Verbosities

There's a discussion going on in the comments at Otis' blog, to which I contributed a comment. First, some context - the italics in Otis' clip are from a question to which he's responding:



Rapid Eye Reality - Tuning Up

What do you do?



Without question, I hunt down the organizers of the terrorist groups and I kill them. I kill them in such a way that there is no question that I intended to kill them. I continued to kill them until there are no more to kill.



So, most supporters of the current war would suggest that's what we're doing in Iraq. We're working to kill the people who tried to kill us. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a lot of evidence to support that. I've yet to see evidence that Iraq provided serious support to Osama Bin Laden or his people. I've yet to see serious evidence that Saddam had much success in building weapons of mass destruction. So, launching an assault on Iraq and deposing Saddam might have been a good idea. I'm not saying it wasn't. What I'm saying is, 9/11 wasn't justification for it. What I'm saying is America is in the middle of a crisis of its own making and the only people winning are the Haliburtons of the corporate world.



People sound so hopeless. What possible series of US/world events leads to people sounding hopeful?



Maybe I'm being naive. Maybe there was reason to occupy Iraq for four-plus years in an effort to fight terrorism. Maybe the trillions we've spent destroying and rebuilding Iraq is actually making my family safer. However, I don't think that.



I have an in-law who once said, "If we don't find them over there, your son will have to fight them over here."



My question: Who is "them?" Iraqis? Muslims? Middle Eastern people? Brown people?



Supporters of the war seem to draw a clear connection between The War on Terror and the occupation of Iraq. I don't see one.



So, what of hope? What would make me hopeful?



Hard to say anymore I guess. Looking back, I wish we would've spent trillions in covert missions and undercover work to find and kill terrorists. I wish we had not gone to war in Iraq. Had we decided to depose Saddam, I wish it would've been a CIA mission as opposed to a full-scale military assault. I wish we would've listened to the intelligence about the insurgency problems we were sure to face. I wish thousands of American soldiers hadn't had to die for a war with no clear goal or exit strategy.



But, hope in one hand, yada, yada.



So, what would give me hope now?



A gradual drawdown of the American presence in Iraq.



A clear timetable for our eventual exit.

Ken Prevo, in the comments:

You've observed the type of people that get involved in seeking power. If you can solve that situation with the simplistic demands your cite in your article, it would seem you've lost understanding of the process that gets us into these situations.



It is great to have a collection of ideals to espouse. You and the beauty pageant winner who wants to end world hunger are in good company.



Quoting NYT op-ed's aren't the way to win over a lot of us. Balanced isn't part of their editorial process on that page.



You indite the politican and I don't have a problem with that. I tend to indite the media. All they want to give us today is body counts. Who are the Iraqi people? What are their goals? Where is it better? Where is it worse? Is that on my nightly news? No, but I can find it on the Internet without problem.



I mentioned Michael Yon's site in my weekend blog. I come from that with a different picture. It isn't handing out simple solutions but it shows an important side that is left out by those with your more liberal view.



The fact is we are in a shitty situation that should have never happened. So, do we go for a shitty exit strategy that runs that cesspool up over the hipboots? That isn't being answered by the liberals or anybody else. Simple reason why...there isn't a simple answer.

My comment:



I'd like to address this quote from Mr. Prevo:



"The fact is we are in a shitty situation that should have never happened. So, do we go for a shitty exit strategy that runs that cesspool up over the hipboots? That isn't being answered by the liberals or anybody else. Simple reason why...there isn't a simple answer."



This argument is built around the idea that the only solution to the current military morass is to find a way to make the military strategy successful. It's a rhetorical construct that was designed to keep the focus of the conversation on the war and the troops and away from alternate strategies such as diplomacy. Since you can't be against the "Great War on Terror" because of 9/11, and you can't be against the troops, if the conversation centers here, warmongering with specious connections to terror becomes a self-perpetuating notion, and nearly unopposable.



Random101 gave you a thought exercise Otis, and I'd like to offer the same to Mr. Prevo. What happens if we do withdraw our troops from Iraq? Wait, before you answer, here's your level of difficulty - all those PNAC/AEI/Weekly Standard pundits who were wrong about the consequences of getting in to this war must be assumed to be wrong about the consequences of getting out.



So, do we go for a shitty exit strategy that runs the cesspool up over the hipboots? Yeah, we do. There's your answer. Let's not wring our hands and pretend that the possible genocide of Kurds matters to us when the Darfur tragedy continues to unravel in small print in the back pages of our newspapers. Nation building and the installation of friendly governments who will give us (read: US-based corporations like Halliburton) control of oil resources is the priority. Terrorism is the enabling force that gives the American public the sense of righteous purpose that allows these invasions, coups and occupations to occur.



(By the way, Iran is going to be as much about oil as nukes, as an Iran without leverage can't get in our way to pipe oil out of the Caspian Sea.)



So am I saying that our war in Iraq is not a righteous battle for the future of free society in the face of Islamic extremism? Damn right I am. Terrorism is a multi-faceted problem, for which there are a variety of solutions - but none of those solutions involves or involved invading and occupying Iraq.



Terrorism is a law-enforcement problem, where we must develop the capabilities to infiltrate and dismantle groups intent on executing attacks before they happen. Terrorism is an education problem, where we must regain credibility as a positive force for the good of humanity with the people in that region of the world, so that the reasonable and moderate Muslims will work with us to push their fringe elements farther and farther out of legitimacy. And terrorism is an economic problem, one in which free markets, trade, and self-determination for all people in that region of the world will help stem the tide of disenfranchised despair.



And yes, sometimes there will be a military solution to terrorism, such as with the Taliban and their inextricable ties to al Qaeda. But it is an economically independent and educated society that trusts the United States that is less likely to breed this dangerous form of discontentment, and it is the Bush administration's historical albatross that they have chosen to ignore these truths in favor of illegitimate warfare.

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