Sorry I've been away. I took a vacation, and I haven't really felt like posting since. I'm getting weary of it all and haven't thought I had much of an original contribution to make. So I'll talk about that and hopefully I'll bring myself around. Or not, let's see.
Osama bin Laden clearly misjudged the United States short-term response to the 9/11 attacks, thinking he could draw us into an extended guerrilla war in Afghanistan (a la Soviet Union). We kicked terrorist butt by matching their asymmetric attack with our own brand of asymmetry (Special Forces and JDAMs). But Osama may have been correct in thinking us to be a weak, impatient society ready to crumble.
In any war there will be times when victory seems an eternity away and the temptation to give up is great. We are in one of those times now in Iraq. While things are clearly getting better the security situation is still poor and the poor performance of the Iraqi police and security forces make it unlikely that it will change in the near future. Things seem pretty bad.
Once one steps back from the distressing media reports from major media outlets the negativity of the situation seems much more suspect. Many of the links on my blogroll to your right have letters from servicemen who have first-hand knowledge of the situation in Iraq and say that the media greatly exaggerates all negatives while ignoring positive developments. This is unfortunate in that it provides normal people with a distorted view of the true situation.
And yet, even with the media's excessively negative portrayal of Iraq there is no excuse for the lack of resolve displayed by many in the formerly pro-war category (the anti-war people have the excuse of being idiots [or at least woefully misinformed]). Support for the war has fallen significantly and now may be below the .500 level. Are we to give up this easily? Was Osama correct in calling us weak and impatient fools?
I hope not, but it is beginning to look that way. By any rational measure our post-9/11 course has been a resounding success. Al Qaeda has been weakened and splintered, its ability to pull-off massive coordinated attacks destroyed. Saddam Hussein ... rotting in jail. The people of Iraq and Afghanistan ... more free than ever. Attacks on U.S. soil ... ZERO. American military dead ... fewer than a thousand. And yet still we prevaricate and navel-gaze with the 9/11 hearings and the Abu Ghraib prisoner crap.
Hello people, we are winning! Merely because we aren't hearing an unending stream of only good news does not mean we face defeat. If the U.S. had given up after the first six months of WWII when the news was unendingly bad, where would we be? We must have the same level of resolve in facing our own battle. It's time for people to buckle up for the long haul. This will be a "long, hard slog" to quote Rumsfeld. It would be better if we could just snap our fingers and change terrorists to law-abiding citizens, but that's not the way the world works. It's time to pull yourself together and quit yer bitchin'.
6 comments:
So no matter how terrible it gets, no matter how many people's lives are lost, no matter what, we should just support the war? Blindly follow along waving our flags and chanting capitalist slogans to sell things. "Just do it!" or "Do the Dew!"
Isn't the beauty of the U.S. that people are allowed to protest and tell the government they are wrong even when it comes to war? Isn't that one of the reasons this is such a great country? Isn't bitching about the government part of American tradition, why we love this great nation of ours? I know it is why I do. So I will continue bitching as long as I want tyvm.
The Purple Princess of Power, HRH
Far be it from me to take away from a person's right to be an idiot. I'm not saying that people who are idiots should be killed, but they should think about the consequences of their actions. If anti-war fools are successful in ending our dreadful "occupation" the consequences would be horrific. We could count on emboldening terrorists to strike us and governments to harbor them. That would be so wonderful, let's go protest now!
I'll get my combat boots...
The Purple Princess of Power, HRH
So, I have to know...purple princess, are the combat boots to wear in a demonstration or to go fight the evil empire???
And, Carl, thanks for the inspiration that we are winning. Now I want your perspective on the future of the Iraqi people actually being able to govern themselves without Big Brother America right there to hold their hand. Is any Muslim nation able to make it as a democracy or do they need a big Kauhuna-type to boss them around?
---the Queen Mother
Both Queen Mother, both.
I don't know if the Iraqis will be able to build a successful democracy. But if it works, it could establish an example for other Middle Eastern countries that could lead to the end (or at least greatly diminish) the threat of radical Islamic terrorism. The "root cause" of which is Arab failure (see the archives of den Beste's USS Clueless for more). It would require a fundamental change in the prevailing strain of Islam but it's worth a shot because it's the best path to our ultimate victory. The alternative is of course that there is no Middle East, and significantly fewer Americans.
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