With a philosophy of “ lets run it up the flagpole and see if it works’ coupled with a stubbornness that is supposed to convey conviction, another military “idea” has been proven wrong.
The attempt to have a partial victory as has been the American policy post WW II can be transcribed into a policy of lets see how much we can waste in American lives and dollars before we have to concede we cannot win. There is only one way to win a war and it cannot be done with accommodation of the enemy. It doesn’t matter if the enemy is a residual band of incompetents or a vicious cadre of killers. Either you conquer and establish a colony or you demand the establishment of a country that respects individual rights with a model in place before you even consider withdrawal.
I mention colonization because that is how Britain demanded proper behavior and it was certainly more rational than this sacrificial blundering we have been witnessing for the last five years. The very idea of a surge is an invitation for the enemy to redeploy. Common sense would tell you that if you attack aggressively in one arena an enemy will concentrate on places you are not concentrating on. Duh! The Democrats think the withdrawal of troops will give us some kind of relief from threats and the Republicans in typical me too fashion are starting to fall into the same lock step. Just as in the pre World War ll aggression of Japan, Italy and Germany our country is pondering how we can avoid war even as war is declared on us. With all the half hearted attempts that have been tried and failed you would think someone in Washington would speak up and say, “Mr. President , why don’t we just take over Iraq, install martial law and be done with it. We are relying on Iraqis to do what we think will be favorable to them and the rest of the world but we took no such stand and had no such hope after WW ll. Why do we not use the model of post WW ll Germany and Japan which will give us victory and a government in Iraq that we can live with?”
The answer is there is no one in Washington with enough guts, enough knowledge of what warfare means and know no other way than to sink in a soup of compromise.
Having deal makers working via committees does not serve the national interest. For all the talk of education and all the money that has been wasted if the best we can expect are graduates that nod their heads in unison at every hare brained scheme that gets public attention, there isn’t enough money in the world to get the kind of results the nation needs. The notion that radicals of Islam are the enemy should trigger a thought that perhaps we need a little radicalism from our side but so far all we have heard is the same old blather that has avoided victory in Korea, Vietnam and now Iraq.
If the war was a game and we were not winning the coach would ask what do we need to do to win. He would not ask how can we leave the field quietly and without too much fanfare. He would not ask if there wasn’t something we could do to convince the other team to look like winners even though they didn’t play by the rules. He would not ask to accept defeat as inevitable. But politicians are not coaches and the only win they understand is whether or not their opponent gets the job. You don’t see a politician talking of withdrawal if he sees a chance to win ( I give you Al Gore as an example ). Its all right to beat your opponent in the political arena but the battlefield seems to be a different breed of cat. What kind of a person fights with all his might to win and then sends soldiers into battle with their lives at risk and denies them the same ambition.? Only a misguided altruist (aren’t they all?) wiling to shift toward any variation of the same basic idea which is so wrong that without a quest for total and complete victory is doomed to fail.
The knuckle heads that speak of giving the surge a chance can now see the chance has been given and it cannot work. The choice is still either or. Either we win or we lose.
There is retreat, which the Democrats and some Republicans are advocating but that is only an appeasement, We will have to fight for our lives and our way of life somewhere and if we decide to keep retreating there will come a time where our backs will be against the wall, our enemies will be better armed and we will be hunkering in a corner wondering how did the worlds greatest military power sink to such a weak position.
The answer is simple.
We have to decide to fight to win and get this over with or we can continue to placate and retreat until the option will only be surrender. Now is the time to recognize that this war is real and we cannot hide from attack but must meet the enemy head on with the objective of pummeling him and all who support his agenda into the kind of state where there is a recognition that to attack the United States is an act of futility. There is only one way the thugs of Islam will recognize this and that is for them to witness the defeat they deserve. That means no holds barred.
Tags: Islam war
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