Martial Law in Iraq Would Have Been a Sound Strategy, #2

I thank CON for posting a substantive rebuttal to my arguments. Regardless, there are fundamental flaws throughout CON's case. I will deconstruct below.RebuttalCultural SensitivityPRO/CON agree that the number of Arabic linguistics majors in US universities was appallingly low in 2002. However, there were two significant factors present in 2002 that mitigate CON's "6 linguists" number and would make my proposal feasible:CS1) The Defense Language Institute (DLI) is not included in CON's number. DLI is a facility in Monterey, CA, that trains linguists for the Department of Defense (DoD). According to Congressional testimony (pg. 22404), 365 students graduated from the DLI Arabic program in 2002, which significantly augments the 6 linguists PRO cited that graduated in the civilian sector. [5]The DLI program involves 6 hours of daily instruction 5 days a week, with daily homework and mandatory study hall sessions for the duration of the program, which for Arabic is 63 weeks. A student thus receives more language instruction in one day through this program than a college student would receive in one week, thereby equating this Arabic program to over 315 weeks of equivalent college instruction, or over 6 years worth of intensive college-equivalent language training.The curriculum consists of 39 units solely dedicated to language instruction (equivalent to 8-12 semesters of language instruction), 2 units to geography, and 4 units to foreign culture. [6]CS2) As one can see, the shortfall of this language-intensive DoD program is indeed area studies and cultural sensitivity, which is a perfect complement to civilian university programs dealing with the Middle East, where area studies is a strength. As PRO's own source states: "...the 9/11 commission is mistaken about the paucity of programs...There are many colleges and universities that offer instruction in a wide range of Middle Eastern languages, as well as Islamic history and culture. In fact, a portion of the federal government's $90 million of Title VI funding currently goes to 17 institutes at schools across the country *—from NYU to Michigan to UCLA—that do nothing but grant degrees in subjects touching on the Middle East." [7]To summarize, the strengths in civilian programs deal with cultural sensitivity, and the strengths in DoD programs deal with language proficiency. A merging of the participants of the two programs would thus have compensated and complemented the strengths inherent in both programs, and led to a capable, feasible, and culturally sensitive contingent of specialists deployable to the Middle East by 2003. SecurityMany of CON's points pertaining to security are either wildly inaccurate or do not demonstrate an understanding of my arguments in round #2.S1) While undeniably horrific, the casualties suffered by Japan from the a-bomb strikes are dwarfed by the firebombing campaign preceding it; this campaign, as CON himself stated, had already all but guaranteed capitulation of some sort from Japan; the a-bombs only sped up the timeframe. While, the US enjoyed asymmetry of power from nuclear weapons against Japan in WWII, the US similarly enjoyed assemetry of power vis a vis Iraq in 2003.The conditions for capitulation in both the Japanese and Iraqi scenarios thus have a proportional equivalence to them; for Japan, it took several years and two a-bombs to achieve capitulation due to a credible Japanese resistance. For Iraq, it took less than one month due to the almost complete lack of credible resistance wrought by nearly a decade of crippling sanctions against Iraq.At any rate, capitulation was achieved, and thus we had an opportunity for occupation in both cases.S2) CON assumes his argument when stating that "the spirit of the Japanese was broken in the wake of the WW2 a phrase that simply cannot be applied to the peoples of Iraq after the invasion by US forces as evidenced by their continuous resistance to US occupation."As I have stated in round #2, Japan more than likely would have put up a resistance had the US not displayed cultural sensitivity by co-opting the emperor of Japan - by doing so, Japanese resistance was curtailed before it even became an issue. In Iraq, the US did almost nothing to display any sort of cultural sensitivity; instead of co-optation, we have Abu Ghraib and sectarian violence. CON could not have brought more solid proof of the validity of PRO's plan, that with cultural sensitivity, resistance would have been minimized, thus facilitating securing the country.S3) PRO/CON agree that the ethnic makeup of Iraq in 2003 was materially different from that of Japan following WWII. However, it is much more homogeneous than Bosnia [8], which experienced a marked decline in violence following UN occupation per Shinseki's advisement of an adequate occupation force. [9]S4) CON states "recovery of Japan...had far more to do with the Cold War dynamic." CON's statement is off the mark. There would have been no "Cold War dynamic" in Japan had it not been for the peace secured via martial law beforehand. The foundation of security laid by martial law allows for reconstruction to occur. Japan would have had nothing "to export to the US while protecting its domestic market," because without the foundation of security, Japan would have had neither a domestic nor an export-oriented industrial capacity. Instead, it would have been mired in guerrilla warfare and civil strife for years if not decades, like Iraq. S5) CON criticizes my [ML1] point from round #2: "deployment of academic "Peaceniks"...is for all intents and purposes an opinion."First of all, PRO's scenario is a hypothetical, no question. Regardless, PRO has brought up plenty of sources and evidence that this method would have been feasible, actionable and would have forwarded US interests.I also point out that CON's stance is also opinion. CON's point is thus not a valid rebuttal.S6) CON is worried about "slight imperialistic connotations," ignoring the fact that nearly every aspect of PRO's plan involves OVERT imperialistic connotations regarding the US presence in the Middle East. This is no question a realist power play, in line with the Bush Doctrine, and in line with the treatment of Iran, Iraq, and North Korea as the "Axis of Evil".CON then states that "[imperialism] would decrease trust in any American lead [sic] regime," completely failing to take into account that it worked just fine in Japan, which was another overt imperialist venture by America. We wrote Japan's constitution. Japan turned out just fine.S7) CON then makes a mess of the numerous statistics stemming from Shinseki's testimony in my NYT article. CON is correct that Senator Lindsey Graham thought that "[The US] never had enough troops to begin with," but this is precisely because the US did not follow Shinseki's advice. Had the US followed Shinseki's advice by increasing troop/civilian ratios to what it was in Bosnia, we would have had enough troops to secure the region, to include especially Baghdad.CON is correct that "General Shinseki in fact advised against "fighting a 12 division war" with a "10 division army" - we indeed fought a "12 division war with a 10 division army" because we did not take Shinseki's advice to fight a 12 division war with a 12 division army. Again, had we followed Shinseki's advice, as I advocate in my proposal, none of this would not have been a problem.War BondsCON makes the claim that war bonds constitute a "complete fantasy...not backed up with any facts or statistics." My proposal was based off of facts and statistics stemming from the precedence of floating war bonds set by WWII.During WWII, the US spent more than $300 billion against the Axis powers, or $4 trillion in today's dollars. [10] More than $185 billion of that was funded through war bonds [11], which were paid off in 10 years due to a booming economy post-WWII. Given that Iraq was a tiny threat compared to the Axis powers, we can assume the initial flotation of war bonds would have been far smaller than the $4 trillion mark, perhaps just $500 billion or so, if even that much. Recall that hostilities ended within 1 month in Iraq, whereas WWII took America years to fight. This is easily within US capabilities to finance; Iraq alone is not a major theatre of war for the US.As stated in round #2, war bonds would have made Americans more cognizant of the sacrifices necessary for war, would have cut American profligacy thus lessening the impact of the 2008 financial crisis, and would have made America far less dependent on foreign financing for the federal budget.ConclusionCON confuses several aspects of my case, and does not seem to be able to recognize the combining of cultural sensitivity and martial law into a cohesive strategy; CON repeatedly only argues against one point without considering the impact of the other. My strategy is in line with "smart power" application per the dean of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government Joseph Nye's theories (only the first 5 minutes of video); by combining coercion with persuasion, we get a much more effective and potent foreign policy. The Bush administration completely failed to even consider soft power, and displayed exceptional hubris through an inadequate hard power deployment. My proposal seeks to remedy both these short comings.I await CON's rebuttal.http://www.youtube.com...[5] http://tinyurl.com...[6] http://www.dliflc.edu...[7] http://www.slate.com...[8] http://bosniaandgenocide.tripod.com...[9] http://www.commondreams.org...[10] http://www.nationalww2museum.org...[11] http://www.u-s-history.com...