After 9/11 we (our elected officials, high ranking analyst’s, generals, and the likes) likely built a prioritized list of countries that:
A- Supported Terrorism
B- Had long standing military and political grudges
C- If we demonstrated our resolve against it would be a example to the world that the US is done looking the turning the other cheek after being targeted by terrorists (Cole, Twin Towers, Pan Am, Beirut, Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania).
D- Would not start a nuclear war if we attacked.
The US has been attacked so many times in the past 20 years by militant fundamentalist Muslims that it isn’t even major news unless the numbers exceed triple digits. Check out this site (http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0001454.html) and tell me how many of these you could recite off the top of your head.
Even though in the back of my mind I feel that Iraq moved their WMD to Syria as they had their war planes in the first conflict, I will concede that personally I believe that the WMD objective and the UN declarations were an excuse to demonstrate how serious we were (a ’show of force’ so to speak) about this problem we had long ignored.
Immediately Pakistan, Syria, Libya, N. Korea all knew that the sleeping giant had awoken and they began to appreciate the seriousness of the US’s position. Of course this would upset the traditional geopolitical balance. Counties that long felt they could denigrate and attack (verbally and phyically) the US now worry they may be the next "Iraq". That may, if you look at it from a long term perspective, not be a bad thing. This demonstration of force to oust a dictator that abused his citizens and stole their wealth reduces the likelihood that we will need to do it again this half century. Meanwhile the average, non-foreign militant, Iraqi’ will get an opportunity to rebuild their country and regain their national pride. I am confident it will happen and no I don’t think the results should be measured in weeks or months.
Meanwhile, the militant Muslims are watching liberal media and bloggers like yourself nip at the heels of the elected US leadership and try to turn this into Vietnam warmed over. Don’t be fooled. Every enemy of the US studies past American conflicts that are deemed not ’successful’ by historians and develops tactics to recreate those perceived US failures. History has proven that because of the civility of the average American, they will not support conflicts that appear to involve uncivil means for fighting a war (save the civility of war sidebar for a latter date). No nation has yet won a conflict head-on, but a couple third world counties have created the appearance of moral victories, even though they lost thousands of soldiers more than the US by using non-traditional or guerrilla tactics.
Don’t forget being the sole ’super power’ in the world is a little bit like playing king of the mountain, it’s easier when everyone is not focused on you at the top.
After 9/11 we (our elected officials, high ranking analyst’s, generals, and the likes) likely built a prioritized list of countries that:
A- Supported Terrorism
B- Had long standing military and political grudges
C- If we demonstrated our resolve against it would be a example to the world that the US is done looking the turning the other cheek after being targeted by terrorists (Cole, Twin Towers, Pan Am, Beirut, Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania).
D- Would not start a nuclear war if we attacked.
The US has been attacked so many times in the past 20 years by militant fundamentalist Muslims that it isn’t even major news unless the numbers exceed triple digits. Check out this site (http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0001454.html) and tell me how many of these you could recite off the top of your head.
Even though in the back of my mind I feel that Iraq moved their WMD to Syria as they had their war planes in the first conflict, I will concede that personally I believe that the WMD objective and the UN declarations were an excuse to demonstrate how serious we were (a ’show of force’ so to speak) about this problem we had long ignored.
Immediately Pakistan, Syria, Libya, N. Korea all knew that the sleeping giant had awoken and they began to appreciate the seriousness of the US’s position. Of course this would upset the traditional geopolitical balance. Counties that long felt they could denigrate and attack (verbally and phyically) the US now worry they may be the next "Iraq". That may, if you look at it from a long term perspective, not be a bad thing. This demonstration of force to oust a dictator that abused his citizens and stole their wealth reduces the likelihood that we will need to do it again this half century. Meanwhile the average, non-foreign militant, Iraqi’ will get an opportunity to rebuild their country and regain their national pride. I am confident it will happen and no I don’t think the results should be measured in weeks or months.
Meanwhile, the militant Muslims are watching liberal media and bloggers like yourself nip at the heels of the elected US leadership and try to turn this into Vietnam warmed over. Don’t be fooled. Every enemy of the US studies past American conflicts that are deemed not ’successful’ by historians and develops tactics to recreate those perceived US failures. History has proven that because of the civility of the average American, they will not support conflicts that appear to involve uncivil means for fighting a war (save the civility of war sidebar for a latter date). No nation has yet won a conflict head-on, but a couple third world counties have created the appearance of moral victories, even though they lost thousands of soldiers more than the US by using non-traditional or guerrilla tactics.
Don’t forget being the sole ’super power’ in the world is a little bit like playing king of the mountain, it’s easier when everyone is not focused on you at the top.