THE DIGNIFIED RANT
FOREIGN AFFAIRS AUGUST 2002 ARCHIVES
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"Screwed Up Priorities" (Posted August 31, 2002)
Germany has told the United States it will withhold evidence against Sept. 11 conspiracy defendant Zacarias Moussaoui unless it receives assurances that the material won't be used to secure a death penalty against him, Germany's justice minister said in remarks released Saturday.
This article is nice, isn’t it? Moussaoui is part of a conspiracy that killed 3,000 people, toppled the Twin Towers, smashed into the Pentagon, and only saw failure over Pennsylvania.
The Germans are upset this charming fellow could die as punishment.
What kind of scum are the Germans to balance his life against the lives we lost? And then judge his superior?
I strive mightily to convince myself that the Europeans are our friends. I try to keep in mind all that we have in common. I try to remember our shared struggles in the past. I try. I really do. But then somebody does something like this to just slap me in the face and remind me of how alien their minds are. More and more, as they just screw us over, I begin to think of them more as non-enemies. I enlisted in the military believing I might be needed to fight in Europe to protect them (I use the term "fight" loosely as I was just a radio operator). My faith in their friendship for us is eroded every time a politician speaks or I read an editorial column from there. I try to hope that ordinary Europeans think better of us. Won’t somebody over there at least try to show us you think us worthy of being a friend?
“Motivation” (Posted
The September 11 killers
began planning
their attacks in 1999 and settled on their targets in early 2000. I hope
this ends the ridiculous accusation that somehow the “disengagement” of the
Their hate had nothing to do
with the Palestinian issue except as a useful means of whipping up already
existing hatred even further. So let us at least agree that solving the
Palestinian problem before we take on
On to
“Why We Fight” (Posted
One author comes out against showing the images
of September 11 on the one-year anniversary of the attacks. He wants us to move
on and heal ourselves:
[D]rifting away might be the
psychological distancing that is a natural and essential part of the painful
process of grieving and healing. Mr. Brokaw said viewers could be warned that
the coverage might be upsetting. That's not all the networks and cable news
stations could do; they should make the editorial decision not to use this
footage, which is still profoundly disturbing. Replaying those scenes does not
serve a news purpose. There is no reason to think that anyone has forgotten
what happened in
The author goes on to say
that the constant replaying of the impact “brutalized” viewers in the days
after September 11 and served no journalistic purpose.
Perhaps journalistically, he
has a point. But if he thinks there is no purpose at all, I disagree strongly.
Should the networks display some restraint? Sure, there is probably no reason
to show it over and over, all day. There is obviously some dividing line
between appropriate and awful. But I’ll personally cut them some slack if they
make a mistake as to where that line is. I won’t be watching the news channels that day
lest my young son see all this. But refuse to use the footage? No, the networks
should use it. Remind Americans why we are fighting and why it is outrageous to
complain about the well being the al Qaeda and Taliban prisoners held in
The author says that one day
it may be appropriate to look at the images again, after we have healed. But I
think the time to view those images is now. The time to move on and heal is
after we have won. After we can take our children to a public place or large
event and not worry that we might be attacked, then we can move on. After our airports are places where we
eagerly anticipate our vacation or feel at home returning from a trip, rather
than places of apprehension, then we can move on.
We can move on when our
enemies are dead and defeated.
One day, it will be
appropriate to distance ourselves from the memories of that horrible day and
grieve and heal. We are far from that day.
"Hiding" (August 28, 2002)
Some opponents of war against Iraq, and perhaps some who favor it, are adamant that America can strike only if the UN Security Council authorizes the attack and if Congress authorizes war.
As a general principal on the Iraq question, I think we can still take action under the original Security Council authorization to eject Iraq form Kuwait and restore peace. Likewise, Congress authorized war and we have never formally ended that war. For both Congress and the Security Council, the ceasefire has only suspended hostilities.
If Congress wishes to, and if they have the cojones, they can exercise the power of the purse and forbid the President from spending money to fight Iraq. Or Congress can repeal the act authorizing military action against Iraq. If opponents of waging war are serious, they don't have to wait for the President to request a declaration of war. Nor does Congress have to sit and wait for the President to launch an attack before objecting. Congress has options it can initiate right now. The Security Council, on the other hand, is helpless to repeal its authorization due to our veto. Oh well.
That said, we can ignore the UN and still work diplomacy to gain as much support as we can. Congress is another matter. Though I do not believe we need Congressional authorization from a legal standpoint, Congress should declare war to demonstrate our resolve and to steel us for battle. As has been said, we don't do sneak attacks. We can't get strategic surprise in any case so why worry about it? (And it might do wonders to cripple Iraqi troop morale if they see the Green Machine coming months in advance of an invasion)
My main point is to object to the incomprehensible fetish for the legal niceties that so many insist we follow before we can so much as say "boo" to the Iraqis. Why should Iraq get the protections of the international community when Iraq has flouted those rules? Did Iraq get Security Council approval for their invasion of Kuwait in 1990? That was quite the regime change, if temporary. And what did Kuwait do to deserve this? They failed to submit to the shakedown for their lunch money that Saddam demanded. And what of 1980? Again, Iraq hardly sought Security Council approval before they invaded Iran and attempted to dismember Iran. Here at least, Iraq had a case to make. Iranian subversion, terrorism, and murder in Iraq were certainly hostile acts. Yet Iran was hardly about to invade Iraq. And the Iranians loudly proclaimed their support for the Palestinians while condemning the Iraqis as a lesser "Satan." And the Arab world quietly backed Iraq (except for Syria and, for a while, Libya) against Moslem Iran.
Hey! I think we can cite the Iraq precedent of 1980 for our invasion! Thanks Saddam! You're a gem! See you in Baghdad. We're coming.
“Hello?” (Posted
Is the Chancellor not
listening to us? What on earth is he talking about when he proclaims his surprise
that it seems it is no longer American policy to pursue futile UN inspections
and instead we want to overthrow Saddam Hussein? Schroeder and the other Euros
have been protesting an invasion so much that they seem to have forgotten why
they are protesting so much. Yes, we will attack and overthrow Saddam Hussein.
But Euro hope springs
eternal. According to the article:
European governments, including
But the constant surrender
offers by the Euros tell Saddam that the threat of force will always be just
that—a threat. And given the enthusiasm of Euros protesting our planned
invasion, the threat is not even taken seriously. At least
not a European threat. What are they going to do to the Iraqis, bleed on
them? Honestly, for a continent that likes to lecture us on our simplicity,
their ignorance of the basic requirements of making somebody believe your
threats is mind boggling. I’d sooner expect bunnies and kittens to drop from
C-130s and topple Saddam.
Our threat is real because we
will invade. The Euros would convene a conference or something and maybe, after
6 months of study, mildly reproach
For the last time, no, we
will not be satisfied with sham inspections that rely on the good will of UN inspectors and the good will and cooperation of
Saddam Hussein.
Are we clear on this? Remember Euros,you are protesting because
you are unhappy we will invade
Oh, and one more thing: we
will remember that you seem more concerned about Saddam’s fate than ours.
On to
I watched "We Were Soldiers" last night. My son is safely asleep upstairs. Mister is only 5-1/2. I know others younger than him know about September 11, but I have hid that from him. I never watch news of the war when he is awake. I never let him see the images of planes slamming into the World Trade Center. He loves planes and airports and I can’t take that innocent joy away from him and replace it with questions about how somebody could do that. Once, when Mister was playing, he showed me on the globe where his trains went—it was Afghanistan. I paused when I saw where he pointed. I just matter-of-factly told him that American soldiers were there getting some bad guys that had hurt us.
And as I shield my son from this war, I noted a couple months ago a certain Army officer taking command of a parachute battalion in Italy. I met him in 1997. We were both presenting papers at an Army convention. We showed each other our pictures. Me of my son and he of his children. His wife was there in the audience to watch him. My son was nine months old and I’d never been away from him up until then. Now this officer is in Italy, during war, probably away from his children for the Nth time since I saw him. It is routine for him and his children. I have no words to thank him for what he is doing for me, and for letting my child sleep in peace, unaware of the danger. That officer and so many other soldiers. Ours is a married military and children losing fathers and mothers will be routine. Yet still they go!
And when I think of our military and what it has done so far and what it will do in Iraq and elsewhere, my disgust for the Europeans grows. We are protecting them as we protect ourselves, and they haven’t the decency to hang their heads in shame for standing aside as we do the dirty work. As our soldiers die, leaving their children to grow up with a folded flag in the place of their father or mother, the Europeans equate what we our doing in our own defense with the inhuman pieces of living garbage who have sworn to kill us and who have already sent 3,000 to their graves.
Europe is nothing to me. After decades of standing beside them in the face of the threat of nuclear devastation, now they walk away. They cried for us when we were victims in the days after September 11, but now that we fight and win they have dried their tears and condemn us. Europe would die at the hands of our enemies and still apologize for offending the hands that killed them, even in their last breath. We shall fight. And we shall win.
And in fifty years, we will fight and beat the European Union bureaucratic dictatorship that will evolve. In so many ways, they are declaring loud and clear that they are against us and not with us. Shoot, we’re the only evil they see worthy of fighting. I’m just getting tired of fighting for them. And we will beat them too. I hope the British will be with us in that war. I trust they will be with us in this one.
I hope the European friends we do have can rouse their fellow Europeans from their fear-induced inaction before they are too far gone to recover. I cannot understand how they can refuse to fight for a good cause. Our cause! And if fighting these barbarians is not a good cause, what is? Are they incapable of anger over anything more significant than the Kyoto Treaty?
In regard to the Europeans, Andrew Sullivan put it well and I can do no better than to post his letter to Europe in full:
Memo to Europe:
Grow up on Iraq
This summer of phony war looks even weirder when you compare the European and American press. In London and Paris, Berlin and Brussels, the papers are full of speculation about war with Iraq. There are demands that parliament be recalled; there are rumors of potential cabinet resignations; there are secret polls showing the enormous unpopularity of George Bush among Britons. In Germany, the Chancellor is even making opposition to war a key plank of his re-election campaign. But in the imperial capital, thousands of miles away, a strange calm prevails. The Senate has just held hearings on a potential war against Saddam, but the administration says it is not yet ready to give testimony. Congress is in recess. The president has gone to Texas. Many Americans are on vacation. Newspapers are covering the issue, but it has yet to rise to an actual, impassioned, substantive debate. And there's little mystery why. Despite the efforts of anti-war newspapers such as the New York Times, polls consistently show somewhere between 60 and 70 percent of Americans support war. The president has rhetorically committed himself to such an outcome. Privately no one close to the administration doubts it will take place - probably this winter. Americans are not blithe about this war: it will be their sons and daughters who die in it. But neither are they prepared to ignore a threat to the West as dangerous as any we have faced.
And American response to European panic and resistance? It's perhaps best summed up by a slightly impatient sigh. "Europeans Queasy About American Power" is not exactly a shocking headline any more. It simply isn't news that the Guardian opposes the use of arms to pre-empt the re-emergence of one of the most evil and dangerous regimes in the world. It isn't news that the EU, as represented by Chris Patten, prefers to subsidize Palestinian terror rather than fret about the possible Iraqi use of biological weapons. American eyes simply glaze over at this habitual pattern of European denial and protest. If Europeans opposed even the war in Afghanistan, what chance is there they will support war against Iraq? Americans have seen it before. They'll see it again. Meanwhile, they have work to do.
But, at a deeper and more worrying level, it's increasingly true that many Americans simply don't care any more. They are used to Europeans instinctually opposing any use of military force; and they are used to reflexive (and often hypocritical) anti-Americanism from the European center and left. But added to this is a relatively new and unanswerable factor: why on earth, apart from good manners, should Americans care about what Europe thinks? Yes, diplomacy demands courtesy and "listening." But it's not at all clear what else it requires. Militarily, Europe is a dud, and well on its way to becoming a complete irrelevance. With the sole exception of Britain, the Europeans have contributed a minuscule amount of the money and manpower to defang (but not yet defeat) al Qaeda. They couldn't even muster enough initiative and coordination to prevent another genocide in their own continent in the 1990s. They have cut their defense spending to such an extent that, with the exception of Britain, they are virtually useless as military allies. And these cuts in military spending are continuing - even after September 11. If a person who refuses to lock his door at night starts complaining about the only cop on the beat, sane people should wonder what has happened to his grip on reality. Does he actually want to be robbed or murdered? Similarly, it is one thing for Europeans to say that they are ceding all military responsibility to maintain international order to the United States. It is quite another for Europeans to then object when the United States takes the Europeans at their word and acts to defend that world order.
And the need for such order has not been abolished in the last decade. The world is still a terrifyingly dangerous place - perhaps, with the advance of destructive technology, more dangerous than at any time in the past. It was once impossible to conceive that radical terrorists could acquire the capacity to destroy an entire city like New York or Rome. But they are now on the verge of that capacity, and last September demonstrated to the world that they would show no hesitation in using it. An average, bewildered American therefore feels like asking of nervous Europeans: just what about September 11 do you not understand? These murderous fanatics could not have been clearer about their intent and capabilities. They want to kill you and destroy your civilization. This must change the prudential equation when faced with a menace like Saddam Hussein. When a tyrant like Saddam is doing all he can to acquirre biological, cehmical and nuclear weapons, when he has already invaded a neighboring state, when he has used chemical weapons against his own people, when he is subsidizing terror elsewhere in the Middle East, when he has extensive ties to Islamist terrorist groups around the world, doesn't the benefit of the doubt shift toward those who aim to disarm and dethrone him? And doesn't the mass grave of 3,000 Americans in the middle of New York City change the equation just a little?
This is the core of Americans' puzzlement about not just European vacillation but passionate opposition to taking on Saddam. When religious leaders actually argue that the United States is more moraly troubling than a butcher who has gassed his own people and waged wars of incalculable human cost, then you know some moral bearings have been lost. You know that the forces of appeasement and moral equivalence are as powerful today as they were in the 1970s when faced with Soviet evil and the 1930s when faced with Nazi evil. In this regard, it is useful to compare the response of Russia and Britain, with the official EU and widespread European hostility to the use of American force in the world. Both Russia and Britain provided key aid in the Afghanistan mission and both governments have been supportive of American concerns over Iraq. Both countries are acting as if they too have a responsibility to counter international terrorism and to sever its umbilical link to rogue states like Iraq, Iran and North Korea. Russia, Britain and America may disagree on some matters - their interests won't always coincide. But they share a common understanding of the threat we all face and have found a practical response to it. This is the difference between cooperating and mere whining. And it's a difference Washington appreciates.
In contrast, the Europe-wide hostility to American power and ingratitude for the Afghanistan campaign are bewildering. It's worth repeating an obvious fact: If it were not for America, al Qaeda, with support from Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Hamas, would still be ensconced in Afghanistan, planning new and more deadly attacks against the West. If it weren't for America, it is a virtual certainty that London and Paris would have by now experienced similarly catastrophic events as September 11. If it weren't for America, militarized fundamentalist Islam would, with the help of millions of Islamist immigrants, be gaining even more strength in Continental Europe. Yet European response to America's world-saving Afghanistan mission has not been thanks, appreciation or support. It has been increased criticism of the United States for seeking to continue the job in Iraq and elsewhere. At times, it even seems that Europeans believe that America's self-defense is more of a problem for world order than terrorist groups, aided by local tyrants like Saddam, coming close to acquiring weapons of mass destruction. On this score, many Americans don't just differ with many Europeans, they are repulsed by their inverted logic and moral delinquency. And they have a point. In a recent essay in National Review, a conservative magazine, Victor Davis Hanson summed up a common American view toward European complainers:
"Iraq? Stay put — we don't necessarily need or desire your help. The Middle East? Shame on you, not us, for financing the terrorists on the West Bank. The Palestinian Authority and Israel? You helped to fund a terrorist clique; we, a democracy — go figure. Racism? Arabs are safer in America than Jews are in Europe. That 200,000 were butchered in Bosnia and Kosovo a few hours from Rome and Berlin is a stain on you, the inactive, not us, the interventionist. Capital punishment? Our government has executed terrorists; yours have freed them. Do the moral calculus."
Israel, of course, plays a central role in this divide. It is still shocking to read, say, the BBC's accounts of what is happening in Israel and the West Bank, compared with even the most pro-Palestinian of major media in America. It is almost a given in the European media that Israel is the problem, Israel the aggressor, Israel the immoral protagonist in the conflict. To read the Independent or the Daily Mirror is to see a world where Israel is always guilty until proved innocent - in Jenin, for example, where the Independent declared a war crime before any real evidence had been presented. The fact that Israel is a democracy, while there is not a single democracy in the entire Arab world, is ignored. The fact that Israel exists in part because of Europe's legacy of genocidal anti-Semitism is also conveniently forgotten. The fact that Israel occupies the West Bank out of self-defense in the 1967 war is also expunged from memory. The incidental killing of civilians in Israel's acts of military self-defense are routinely regarded as morally equivalent to the deliberate targeting of civilians by Palestinian terrorists. And the routine, vile, Nazi-like hatred of Jews, an anti-Semitism that is now a key part of the governing ideology of the Arab states, is simply ignored, or down-played or denied.
When Americans see these double-standards, when they witness reflexive hostility to Israel in the European media, they naturally wonder if anti-Semitism, Europe's indigenous form of hate, isn't somehow behind it. And when Europeans respond with outrage toward this inference, it only compounds the problem. We're not anti-Semitic, we're anti-Israel, they claim. But while the slightest infraction of civilized norms by the Israelis is trumpeted from the mountaintops, the routine torture, despotism, intolerance and corruption that is the norm among Israel's neighbors barely gains a column inch or two. And the mis-steps and human rights violations of other countries - China in Tibet, Russia in Chechnya, Sri Lanka against the Tamils, and most famously, Serbia against Bosnian Muslims - never quite make the sniff-test of outrage and action. (Remember: it was America who finally rescued the Muslims of the Balkans, while Europe fiddled and diddled.) In this context, it is simply natural to ask of Europeans: isn't it a little suspicious, given Europe's history, that it's Israel that always gets your critical attention?
Talk to many Europeans and their self-defense gets even worse. They will soon tell you that America's support for the only democracy in the Middle East is a function of the "all-powerful Jewish lobby" in Washington. It doesn't occur to them that references to such a lobby's subterranean influence are themselves facets of anti-Semitism so deep it barely registers. When the Guardian can run a column days after September 11 with the headline, "Who Dare Blame Israel?" you can see how deep the anti-Semitic rot has buried itself into the liberal mind. When the French have a best-seller on how the plane that crashed into the Pentagon was part of a CIA-Jewish plot, you can see why Americans are circumspect. When synagogues are burned, when Jewish cemeteries are desecrated and an anti-Semitic fascist comes in second in the first round of French voting, is it a shock that Americans see Europe as a place that hasn't really changed that much in fifty years in some respects?
There are, of course, deeper structural reasons for Europe's aversion to American power. By unilaterally disarming itself, Europe is making a statement about how the world should be governed: by mediation, diplomacy, international agreements, polled sovereignty. The American analyst Robert Kagan famously expanded on this theme in a much-discussed recent essay. The experience of the EU - the way in which ancient enemies like France and Germany now cooperate in a conflict-free, post-nationalist arena - is regarded as morally and strategically superior to America's still-tenacious defense of sovereignty and millitary force. What this analysis misses, of course, is a little history. The only reason the E.U. can exist at all is because American military force defeated Nazi Germany. The only reason why all of Germany is now included in the E.U. is because American military force defeated the Soviet Union. Europhiles mistake the fruits of realpolitik with its abolition. And they don't realize that the best and only guarantor of European peace and integration - now threatened from within and without by Islamist terror - is American force again. Instead of cavilling at such intervention, these Europeans should be praying for it - in order to save their own political achievement.
This is not to dismiss the serious questions to be asked about any Iraq war. Should it be a massive land invasion with over 200,000 troops - or a smaller force of, say, 50,000 supplemented by special forces? How do we prevent Saddam using chemical or biological weapons if attacked? How could this destabilize the region in worrying ways - as opposed to the right ways? Is Turkey on board? How do we cope with a post-Saddam Iraq? These are onerous matters and they deserve a thorough airing. But their premise is responsibility for world order. Europeans may believe that they have abolished realpolitik in their internal affairs, that national interest is a thing of the past, that military power is an anachronism. And within the confines of a few European countries, they may be right. But in the wider world - especially in the combustible Middle East - history hasn't ended and a new threat to world peace is rising, with the most dangerous weapons in world history close to its grasp. If Europeans believe that it can be palliated by subsidy or diplomacy or appeasement or surrender, then they are simply mistaking their own elysian state of affairs for the Hobbesian world outside their borders. They are misreading their own times - as profoundly as they did in the 1930s.
America, in contrast, has no option but to tackle this threat - or face its own destruction at the hands of it. The longer America takes to tackle it, the greater the costs will be. The threat is primarily to America, as the world hegemon, but Europe is not immune either. The question for European leaders is therefore not whether they want to back America or not. The question is whether they want to be adult players in a new and dangerous world. Grow up and join in - or pipe down and let us do it. That's the message America is now sending to Europe. And it's a message long, long overdue.
August 11, 2002, The Sunday Times of London
copyright © 2002 Andrew Sullivan
“10th Mountain”
(Posted
I guess the 10th
Mountain Division will have another role more strenuous than diplomatic
deterrence. Having fought in the mountains of
Take
"Are
We Chumps, Or What?" (Posted
I
know, I’m supposed to follow the Understandniks exhortation to contemplate
I
just can’t do it.
Our
presence in the Gulf, of course, is largely to prevent the local whack-jobs
from waging war against other Islamic states and therefore throwing the world's
gas station into chaos. Do they think we
enjoy hunkering down in isolated desert bases, sweating, and watching
"cleaned up" versions of "Leave it to Beaver" reruns? Do we thank God for the chance to sail into
local ports to refuel, worrying that somebody might have explosives packed in
their dinghy? Are we really such suckers
that we enjoy having the corpses of our soldiers dragged through the streets of
some God-forsaken Heck hole to enjoy the privilege of keeping Moslems from
starving?
As
to our disregard for Islamic lives, let me list some of our government’s help
to the Islamic world:
Keeping
the Soviets from occupying
Keeping the Soviets at bay against
Rescuing Egypt from the French, British, and Israelis (1956)
Sending an aircraft carrier to help Pakistan survive yet another war with India
(1971)
Imposing a ceasefire in the 1973 Arab-Israeli War before the Israelis captured
Egypt’s 3rd Army and marched on Cairo (1973)
Rescuing the PLO from Israel (and losing 250 Marines in a suicide
bombing)(1983?)
Rescuing Iraq from the Ayatollah Khomeini (1980s)
Keeping the Iranians from sinking Kuwait's oil tankers (1987-88)
Rescuing the Saudis from a threatened Iraqi invasion (1990)
Rescuing Kuwaitis from Saddam (1991)
Rescuing the Kurds from Saddam Hussein (1991)
Assisting with floods in Bangladesh (1991?)
Saving countless Somalis from starvation (1992)
Rescuing Bosnian Moslems (1995)
Rescuing Kosovo Moslems (1999)
Rescuing Afghanis from the Taliban/Al Qaeda dictatorship (2001)
Sending aid to help earthquake victims in Iran (2002)
These are just the things off the top of my head. I’m sure I have some of the years wrong too, but
the point is still valid nonetheless. Did we do this out of pure altruism? Of course not. But does that diminish the fact that we
helped Moslems? No. If we truly hated Moslems, we would not have
carried out these acts. "Let 'em
rot!" would have been our excuse to do nothing.
The
thing that really gets me is the assertion that we should feel guilt for the
Crusades. First of all, we weren't there. We didn't exist. Shoot, only the Indians knew
that
But
aside from that quibble, what of the Crusades?
Does the West really have to feel guilty over this? Let's see, Islam forms in the heart of the
Arabian peninsula and rides out on jihad overrunning the fragmented, weak,
dying remnants of the Byzantine Empire, and swarms into the Balkans, Spain (the
Moroccans are still clearly stinging over this as the Parsley Island episode
indicates), and into France. I'd almost
forgive them for invading France, but on principal I have to condemn it. (Kudos to the French for defeating the
Moslems at
The
West "took it back."
That's
right, Islam conquered it.
"We" took it back and then lost it again. And now we are condemned for trying to take
back what was ours. That is, if they'll
forgive the expression, a lot of chutzpah.
I'd say we have our own grievances to neurotically fixate on to obscure
the fact that we have failed our citizens on almost every level of cultural,
economic, and political well being. Oh
wait, we haven't failed on any of that (maybe culturally, given the Osbourne’s
and Anna Nicole Smith show). Silly
me. Never mind.
Now,
I'm not holding a grudge for any of Islam's past actions. I'm even ready to give them a pass for the
Barbary Pirates pouncing on our shipping just as soon as we kicked the British
out of our country. We hit them back and
we'll just call us even on that one, ok?
I think we can all just get along. But why do we need to apologize for
what we didn't do, keep helping Islamic countries and people despite their
condemnations, ignore what they've done to us, and generally wallow in guilt
over our military, economic, and cultural superiority? If the self-proclaimed jihadists really think
the Moslem world can take the West on, I bet even the French would give them a
Tours II walloping.
Me,
I don't think there is a clash of civilizations between Islam and the West.
Islam is probably no more intolerant than Christianity was until a couple
centuries ago. I am loathe to condemn an
entire religion and culture (ours is better, but I wouldn't force them into our
way, except when they move here: see Mark
Steyn for a good piece on cultural—not
ethnic—superiority) because some nuts are gunning for us. We just need to kill the nuts. But I am tired
of people trying to make me "understand" why the Islamic world hates
us and why I should somehow "understand" the rage that led to
September 11th. I'm all for
understanding the enemy. But I won't try to understand in order to rationalize
it. Let's just stomp who we have to stomp and when they complain, we'll say,
"You know, we just haven't gotten over that Islamic invasion of
“Invasion” (Posted
Ok, I’ve been off on other
topics related to the war but not actually on the pending attack. Time for as
much nuts and bolts as a former enlisted reservist can muster on the subject.
How will the American Army
(and Marines and British) get to
First, back to the basics.
The invasion force will be two heavy divisions, 101st Air Assault
Division, a Marine Expeditionary Force (a division with air support) plus extra
battalions in the region, an Armored Cavalry Regiment, 10th Mountain
Division (with two of its brigades?), a Ranger regiment, and maybe a brigade of
82nd Airborne Division (which is earmarked for Afghanistan now). The
British will provide a heavy brigade and an infantry brigade (Marine or
Paras?). Separate aviation brigades and artillery brigades plus all the other
supporting combat support and combat service support stuff. Plus carriers and
Air Force for air support.
Deployment will be the
mountain division in the north, with a Turkish corps. The rest in
The Air Force will deploy
combat aircraft in
I’m guessing no more than a
week of air strikes before the ground war begins. Precision weapons and the
need for speed will allow/compel us to make haste.
The Turkish corps will march
south toward
The Jordan-based units will
have the Army provide base security while the Marines conduct SCUD raids and
search and rescue for downed pilots in western
Advancing out of
The main drive will be on
either side of the
The Ranger regiment will be
available for a strategic target like a nuke site or a Saddam caravan.
If the Iraqis try to move,
air power will make their lives hell.
Special forces and
psychological warfare will try to get Iraqi army units to defect.
In the end, we will have
The big question is whether
Saddam’s minions use the chemical and/or biological weapons when he orders them
to fire them off. We can cope with whatever he can throw at us. The size of his
attacks and whether we are advancing rapidly will shape our response. If we are
winning handily, we may ignore his use of such weapons. If it bogs us down, …do
we still have neutron weapons?
One week of air strikes. Then
a ground invasion that takes us a week to get to
"Motivation" (Posted August 21, 2002)
The New York Times has an article on Afghan opinion of America’s presence in their country that is relatively surprising in its fairness. Although it seems to return to the issue of "things could go wrong at any moment" repeatedly, Ian Fisher does state clearly that most people interviewed are supportive of us and view America as guaranteeing stability. Most give us the benefit of the doubt despite some accidents because of our past conduct. Still, the author finds a vocal critic of American presence and follows with a quote that belittles the conduct that has earned us some good will:
One Western diplomat in the capital, Kabul, said: "They are trying to be more careful. And why is that? It's not because they are humanitarians. It is in their narrow interest to do so."
Given the brutality and callousness toward civilian casualties when noncombatants get in the way that virtually every other country practices when fighting an enemy, who is this diplomat to complain? I’ll take a leap of faith and assume we’re talking about a French diplomat. But really, it could be virtually any European. Civilians represent upwards of ninety percent of the casualties in modern warfare, and when we take care to avoid civilian casualties, our care is dismissed. It is significant to note that the diplomat could not even deny we take care to avoid civilian casualties. But the diplomat could not give us credit and instead assumed a more sinister motive of just taking care of our "narrow interest." Humanitarianism has nothing to do with it, apparently.
If it is truly just in our narrow interest (which it undeniably is) why are we virtually alone in our degree of care? If it was in the "narrow interest" of Russia to avoid civilian casualties they would not have razed Grozny. This is not just to pick on Russia, for if countries truly avoided killing civilians in their narrow interest, the percentage of civilian casualties would not be so high. Why is it that America thinks fighting clean is in our narrow interest when few others agree? Doesn’t that alone say something good about us? Clearly, most countries do not consider it in their narrow interest to avoid civilian casualties. Let’s give us some credit here. We at least try to avoid civilian casualties. We mostly succeed, too.