Posted on 02/08/2002 7:29:56 AM PST by jays911
The Longest War
The fight we’re in didn’t begin on September 11; it started thousands of years ago. It’s the struggle between East and West, and history can both encourage and help us—if we read it properly. by Victor Davis Hanson
About as many americans were killed in the terrorist attacks of September 11 as at Lexington and Concord, at the Alamo, at Fort Sumter, on the Lusitania, and at Pearl Harbor combined, all of which precipitated Americans’ entry into major wars. Where else can we turn but to history to make sense of such carnage? Yet many facile comparisons that are being made with the past are fraught with error. They tell more of our own popular perceptions of culture than of the real lessons of history, and they misinform us about every element of the situation, from its underlying politics to the nature of the terrorism involved, the proper role of the military in our nation’s survival, the broader cultural context, and the true philosophy of war itself
One, complete annihilation turning the entire region into a glowing mass of molten glass followed by a country by country, house by house search and extermination of any survivors.
Two, completely cut any and all ties with the entire region. Finding an alternative source for energy, be it Russia or solar power etc, is the key. This would be followed by immediate and permanent expulsion of any foreign nationals from the entire region This of course, leaves the sticky situation of Israel. That is a conundrum.
Still, given the two options, I’d advocate the latter.
Owl_Eagle
”Guns Before Butter.”
And Russia will be coming on-line soon.
Many of these countries have lived on the equivalent of welfare for the last 50 years. they have not developed any products or services that the rest of the world wants, and they have deliberately kept their citizens ignorant.
Something in this formula is going to give.
Russian lines will help considerably and we should get our own on line quickly before the potentially huge Chinese demand makes this situation worse. We are like babies suckling at the nipples of Saudi/Muslim oil.
In that regard, it is hard to learn from war, which Thucydides called “the harsh schoolmaster.” It shatters our modernist assumption that we can change the nature of man and eliminate the Neanderthal need to resort to arms. America at the beginning of the millennium, awash in wealth, luxury, and learning, was convinced that our enemies were either ignorant, misinformed, or temporarily insane—not evil, and certainly not rationally evil. And so in place of strong military preparation and the swift responses to aggression that had been the wisdom of the ages, we wanted lawyers to handle war as a criminal matter, or we thought we could avoid it through conciliation and mediation, or by buying off our enemies with money, kindness, education, apologies, or, as a last resort, the occasional Tomahawk missile. It didn’t work with bin Laden. He, after a career of bombing Americans around the world, reckoned that we were decadent and soft and would continue to tolerate the killing of our people.
Had Gore been in office, I believe the legal pettifoggers who would wish to "handle war as a criminal matter" would have had far greater influence on our response to the attack. It's possible that some pissant tomahawk bombardment once again would have been the full extent of it.
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