On 5/12/07, Jim wrote: > > > Bringing up these attacks only serves to remind us that we've failed to > destroy an enemy (al-Qaeda) that has attacked us (as you note, multiple > times)
Personally I don't think we're going to destroy Al Qaeda anytime soon. Contain them, yes, but destory them? It's very hard to destroy an idea, even an evil one. See neo-Nazism in the U.S. as an example. while spending wildly to neutralize an enemy that never did (Saddam). So you think Saddam had perfectly harmless motives from an American perspective when he invaded Kuwait? When he tried to have former President Bush assassinated? When he paid thousands of dollars to the families of suicide bombers in Israel? The sad facts are that a) Iraq posed no actual threat to us, b) sadly most > terrorist attacks on American soil have been perpetrated by Americans and > c) > we've placed ourselves in a position where it's difficult to respond to > actual threats at home and abroad. This statement is so wrongheaded on so many levels, but it is clearly what you and many, many other people around the world believe. Saddam was on the verge of breaking the will of the Europeans to continue the sanctions regime in the UN, and he would have gone on his merry way and resumed his search for plutonium and the production of nuclear and biological/chemical weapons. Were we going to stop enforcing the no-fly zone in the north? I'd like to know, really, I'd like to know. Would you have supported leaving the Kurds at the mercy of a guy who gassed them and slaughtered them by the thousands? As to the difficulties we have incurred as a result of the war, no doubt we have paid a price. But that is the price of supporting liberty over tyranny. If we will not stand up and support the cause of liberty, who will? We've made Iraq the terrorist poster child. We could leave soon which, I > think, would turn Iraq into a terrorist playground or stay until things > are > "stable" which (if it's even possible) could easily consume as much time > and > resources as we've already spent; probably more. > > The Iraq war has dangerously weaken America. It will go down in history > as > one of the worst military blunders of our age. The Bush administration's > legacy will be mocking derision. So you think. Of all the post-invasion blunders, putting Paul Bremer in charge was maybe the biggest. Having Rumsfeld running DoD didn't help, either. Nevertheless, I think it is the willfulness of our enemies to spend lives rather than our own incompetence that has made the biggest difference in Iraq. Syria and Iran, in particular, have made every effort to derail the government of a democratic Iraq. The failure of DoD and State to push back on these countries is what has concerned me most. Once again, though, I go back to the big picture of what is at stake here. Iraq is the battlefield, but at stake is the course of the Middle East, the cause of freedom in the Arab world, and the place of militancy in Islam. If you think these people are going to stop attacking us because we leave Iraq, you are sorely mistaken. The Baathists are no longer even the big worry in Iraq. Al Qaeda and Iran are the main players now. They are fundamentally our ideological enemies, and there can be no long term peaceful co-existence between us. Our very existence as a nation, indeed the basic concepts of western civilization and democracy are anathema to Al Qaeda and to Iranian theocracy. Do we just ignore them and hope they go away? -- --------------- Robert Munn www.funkymojo.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| ColdFusion MX7 by Adobe® Dyncamically transform webcontent into Adobe PDF with new ColdFusion MX7. Free Trial. http://www.adobe.com/products/coldfusion?sdid=RVJV Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:234602 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
