mend it. Sadly.

And the latest dreadful news this morning will perhaps reinforce that idea.

I agree bags. It is easy to read and clear-sighted.

I am very sad about the troubles in Iraq as I had a lovely, gentle Iraqi student-boyfriend - well just a friend really - in 1961-62. He came from Baghdad and we were at the same college. I have often wondered what happened to him and if he has survived the mayhem that has engulfed Iraq in recent years. When you know a real person as opposed to seeing crowds of anonymous people on TV reports, it seems to make the all the suffering and chaos much more real. I hope life has been good to him.

Just read the article. I didn't think it was balanced, more like a bit of a rant in favour of our invasion of Iraq. I didn't think it was well written either. Too convoluted. I was always taught that good writing aims to make a point clearly without too many 'big' words .

I may be biased because I was part of the 2003 march against the Iraqi war.

Oh, I thought it was against the invasion of Iraq!

Would have liked to have read David Aaronovitvch's article. Bloody firewall! Won't pay!!!

Eh, I'd better go back and have another read.

I don't actually care about the article. What's the point in all this "I told you so" stuff? Just get on with the air strikes Obama. And don't bloody back off this time!

No, still don't like the article.

I find it rather unpleasant in tone, in fact.

Unrepentant Jacobi just seems to be arguing (somewhat sneeringly) against an anti war article by Owen Jones.

He also attempts to cast doubt on the integrity of those of us who marched in 2003.

He defends David Aaronovich who I remember was quite openly pro-war.

Some people who voted for the invasion of Iraq have now said they think they were wrong to do so. I admire them but not people like UJ.

Yes, Saddam was a wicked and cruel man, but so is Mugabe and we didn't go there? As are other despots around the world.

It would be interesting to see the correlation between sending troops in to 'rescue' such populations and the amount of oil countries produce.

Jingle - the trouble seems to be that there isn't really an entity that can be meaningfully called 'the Iraqi people' - there are Sunni , Shia and Kurds - I know it's not helpful to say so but Iraq is a construct of Western imperialism and was always a problem in waiting. <sighs>

Yes the post World War 1 history and our responsibility for creating Iraq is still so relevant, isn't it, GrannyTwice. We have many friends who were anti the war and who marched, but I could never really agree with them because I could not get past what was happening to the Marsh Arabs, the Kurds and the Iraqi opposition under Saddham.
I thought it was a good article on the whole. I like Owen Jones, but his Guardian article annoyed me because it seemed to ignore the history of Iraq.
I thought the management of events immediately after the war was a disaster, though.
Good article, thank you Bags.

Maybe. But this ISIS lot who have appeared out of nowhere, are the worst yet. And have to be dealt. It was the West who rushed, in the end, to get out of Iraq, far too soon. Infrastructures should have been created.

History now, is irrelevant.

I thought Iran had offered help and assistance?

The words ' long spoon' and 'devil' come to mnd!

In getting rid of Saddam, the West created a vacuum, they had no plans for what came after.

We should stay out of it. We are very bad at interfering with cultures we do not understand and simply create martyrs and more excuses for terrorist activity.

We should stay out of it.

I agree with that sentiment. It will take time for them to sort themselves out as it has with other countries undergoing similar problems with a change of societal structure. It is important that they manage to control events themselves if they are to have any hope for the future.

Too late. The interfering has been done. Yes, hopefully Iran and the (good old) US will sort it out.

I agree about staying out of it but I see no hope for the possibility of a resolution. Positions are so entrenched.

This has to be sorted out between the Sunni and the Shia I agree, but I'm dreading it should swing completely into a bloodbath as happened in Rwanda where the majority Hutu slaughtered the minority Tutsi and any moderate Hutu who spoke up in their defence.

I agree with you, Petallus, it's a rant against those who opposed the war in the first place, sneering at them for just marching in the UK.
Iran and the good old US will sort it out, will they, jingle, using nuclear weapons which the US can have but not Iran?

Another way of looking at the present situation is that this started boiling up well before 9/11, or the decision of the West to invade in 2003. These were symptoms of the problem, stages in its development.
The Arabs have been fighting eachother for centuries, and the last ?50 years has seen the emergence of extremist groups who want to extend their influence beyond the traditional Arab borders.
Reluctantly I agree with the need for the West to try to oppose these extremist groups. After all , they're already causing serious problems in the UK without using violence. (schools etc.)
I worry personally because our oldest and his family live and work in Kuwait, Iraq's neighbour to the south. I'll have to ask them about their views.

Have read the article as well as Owen Jones article must now read Aaronovich but whilst the article is marginally interesting, I am not sure that it really takes us any further in the middle east problem which seems to grow more alarming by the day.

One thing I was reading recently was that most of the countries there exist because of good old emperialism, and like Africa was done so largely by us and France, of course we made a complete dog's dinner of it and look at the result

you will have to excuse my spelling I am useless!! and getting more useless as I age.

Oh FGS jendurham! Can't you recognise irony when you see it?!

And who the f--- mentioned nuclear weapons?! Weird (post) or what.

All of this is a bit intellectual for me really. I just know that the pictures on the news make me want to vomit. These men being led away with only moments left to live. How can we ignore it. It's barbaric. But what can we do.