Marie Harf, spokesperson for the State Department, said yesterday, "We can't kill our way out" of the war with ISIS. That sounds so clever, it must be true. She adds that it's about creating jobs for these young people, and we'll twitter them out of existence.
Sometimes these statements are as stupid as they sound. The best deterrent for recruitment to ISIS is to kill existing members. Our inactivity or lack of resolve has gotten us to where we are today. The Administration will call it "leading from behind", another clever sounding statement that is actually as ridiculous as it sounds. What we need is Leadership. Where is the modern dayWinston Churchill? We need him desperately!
“Our inactivity or lack of resolve has gotten us to where we are today”.
ReplyDeleteWould you include this statement as one sounding equally stupid? Actually, our activity is EXACTLY what has gotten us to where we are today. Now, there is a never ending drumbeat by talking heads insisting what we need are “boots on the ground”. This is often repeated with no sense of supporting logic whatsoever.
Unfortunately, we certainly will need to do a good deal of killing. But, the idea of going into a third ground war is absurd. We’ve technically won two military victories already. The cost has been huge in terms of dollars, lost and maimed lives, and increased hatred from that part of the world.
The complexities of the Middle East seem beyond our ability to listen and learn. The multitude of sub-sects of the two primary branches of Islam is enormous. Loyalties of folks within those many sub-sects are frequently not with the artificial nation/states created by outsiders. The leaders of those nation states have most frequently been oppressive toward many of these groups. We have often been supportive of these oppressive leaders. Yet, we find it odd for some reason when these people ally themselves with ISIL when ISIL seeks to overthrow those repressive governments. Then, our solution is to kill them all?
More now than ever, people of this region themselves need to solve the problems of this region. Thus, we can continue to knock out leaders and cells of ISIL with drone strikes, fighter strikes, whatever. Only when Middle East interests themselves see ISIL as a threat will ISIL be exterminated. We are seeing the beginning of that now with the entry of Egypt and Jordan into the fray. If we decide to put “boots on the ground’’ yet even again, these countries will be willing to sit back and let us carry the load with our lives and our treasure, just as they have done in the past.
In ending, I’ll remind you of yet another cute but accurate little phrase. “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results”. And, please understand that I consider Winston Churchill a great personal hero. I also believe he had absolutely no relevance in this issue.
Ralph,
DeleteThanks for your comments, and we'll have to agree to disagree. Knowing what we know now, should we have gone into Iraq? The easy and popular answer today is "no", but I'm not even sure that is the correct answer. What do we know now that we didn't then? There were no nuclear weapons, although there were weapons of mass destruction (chemical weapons). We also know that Saddam Hussein is not around, and we haven't had a major (9/11 type) attack on the US since we went into Iraq. I actually don't know if I would have supported the invasion of Iraq, given what we know today, but I hate taking the politically correct way out.
You are also right that we had the war won, and we snatched defeat from the jaws of victory when we totally withdrew. I believe we should have left a peace-keeping force in Iraq, as recommended by the military. ISIS might have still developed in Syria (although we could have possibly prevented that also) but it would not have even considered coming into Iraq.
The Middle East is a difficult region to grasp. There has been violence there for thousands of years, but when they export that violence to the US, as on 9/11, I think we had to react to discourage/prevent that kind of aggression. It is a complex situation, but I believe that inactivity is not the answer.
Thanks again for your thoughtful response,
Kevin C
Ralph,
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, Winston Churchill is relevant because he represents a leadership that we are sorely missing today. There are many who would suggest that without him, WWII would have turned out very differently, and I am among those.
The Middle East is a complex and violent area and has been for thousands of years. We could debate whether we should have gone into Iraq and Afghanistan, it is a little late for that. We are there and we need to manage this in the right way. I agree that we should get others in the area committed to eliminating ISIS (Egypt, Jordan, Turkey and Saudi Arabia just to name a few), but I also think we need to get the Western powers in Europe to pony up, and I state that in my article.
Finally, while this Middle East is complex, there is one thing that is very simple. Evil needs to be confronted wherever is rears its ugly head, and ISIS is Evil. Most people credit Edmund Burke with the quote, "All that is necessary for Evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." I agree with Edmund.
We do need to eradicate ISIS, and even Muslims in the Middle East are agree with that statement (Sunni and Shia alike). I believe it will take ground troops from all of the coalition partners to do that and then we can leave a peace keeping force there so that we don't find ourselves in the position in another two or three years.
Ralph, thanks for your comments. I understand your POV and I think differ only slightly with your position.