Do You Want Us To Win?
The latest hyper-Republican attack on war critics involves flinging the question “Do you want us to win?” aggressively in their faces. So typical this technique is, and quite insulting to human intelligence, for it is designed to paralyze the human mind and back it into a corner where there can be no answer but “yes” or “no”, as if there are no other complexities to the issue. It is no different than asking “are you for Jesus or against him?” or – “Does your momma know you are gay?”
There are in fact many ways to respond to this question, not the least of which is to point out that whether I want us to win or not is immaterial to the course of defeat and national bankruptcy we are actually on. Are we winning now? Plus, how does one define “winning”? Is the act of being bogged down in a middle eastern war that sinks our nation deeper into the hole of a growing catastrophic debt - winning? Is the constantly climbing death rate of our troops, who are in the midst of a civil war and a fight against an insurgency that uses guerilla tactics - a sign of our winning? Is the suspension of our Constitution and the establishment of a base for a police state dictatorship in the name of a false security – winning? Is fighting a war that can never be won – winning?
It is not “do you want us to win” but rather – “do you want us to survive?” “Do you want us to have anything left that is actually worth fighting for?”
This is not an attack on the troops, who are performing their job admirably in the worst of all possible conditions. But this illustrates one of the reasons we cannot win this war: our troops are performing a job, while our enemy is not!
It is the same situation that America faced in Vietnam: our troops were halfway around the world, performing what was to them a “job” and a “duty”. The Viet Cong were not just doing a “job”, they were ideological fanatics fighting on their home turf. For them it was a struggle to the death, and no amount of death was too much to accomplish the goal of defeating the invader, which was us. The same is true once again with the enemy we fight now. Soldiers who fight because it is their job do not have what it takes in the long term to defeat an endless supply of religious / ideological fanatics who are fighting on their home turf against a foreign invader, which in this case is us, again. The “job” mentality cannot win in this battle of endurance. The American people do not belong in Iraq; it is not our home. Most of our troops just want to finish their tour of duty and come home. They are not ideologically motivated like our enemies are. Furthermore, the American democracy that has previously backed this effort does not have the will for this battle over the long haul. Another election or two, and the war will be ended, no matter what the conditions in Iraq are (unless democracy becomes totally suspended, and a dictatorship keeps us fighting against the popular will) We cannot win this war. It is the Middle East, after all. What did we think was going to happen?!
I know references to Viet Nam can seem tiresome and overdone, but it was the only war where America has suffered a defeat, and the conditions in this current war are similar. Our people are becoming tired of seeing their sons and daughters, moms and dads dying in a foreign land, halfway around the world; men and women who are performing their duty against an enemy that is religiously-fanatically motivated to fight until they gain control of their homeland. The reality of the situation is that we cannot win. Every death in this war is senseless.
Think of how the collapse of the Soviet Union was hastened by the arms race. During the Reagan years it was calculated that American capitalism could sustain the pressures of an arms race without breaking, whereas the Soviet system would buckle and cave. An arms race was launched, and although America incurred massive debt, the Soviet Union died. Now consider that the same basic thing is being done to us. The attack on the Pentagon and the Twin Towers was not meant to destroy the US at once, but to get us to launch an all out war in the middle east. The Taliban were confident they could draw us into a quagmire like they did the USSR. I think they were surprised at how efficiently they were deposed. Nevertheless, the basic plan can continue, for the Taliban have returned with a strategy of “wear em down” and “wear em out” guerilla tactics. Then came the Big Blunder: we invaded Iraq.
American government meddling in Iran in the seventies (the Shah was backed by the US) coupled with American support of Israel, directly fuelled the Islamic Revolution in that country, which led to the Ayatollah Khomeini and the hostage crisis. When Saddam Hussein attacked Iran, the US govt. began to support and arm him, helping to make the monster that he became. When Saddam gassed the Kurds, the US govt. looked away, for he was performing a service that was useful to our short-sighted foreign policy. The people of the middle east were not ignorant of this, and when it surfaced that the US govt. had also sold arms to the Iranian govt. and in turn passed those illegal funds to the contras, it made us look even worse. After the Iran / Iraq war ended, Saddam invaded Kuwait, an act his govt. claimed was it expressly given a “green light” to do by the US ambassador in Iraq. Suddenly this former ally which the US had armed is our now enemy, and American forces are mobilized in Saudi Arabia. When Osama Bin Laden saw American troops in the Holy Land, he decided that America, the “Great Satan” was indeed involved in a plan to politically, militarily, and economically dominate the middle east. We had, after all, armed Saddam before we turned against him. America in fact has quite a history of arming its future enemies / past allies. When we speak of America’s responsibility in instigating this whole mess, this is what we are talking about. Our foreign double-dealing sowed the harvest we now reap.
Responsibility and blame are not the same thing. The “blame game” is a negative attempt to avoid responsibility, while responsibility is a positive attempt to step forward and assume the ability to analyze and correct the situation. The whole “blame America first” accusation is a political ploy meant to blind you to America’s need to take responsibility for its own dilemma. A responsible America is a nation that is mature enough to accept the consequences of its own actions, and which will step forward and assume an actual command of the situation it finds itself in, which necessitates an honest appraisal of past actions that have created our enemies in the first place, and subsequently played into their hands.
Al Qaida’s top leaders probably saw it like this: the only time America has been defeated was when it got bogged down in an endless war against an ideologically committed enemy that utilized guerilla tactics. America would get bogged down in an endless war on turf that was not its own; a divisive war that would tear apart the political and social culture, instigate a totalitarian response undermining the nation’s culture of freedom, and bankrupt its treasury, ultimately ruining its economy. In short, the events of September 11th were designed to be a sure-fire way to instigate America into the type of economic, political, and cultural quagmire that brought down the Soviet Union. Whether or not our enemies actually saw it with this kind of foresight is at least debatable, but the eventual outcome of our current course is not. To “stay the course” is to commit national suicide.
Victory equals the survival of the United States as an economically viable and truly free nation. Victory equals bringing our troops home from a hell in which they do not belong, and sparing their valuable lives. They too are American citizens, lest we forget. To achieve this victory requires us to change course, and to do it quick.
Now I ask the war proponents: Do You Want Us To Win?
- Werbinox
There are in fact many ways to respond to this question, not the least of which is to point out that whether I want us to win or not is immaterial to the course of defeat and national bankruptcy we are actually on. Are we winning now? Plus, how does one define “winning”? Is the act of being bogged down in a middle eastern war that sinks our nation deeper into the hole of a growing catastrophic debt - winning? Is the constantly climbing death rate of our troops, who are in the midst of a civil war and a fight against an insurgency that uses guerilla tactics - a sign of our winning? Is the suspension of our Constitution and the establishment of a base for a police state dictatorship in the name of a false security – winning? Is fighting a war that can never be won – winning?
It is not “do you want us to win” but rather – “do you want us to survive?” “Do you want us to have anything left that is actually worth fighting for?”
This is not an attack on the troops, who are performing their job admirably in the worst of all possible conditions. But this illustrates one of the reasons we cannot win this war: our troops are performing a job, while our enemy is not!
It is the same situation that America faced in Vietnam: our troops were halfway around the world, performing what was to them a “job” and a “duty”. The Viet Cong were not just doing a “job”, they were ideological fanatics fighting on their home turf. For them it was a struggle to the death, and no amount of death was too much to accomplish the goal of defeating the invader, which was us. The same is true once again with the enemy we fight now. Soldiers who fight because it is their job do not have what it takes in the long term to defeat an endless supply of religious / ideological fanatics who are fighting on their home turf against a foreign invader, which in this case is us, again. The “job” mentality cannot win in this battle of endurance. The American people do not belong in Iraq; it is not our home. Most of our troops just want to finish their tour of duty and come home. They are not ideologically motivated like our enemies are. Furthermore, the American democracy that has previously backed this effort does not have the will for this battle over the long haul. Another election or two, and the war will be ended, no matter what the conditions in Iraq are (unless democracy becomes totally suspended, and a dictatorship keeps us fighting against the popular will) We cannot win this war. It is the Middle East, after all. What did we think was going to happen?!
I know references to Viet Nam can seem tiresome and overdone, but it was the only war where America has suffered a defeat, and the conditions in this current war are similar. Our people are becoming tired of seeing their sons and daughters, moms and dads dying in a foreign land, halfway around the world; men and women who are performing their duty against an enemy that is religiously-fanatically motivated to fight until they gain control of their homeland. The reality of the situation is that we cannot win. Every death in this war is senseless.
Think of how the collapse of the Soviet Union was hastened by the arms race. During the Reagan years it was calculated that American capitalism could sustain the pressures of an arms race without breaking, whereas the Soviet system would buckle and cave. An arms race was launched, and although America incurred massive debt, the Soviet Union died. Now consider that the same basic thing is being done to us. The attack on the Pentagon and the Twin Towers was not meant to destroy the US at once, but to get us to launch an all out war in the middle east. The Taliban were confident they could draw us into a quagmire like they did the USSR. I think they were surprised at how efficiently they were deposed. Nevertheless, the basic plan can continue, for the Taliban have returned with a strategy of “wear em down” and “wear em out” guerilla tactics. Then came the Big Blunder: we invaded Iraq.
American government meddling in Iran in the seventies (the Shah was backed by the US) coupled with American support of Israel, directly fuelled the Islamic Revolution in that country, which led to the Ayatollah Khomeini and the hostage crisis. When Saddam Hussein attacked Iran, the US govt. began to support and arm him, helping to make the monster that he became. When Saddam gassed the Kurds, the US govt. looked away, for he was performing a service that was useful to our short-sighted foreign policy. The people of the middle east were not ignorant of this, and when it surfaced that the US govt. had also sold arms to the Iranian govt. and in turn passed those illegal funds to the contras, it made us look even worse. After the Iran / Iraq war ended, Saddam invaded Kuwait, an act his govt. claimed was it expressly given a “green light” to do by the US ambassador in Iraq. Suddenly this former ally which the US had armed is our now enemy, and American forces are mobilized in Saudi Arabia. When Osama Bin Laden saw American troops in the Holy Land, he decided that America, the “Great Satan” was indeed involved in a plan to politically, militarily, and economically dominate the middle east. We had, after all, armed Saddam before we turned against him. America in fact has quite a history of arming its future enemies / past allies. When we speak of America’s responsibility in instigating this whole mess, this is what we are talking about. Our foreign double-dealing sowed the harvest we now reap.
Responsibility and blame are not the same thing. The “blame game” is a negative attempt to avoid responsibility, while responsibility is a positive attempt to step forward and assume the ability to analyze and correct the situation. The whole “blame America first” accusation is a political ploy meant to blind you to America’s need to take responsibility for its own dilemma. A responsible America is a nation that is mature enough to accept the consequences of its own actions, and which will step forward and assume an actual command of the situation it finds itself in, which necessitates an honest appraisal of past actions that have created our enemies in the first place, and subsequently played into their hands.
Al Qaida’s top leaders probably saw it like this: the only time America has been defeated was when it got bogged down in an endless war against an ideologically committed enemy that utilized guerilla tactics. America would get bogged down in an endless war on turf that was not its own; a divisive war that would tear apart the political and social culture, instigate a totalitarian response undermining the nation’s culture of freedom, and bankrupt its treasury, ultimately ruining its economy. In short, the events of September 11th were designed to be a sure-fire way to instigate America into the type of economic, political, and cultural quagmire that brought down the Soviet Union. Whether or not our enemies actually saw it with this kind of foresight is at least debatable, but the eventual outcome of our current course is not. To “stay the course” is to commit national suicide.
Victory equals the survival of the United States as an economically viable and truly free nation. Victory equals bringing our troops home from a hell in which they do not belong, and sparing their valuable lives. They too are American citizens, lest we forget. To achieve this victory requires us to change course, and to do it quick.
Now I ask the war proponents: Do You Want Us To Win?
- Werbinox
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home