What qualifies as resistance?

Why should we call them 'resistance'?

It seems that anyone can call themselves resistance now. Funnily you don't even have to be iraqi. Is this the way it should be? Can you use the same word to describe the current resistance as the one you use to describe the Warsaw uprising against the nazis? Or the worldwide movement against british colonialism? Or the struggle against the zionists in palestine?

What exactly would we expect from resistance?

Is a desire to return to the way things were (politically) five years ago the only requirement for resistance? Obviously not.

1-How about a declared political program?
2-How about a commitment to elections?
3-How about a commitment to a constitution?
4-How about public accountability?
5-How about declaring where the weapons/cash come from?
6-How about not bombing street markets?
7-How about taking part in cleaning Iraq of the Baath?
8-How about rebuilding the country while half the world is still in the mood?
9-How about policing your borders?
10-How about retraining as electricians or builders?
11-How about taking part in the political process?
12-How about explaining exactly how they plan to defeat the world's biggest military?

This resistance does not look like any other I have seen before.

Maybe they really are waiting for us to tell them what we want?
Are these twelve points important or ....?

Abu Burkan

Comments

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reaction to force

13.05.2005 13:30

There is nothing to say that the resistance in Iraq has to come from within or be accountable, ethical, honest, nice, fair, non violent, democractic or anything other than a movement that seeks to obstruct and remove the occupying power.

resistance
n 1: the action of opposing something that you disapprove or
disagree with; "he encountered a general feeling of
resistance from many citizens"; "despite opposition from
the newspapers he went ahead" [syn: opposition]
2: any mechanical force that tends to retard or oppose motion
3: a material's opposition to the flow of electric current;
measured in ohms [syn: electric resistance, electrical
resistance, impedance, resistivity, ohmic resistance]
4: the military action of resisting the enemy's advance; "the
enemy offered little resistance"
5: (medicine) the condition in which an organism can resist
disease [syn: immunity]
6: a secret group organized to overthrow a government or
occupation force [syn: underground]
7: the degree of unresponsiveness of a disease-causing
microorganism to antibiotics or other drugs (as in
penicillin-resistant bacteria)
8: (psychiatry) an unwillingness to bring repressed feelings
into conscious awareness
9: an electrical device that resists the flow of electrical
current [syn: resistor]
10: group action in opposition to those in power

Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

ben

Resistance

13.05.2005 13:39

I would classify as a true resistance those Palestinians who are fighting against the oppression and corruption of the Palestinan Authority and Hamas. Those brave Palestinians who are working with ordinary Israelis to bypass the leaders on both sides and form common collectives to build peace and security. The Paestinians who refuse to let their children be brainwashed into suicide bombers, those Palestinians who refuse to pay "protection levy" to the terrorist groups.

These are true resistors.

Yusef

The same old game of spin...

13.05.2005 15:20

The trouble is, Yusef, that you are simply playing the same word game as the neo-cons, zionists, New Labour, Stalin or anybody who wishes to take words with OBJECTIVE definitions (as usefully shown in the above dictionary post) and apply them solely to your favoured political group.

This is why anyone who disagrees with the US/Sharon/Blunkett is now a "terrorist" (or more properly "turrrst").

Sorry, but no matter what you may feel about it, "resistance" is composed of people and groups who simply "resist" something. Whether they do it in a nice way or in a way you agree with, that is neither here nor there.

"The real resistors" indeed! You may not like the violent actions of Hamas et al, but you can hardly claim they are not "resisting" the occupation, can you? of course not.

Lexicographer

Let's get this straight

15.05.2005 16:29

A coalition of countries invade another one even though this other country was never a military threat to them.

This coalition then goes on to make economic arrangements such as the selling off of the other country's wealth, (oil etc).

The other country will forever be one big base of the coalition (14 permanent US bases to be set up agreed)

Elections for this country were set up only open to groups not opposing the occupation.

The vast majority of the country views the coalition forces as occupation forces.

A section of the country directly attacks these forces and any other group linked to these forces (contracters/contracted workers, police, army,)

But you dont think we should call them resistance..........

What would be good enough for you??!

Let's make an emotionalist argument.......

16.05.2005 08:11

Funny how you managed to overlook my twelve points and just posted the tired old arguments that are expected of those with no political education at all.

When it is the baath fighting to regain control power, you are still happy to call them resistance. But you fall short of publicly declaring yourself a Baath sympathiser. Why?

Abu Burkan

...

16.05.2005 13:37

I think most of your points are rather irrelevant and to me, whether a 'resistance' is valid can be reduced to 3 simple issues -

1) Method - Is it discriminate, concentrating on military targets or indiscriminate; attacking the civilians it claims to be working for.

2) Motive - Are its aims honourable; for a more just system with a higher respect for human rights or at the very least a rejection of a current unjust system.

3) Degree of popular support - This is perhaps a check or balance and in many ways reflects the outcome of the other two but without significant popular support it has to be questionable whether a 'resistance' can be valid. A resistance inevitably effects the whole population due to counter-measures and repression. It's only with support that this can be justified. Your responsibility concerns not only your specific acts but the effects that you know they will trigger.

So does the Iraqi resistance qualify? Well it's difficult to say because it actually consists of a spectrum of groups, all different.

Clearly there are Ba'athists and Islamic extremists involved and these surely wouldn't qualify but just as it's simplistic to deny the existence of these thuggish elements so too is it over-simplistic to deny that there are non-Ba'athist nationalist forces at work; some probably victims of bereavement others 'defending their homeland'. These do, according to virtually every poll, have strong popular support targeting as they generally do only the US/British military. Their motive is the rejection of a violent occupation, - something that is again supported if you look at even Western polls.

It's probably silly therefore to talk about the resistance as one whether supporting or condemning it.

Andrew

twelve points for Andrew

16.05.2005 16:05

Andrew it looks to me that all the twelve points contribute to the three factors you outlined.

Maybe I am wrong, can you show me which ones aren't?

As to the lumping of all groups under the umbrella term, it would be silly if there were more than three equally sized groups.

But when 95% is the Baath fighting to regain its stranglehold on iraq, why do you even bother describing the negligible other groups?

Is it a reluctance to abandon the third-world maxim "My enemy's enemy is my friend"?

Abu Burkan

Abu

17.05.2005 02:49

If you could prove to me - and everyone - that '95%' of the resistance was merely the Ba'ath party then I genuinely would admit that the 'resistance' was not worthy of such a term. Can you do that? I don't write here with an agenda. I won't deny some 'leftists' will blindly support the resistance simply because they're fighting the US - and that is indeed an application of the crude maxim 'my enemy's enemy is my friend'. Others will blindly condemn the 'resistance' simply because they're resisting a foreign army. I'm interested in rational arguments though.

Andrew

...

17.05.2005 13:58

Well, one of your twelve points doesn't make much sense

How about declaring where the weapons/cash come from?

I mean, how can a resistance group operate against a technologically and militarily superior force if it discloses all it's secrets. A resistance group, by it's very nature, has to be secretive, because if it involves itslef in a toe to toe fight, with everything open and accountable, it will lose.

I think the most important thing is whether the group enjoys popular support or not. That has what has made effective resistance movements in the past, like the Viet-Con. And we can discuss whether that applies to Iraq.

Hermes

back

17.05.2005 14:47

Andrew: No I cannot back up my 95% figure. I merely used 95% because I didn't want to say 100%, there are a few mightily frustrated and misguided but basically decent Iraqis out there 'resisting'.

Having said that, I believe you cannot back up any figure- especially your belief that the Baath is a minority in this movement. When you can convince people that the Baath members (who tortured and raped Iraqis for my entire lifetime) have given up quietly and decided to live on equal terms with everyone else..... then we can discount the Baath from massive involvement with the 'resistance'.

Hermes: OK, so they have to keep the sources of their funding quiet. Why, because they would get frozen otherwise?

If the dozens of bank accounts held by leading Baath figures and their members in several countries around the world haven't been frozen yet, and Saddam's family can live in luxury in Jordan, how can smaller bank accoutns get frozen?

All it woud take is a public denunciation of the Baath and all it stood for, and a real campaign of rooting out the Baath.
Besides I don't expect them to provide names and addresses, just to say generally- "we get some funds and support from %%%%%% country, or from &&&&&&-ian businessmen". But when nobody owns up to it, you have to assume that the Baath's funds from massive theft over the years are being used. Is it too much of a jump? You act ike it is the most outlandish suggestion in the universe- that the Baath may try to get rid of an elected government and get back into power.

Abu Burkan

Abu

18.05.2005 14:37

I didn't claim that were Ba'athists constituted only a tiny part of the resistance. I said we simply can't know. Yes it's unlikely that every Ba'athist just gave up and went home after decades of violence but let's not forget - as the Sunday Times reported a while back American forces have covertly being recruiting former officers of the Mukhabarat, those responsible for the torture and killing. It may well be the case that many Ba'athists will find a role in the 'new' Iraq due to the fact that the US have little genuine interest in democracy for its own sake and if they deem it necessary to rebuild repressive structures to quash dissent and resistance, they will do so. This is evidenced only to clearly by the way, after the war, they installed Iyad Allawi as leader - an authoritarian former Ba'athist with a lot of blood on his hands but personally opposed to Saddam after a falling out. He exemplifies perfectly that the US would be content with a new face on an old regime.

Andrew

Andrew

20.05.2005 10:38

We agree on the history of Allawi, and the recruitment of destructive elements in the current security forces and govt.

We also agree on what the unofficial requirements are for the new govt., from the point of view of the occupiers- basically "just stick to pre-1990 levels and you'll be fine".

I still don't see how hundreds/thousands of adults would joing ragtag militias without any idea of political programs or questioning who they were really serving. Is it possible that there are adults who think the US can be defeated militarily, regardless of cost, and that it is worht trying in any case?

Apart from Ba3thys whose lives would be worthless without a ba3th government, I cannot think of anyone who would choose the military path to freedom in Iraq.

Abu Burkan (all that is my first name, not just Abu, btw)