According to Atrios, George Will is calling Iraq "our Chechnya." I guess he hopes that most of the people listening won't know what he's talking about and take hope from that comparison and the rest will swallow the RNC talking point that Iraq has always been the US' front in the global war on Islam terra.
But he's a dope anyway. Everyone knows that Chechnya is Russia's Vietnam. Our Afghanistan is Russia's Afghanistan. Iraq's Iraq is our Revolution and Our Iraq is another Vietnam. It couldn't be more clear.
If I were to make a historical analogy, I think I'd call it France's Algeria.
Posted by: Linkmeister | June 26, 2005 at 07:40 PM
Wow. Chechnya is a nightmare, and has been for years. Is Will just counting on the collective ignorance of the American population for us to think that's a good thing? Or maybe he's just trying to draw the Iraqis in the place of the Chechens, who are particularly nasty guerrilla fighters. Of course, over the last century or so, the Russian central government has by displacement and direct action slaughtered huge percentages of the Chechen people for its own purposes, so it's not as if the Chechen's savagery is unwarranted.
Oh, damn, there I go looking for root causes again. That is so *French* of me.
Posted by: paperwight | June 27, 2005 at 09:56 AM
He has to hope most people only know that in Chechnya the Russians are fighting Muslims. He must be trying to jumpstart the whole "We have always been at war with Islam" riff.
Posted by: eRobin | June 27, 2005 at 01:08 PM
Most Americans couldn't find Chechnya on a map. I believe the collective ignorance will help support that analogy. As for Iraq, it is starting to resemble the Battle of Algiers.
Posted by: Agitprop | June 27, 2005 at 01:31 PM
I watched The Battle of Algiers when it was rereleased last year. Great movie, and I keep wondering why we are unable to learn from the mistakes of others.
Posted by: paperwight | June 27, 2005 at 02:12 PM
They learned. They just learned the wrong thing. They think that the only problem with having a really awesome war is when an unruly media gets in the way.
Posted by: eRobin | June 27, 2005 at 03:43 PM