Absolute Warfare

This email, written in early 2008, although I do not discuss it directly, really touches on this concept I came up with while playing a video game called Command & Conquer (which is extremely popular in the Arab world, especially the newest one where the US, China and an Arab Terrorist group are the main teams...if you read my Syria story you'd remember that I got my ass kicked by a Syrian Christian while playing this game in Syria. They guy was playing as the US and basically bombed me into oblivion). I called the idea Absolute Warfare. In the game the players have to explore a map to find their opponents. However, there is technology available to the players that allows them to darken the parts of the map they control so the other player is unable to see it. The idea is to know everything and to deny any information to your enemy.

Modern Warfare touches on this. This post focuses specifically on the media. Media is a complex word in this post because it encompasses TV news and information in general and propaganda also.


we are in a media war
the battle is not physical anymore
it is on cnn
it is rumors
it is conjecture
you want info?
I just talked, yesterday, to two iraqi guards charged with defending me.
they said the the mahdi army is not firing missiles at the green zone. al qaeda is firing missiles at the green zone.
furthermore, the mahdi army defends the people against al qaeda and the US and the iraqi govt
i told him
that ALL the americans disagree with him
and that WE think the mahdi army is shooting at us
he thought that was interesting
see, one of the Personal security detail guys that defend me here
read a book by some guy who interviewed a bunch of iraqis
about how much the US "fucked up"
and this PSD guy had been iraq since 2003
The PSD guys' criticism of the book was that the author "believed everything the iraqis told him"
see, the Iraqis are just as misinformed, often times, as american journalists
and sometimes, often times, the American military is actually right
so you have to listen to both sides
the mahdi army is shooting rockets at us
the fact that the Iraqis that live in sadr city say the are not
is interesting because it means that the mahdi army's PR department is MUCH better than ours

I was encouraged by the fact that this Iraqi guard hates al qaeda more than anything, and he called them terrorists in arabic, which is new. I have heard al qaeda called jihadists by Arabs, but terrorists is a distinct word in arabic and it is not complimentary (Jihadist is complementary...actually, it is one of the greatest compliments). The Surge was all about refocusing the anger of the Iraqis against al qaeda instead of the US, and, for this guard at least, it worked. We won that media battle

But the Iraqis get lied too by other Iraqis as much as we do. The guys I was talking too who said that the Mahdi Army was great are the same people who are tasked with defending my safety. And we got in a damn gunfight at the compound these guys were defending and we drove the terrorists who were attacking us off.

See, the Iraqis are as capable of the doublethink as everyone else. They can fight the US and defend us at the same time because the situation is complicated. The citizens of Sadr city are currently pissed off because an American Apache launched a missile into Sadr city and killed an entire family. That does indeed suck. I explained to the guard that the Americans attack Sadr city because we think that the rockets come from there. Hopefully, the Iraqis will go home and begin to ask questions like "I heard the Americans think the Mahdi Army fires missiles at them and that is why they attack us...is that true?" And, I hope, that question will lead to answers and then eventually someone will find out who is firing fucking rockets at me. As of today, the rockets have slowed. But for a week prior to that, about 120 rockets landed in the International Zone and many of them were very close to our compound.

The war in Iraq is far more complicated than Sunni vs Shia...and it is more complicated because it is so much simpler...no one likes it when babies die. The Mahdi Army kills Sunni babies, so the sunnis hate them. The Americans have killed babies in Sadr City, so the Sadrists hate the Americans. The Badr Brigades of the Dawa party (the party of Nuri al-Maliki the Prime Minister of Iraq) and the Sadrists are killing each others' babies all across southern Iraq, so they hate each other. By the way, the recent violence in Iraq was because of the recently passed Law Concerning Provinces not incorporated into a district or something like that, AKA the Provincial Powers Act. The Sadrists do not have any power in the LOCAL councils. The Dawa party of PM Maliki and the Supreme Islamic Council of abdel-aziz al-Hakim (big dude in Iraq...google him) of Iraq have all the elected members and they punish the Sadr supporters by not giving them electricity and such. Because of that, the Sadrists have decided they want a piece of the pie. So they started trying to flex their muscle. However, Dawa (Maliki) wants to win the next election, so they started sucking up to the poor shiites and in the meantime they are trying to kill as many Sadrists as possible so that when the local elections do occur, the Dawa party will win...mind you these are all Shiites...the whole Shiite/Sunni division doesn't really work.

There is much more to say, but that would mean less sleep, so I will have to leave you there. As always, please be careful if you decide to forward my emails on. I try to say things which I believe will contribute to the conversation, but the fact that I was talking to Iraqis guarding Americans could be a touchy issue. Not to be dramatic or anything, but this is a Media War at its best.


Good night!

Sam


PS: A correction to my previous email. One of my old professors at Georgetown wrote this concerning my statements about Musa Sadr. He is correct and I was wrong. You will have to dig up on your own my comments about Musa Sadr:)

Great to hear from you and that you are learning so much and enjoying your experiences. FYI, Musa Sadr, whom I knew in Lebanon, was not a Grand Ayatollah. He id come to be called Imam; created a social Movement for the Dispossessed and then a militia, AMAL, whose leader Nabih Berri held a green card from US, and is now Speaker of parliament. Hizbollah had a different beginning.