A lot of the views here still show the sickness of the neo-con ideas that have failed us so greviously.

The failure of neo-cons was not their embrace of democracy- it was the policies they undertook to "implement" democracy. We certainly should be encouraging democracy- it is a progressive force. When people actually have a voice in government, government becomes better. Have we Americans forgotten that bedrock belief. People act better and freedom increases tolerance.

Similar attitudes to what I see expreesed here were expressed toward Russians during the Cold War. Were they brainwashed Communists or simply repressed. I would say the latter. The more Arabs are exposed to modern progress the more they will embrace it. But don't expect overnight change like the Bushies. It doesn't happen that way. And killing them or funding regimes that do so doesn't make us safer. Has it yet?

While I would agree that Democracies are not built overnight, I would disagree with anyone who feels that, just because a country, State or region has no experience with it, it can't be created. Case in point: Germany and Japan. The two could not have been more disparate from one another, or from the United States, but both have prospered and thrived in every sense since the forced implementation of a western style democracy. And when was the last time anyone from either of those countries killed a Westerner as punishment for their trespasses? Japan and Germany were every bit as regionally and dogmatically zealous as Middle Eastern adherents to Islam, but I don't hear them complaining now. The sooner the people of the Middle East move philosophically West, the better for everyone. And if we need to force them for our own protection, so be it.

Sicily9:

While I would agree that Democracies are not built overnight, I would disagree with anyone who feels that, just because a country, State or region has no experience with it, it can't be created. Case in point: Germany and Japan. The two could not have been more disparate from one another, or from the United States, but both have prospered and thrived in every sense since the forced implementation of a western style democracy. And when was the last time anyone from either of those countries killed a Westerner as punishment for their trespasses? Japan and Germany were every bit as regionally and dogmatically zealous as Middle Eastern adherents to Islam, but I don't hear them complaining now. The sooner the people of the Middle East move philosophically West, the better for everyone. And if we need to force them for our own protection, so be it.

I believe your analogies are false -- there are some substantial differences between Germany and Japan and countries like Iraq. Germany and Japan were much more unified before WWII than Iraq was before the U.S. went it. Those countries were much more ethnically and religiously homogeneous than Iraq ever was, and they were united under leaders who had great popular support. When Germany and Japan were defeated in WWII, the Germans and Japanese were defeated as a people; they were broken. It was that acknowledgement of total defeat that allowed them to accept the occupation regime and the transition to democracy. Furthermore, many people in those countries felt (after the fact) shame over their country's aggressive wars, and were willing to accept democracy as a more peaceful path.

In Iraq (and many other Middle Eastern countries), the population is not ethnically or religiously homogeneous. A defeat of the nation's military does not equate to a defeat of the people as a whole, because the people's loyalties are stronger to their clans and coreligionists than they are to the nation. Without accepting defeat, they will continue to resist. Furthermore, the Iraqi people will never accept a democratic government that cannot protect them from the other factions within the country. Since the populations of Germany and Japan were relatively homeogeneous after WWII, there was no civil war in post-war Germany or Japan for the United States to worry about crushing while trying to introduce democracy. Finally, Saddam Hussein may have launched aggressive wars against Iran and Kuwait, but I'd guess that the majority of the Iraqi people did not support him with same the ideological strength that the Germans gave to Hitler or the Japanese gave to their emperor.

There are a lot of dangers behind the phrase, "And if we need to force [the people of the Middle East to move toward the West philosophically] for our own protection, so be it." In the past, the United States has been able to force at least a couple countries toward the West, but that success totally depended on the cultural situation already existing in those countries. An analogous situation does not exist in most Middle Eastern countries. There are great perils involved in trying to "force" democracy on people who are not "prepared" to accept it. That lesson is being taught in Iraq right now.