Next neo-conservative/administration meme: we stayed the course in the Philippines

“al Qaeda in Iraq” is the meme of the day (predicted here several weeks ago, because, although it supposedly emanates from the "organization" itself – per press reports -- it meshes so well with continuing to fool the very gullible or stupid into thinking George Bush’s Iraq War is part of the “war on terror”). Now watch for the next one to be something about sticking to it in the counter-insurgency we fought in the Philippines – and look how well that one panned out in the long run.

Before you say, hmmm, maybe they have a point there, consider the following rather critical differences:

• Whether we should have or not as a matter of moral judgment, or whether we conducted a counter-insurgency there with great cruelty as reported in many historical accounts, the United States actually owned the Philippines as a matter of international law. Asserting dominion within your own territory is a bit of a different matter from preemptive war on a false pretext against an independent country. In the one case, the mass of the population really has little choice but to go along with the legally-constituted power, at least temporarily. In the latter, your dominance, whether direct or indirect through a constructed government with a constitution and laws largely written in the capital of the occupying country, will never be accepted. That is especially the case when the very legality of your dominion under applicable international law is questionable.
• The Philippines had been colonized by Spain for 300 years. Accordingly, it was a Christian population (80%), heavily Catholic, with Spanish spoken by the educated classes. In other words, we had a bit more familiarity with the culture, certainly more than 36 people in-country who could speak Spanish (a number of Arabic-speaking Americans in Baghdad that has been cited).
  
• It was essentially over in two years, with the main rebel leaders actually pledging allegiance to the U.S.-sanctioned government. The Muslim faction that continued to resist for another 10 years from remote places? Now those were “dead-enders,” stragglers.About 7000 casualties (including wounded), although 4300 deaths (majority from disease). This was 1899-1901, remember. Total Iraq casualties (including wounded) estimated at about 45,000 so far.

The analogy, in other words, is extremely weak.