John McCain: No Substitute for Victory

Opinion Journal ^ | 10/26/2001 | John McCain

[Pokey78]

War is a miserable business. The lives of a nation's finest patriots are sacrificed. Innocent people suffer and die. Commerce is disrupted, economies are damaged. Strategic interests shielded by years of patient statecraft are endangered as the exigencies of war and diplomacy conflict. However heady the appeal of a call to arms, however just the cause, we should still shed a tear for all that will be lost when war claims its wages from us. Shed a tear, and then get on with the business of killing our enemies as quickly as we can, and as ruthlessly as we must.

[Lurker]

Dear John,

Sit down and shut the f*** up.

Thanks in advance.

L

[hawaiian]

No mountain is big enough, no cave deep enough to hide from the full fury of American power. Yet our enemies harbor doubts that America will use force with a firm determination to achieve our ends, that we will use all force necessary to achieve unconditional victory. We need to persuade them otherwise, immediately.

AMEN!!!

[The Vast Right Wing]

And exactly what about this do you disagree with? While McCain has been a thorn in the side of the Bush Admin and I have abhorred his shift to the left, on this issue he is correct. Perhaps watching the towers fall made him realize that he has one more shot at being a patriot again, and that is much more important than any petty differences with GWB.

[MHGinTN]

War IS hell. Let's get on with it ... sending our enemies to HELL!

[RIGHT IN SEATTLE]

Just another politician switching his rhetoric as he see's fit.

The dummy watches the polls!

[JennysCool]

Absolutely! We may have had our differences with McCain ... but he is spot-on here ...

[Pokey78]

ICK! Double posted by the WSJ, therefore double posted by me. Sorry. Corrected version (I think):

War is a miserable business. Let's get on with it. War is a miserable business. The lives of a nation's finest patriots are sacrificed. Innocent people suffer and die. Commerce is disrupted, economies are damaged. Strategic interests shielded by years of patient statecraft are endangered as the exigencies of war and diplomacy conflict. However heady the appeal of a call to arms, however just the cause, we should still shed a tear for all that will be lost when war claims its wages from us. Shed a tear, and then get on with the business of killing our enemies as quickly as we can, and as ruthlessly as we must.

There is no avoiding the war we are in today, any more than we could have avoided world war after our fleet was bombed at Pearl Harbor. America is under attack by a depraved, malevolent force that opposes our every interest and hates every value we hold dear. We must expect and prepare for our enemies to strike us again. As in all wars we must endure before we prevail. Only the complete destruction of international terrorism and the regimes that sponsor it will spare America from further attack.

As the president has explained, this war will have many components. But American military power is the most important part. When it is brought to bear in great and terrible measure it is a thing to strike terror in the heart of anyone who opposes it. No mountain is big enough, no cave deep enough to hide from the full fury of American power. Yet our enemies harbor doubts that America will use force with a firm determination to achieve our ends, that we will use all force necessary to achieve unconditional victory. We need to persuade them otherwise, immediately.

Fighting this war in half measures will only give our enemies time and opportunity to strike us again. We must change permanently the mindset of terrorists and those parts of Islamic populations who believe the terrorist conceit that they will prevail because America has not the stomach to wage a relentless, long-term, and, at times, ruthless war to destroy them. We cannot fight this war from the air alone. We cannot fight it without casualties. And we cannot fight it without risking unintended damage to humanitarian and political interests.

The United States is not waging war against a religion or a race. For too long our enemies have been allowed, even by America's purported friends in the region, to sow their hatred of us throughout the Islamic world. Should the conduct of our war incidentally help inflame that hatred it may indeed increase the threat to regimes in the Middle East and elsewhere whose stability is a strategic interest of the United States. But that threat will be infinitely greater should we fail in our mission or delay victory by one day longer than necessary.

We must reject appeals to suspend military operations to accommodate the religious practices of affected populations. Fighting during Ramadan is no more a war against Islam than fighting during Hanukkah and Christmas is a war against Judaism and Christianity. Nor should we agree to a cease-fire to feed starving Afghans. It wouldn't work anyway. The Taliban have no interest in feeding their people. Their only aim is to prevent our victory, and only our victory will alleviate the suffering of innocent Afghans.

It is clear that to destroy bin Laden and his associates we will first need to destroy the regime that protects them. To achieve that end, we cannot allow the Taliban safe refuge among the civilian population. We must destroy them, wherever they hide. That will surely increase the terrible danger facing noncombatants, a regrettable but necessary fact of war. But it will also shorten the days they must suffer war's cruel reality.

Nor should we delay or shrink from helping those Afghans committed to the destruction of our enemies. The Northern Alliance wants to destroy the Taliban regime. So do we. That is reason enough to give them all the air support and other assistance they need to take Mazar-e-Sharif, Kabul and any other Taliban territory they can conquer just as quickly as possible.

We have been sparing in the amount of ordnance we have dropped on the Taliban front lines. We have not yet employed B-2s and B-52s, the most destructive weapons in our airborne arsenal, against them. We shouldn't fight this war in increments. The Taliban and their terrorist allies are indeed tough fighters. They'll need to experience a more impressive display of American firepower before they contemplate surrender.

Munitions dumps and air defenses are necessary targets. But so are the Taliban soldiers. Those soldiers and their commanders will not become dispirited, abandon the regime, and become intelligence assets in our war against terrorists until a great many of their comrades have been killed by the United States armed forces.

The president of Pakistan, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, has been our good and steadfast ally in a war that would, if unsuccessful, threaten his regime. Pakistan has a legitimate interest in who rules its chronically unstable eastern neighbor. But al Qaeda and time, not the violence of our campaign, nor the ups and downs of Afghan politics, are the greater threats to our friend's interests and to ours. Keeping our priorities straight will serve all our interests best.

We have a great many interests in the world that were, until September 11, of the first order of magnitude, and the central occupation of American statesmen. No longer. Now we have only one primary occupation, and that is to vanquish international terrorism. Not reduce it. Not change its operations. Not temporarily subdue it. But vanquish it. It is a difficult and demanding task that will affect many other important interests, favorably in the long run, but in short run, in some instances, unfavorably. That cannot be helped, and we should not make victory on the battlefield more difficult to achieve so that our diplomacy is easier to conduct.

We did not cause this war. Our enemies did, and they are to blame for the deprivations and difficulties it occasions. They are to blame for the loss of innocent life. They are to blame for the geopolitical problems confronting our friends and us. We can help repair the damage of war. But to do so, we must destroy the people who started it.

Veterans of war live forever with the memory of war's merciless nature, of the awful things that had to be done by their hand. They did not recoil from their terrible duty because they knew that the freedom they defended was worth dying and killing for.

War is a miserable business. Let's get on with it.

[Lurker]

John McCain is an enemy of the Constitution who is attempting (quite pitifully) to redeem himself and ride on the coattail of President Bush in order to redeem his pathetic political career.

He is a neurotic little syncophant trying to gladhand his way back into the good graces of the voters of Arizona who were attempting to have him recalled from office.

There's an old saying; Even a blind pig finds the occassional acorn.

That saying assumes that the blind pig gets lucky once in a while. That's not the case here. I mean I can at least have a shred of respect for the blind pig. John McCain on the other hand didn't just get lucky writing this steaming pile of goo. (That's assuming he actually wrote it of course and didn't just fob the job off on some aid or a paid political hack)

Oh no, Senator McCain (I very nearly wretch using the title when referring to this vile man) wrote this in a calculated bid to appear like a friend to President Bush when less than 90 days ago he was holding the Presidents agenda hostage to his unconstitutional Campaign Finance Reform boondogle.

Well, some people may feel the need to applaud John McCain for actually getting something right for once but I do not number myself among them.

As I said before, John McCain needs to sit his dumb ass down and shut the f*** up.

L

[Tanstaafl]

Amen!

[Sonny M]

The actual saying is "even a blind squirrel finds a acorn" (nut).

[Lurker]

Sorry, but McCain really p***** me off.

L

[what's up]

McCain's words are true and on the mark here. I'm sure he wishes he were Commander-in-Chief, but I sure do appreciate him in this supportive role a whole lot better.

He will win over the right if he stays true. Even me who can't normally stand the guy.

[The Vast Right Wing]

Let me ask you again, what about his editorial do you disagree with. Perhaps this time you could actually make an argument instead of spewing ad hominem attacks. If you think he is an enemy of the constitution why? If it is because he is for campaign finance reform, then you must think any member of congress that votes for a law that is later deemed unconstitutional is an enemy of the constitution. I don't think he is an enemy of the constitution, I just think he is wrong on campaign finance reform. But since you raised the question, did you ever fight to defend the constitution? Have you defended your country or devoted any time of your life in service to your country?

[88keys]

McCain is right, but you are right too; I think he wrote this for the wrong reason(s) - he should just be quiet and go away, and let others with more credibility say the right thing! (unless he's re-reformed...always a possibility I suppose?!)

[Pokey78]

Chris Matthews will need to clean his pants and smoke a cigarette after reading his guy's words.

[Lurker]

I will answer your questions seriatum:

Yes, I think any member of Congress who votes for an unconstitutional law is an enemy of the Constution. That would include John McCain.

To answer your second question, I have fought and bled defending the Constitution and this country, just as my Oath required me to. (Not that it is any of your business in the first place.) If I remember correctly, the Oath I took said something about "defending the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic." When I was mustered out, the nice Officer in charge of the proceeding told me that while I was released from my obligation to the Marine Corps, I was most specifically not released from the Oath I took. They must have a different way of doing things in the Air Force or something. It appears that the pathetic Senator McCain (there's that ga g reflex kicking in again) has forgotten or willfully is breaking the Oath he swore in order to further his pathetic little political career.

Perhaps you are willing to tolerate his attempted rape of the First Amendment, but I am not, nor will I tolerate any of his 100 cohorts assisting him.

At the risk of boring the readers of this thread by repeating myself again, John McCain needs to sit his nasty backside down and shut the f*** up. It's becoming tiresome to watch him repeatedly prove himself an idiot.

L

[duckln]

Just another politician switching his rhetoric as he see's fit

He sure switched from the side of the 'fundamental muslims' in Yugoslavia by supporting a more vicious bombing campaign against the Serbs who had essentially the same grievance as us and the Russians.

Now he realizes that the 'fundamentalists' are the problem. He and Biden are putting their toes in the water at our expense. A tad sick I'd say, with these two yinging and yanging Bush.

[The Vast Right Wing]

I think you are just plain wrong to assume that any government official that votes for a law that is found unconstitutional is an enemy of the constitution. If that is the case, then the ONLY people not any enemy of the constitution are the supreme court. Surely this can't be the case. The reality is that reasonable people can have differences in opinion on what is and is not constitutional without being enemies of the constitution. If you believe that it is your way or the highway, well I feel sorry for you. Take your anger and hatred and point it at the taliban, not our own citizens that are trying to help out the war effort. In short GET OVER IT.

[Lurker]

John McCain is as big an enemy of the Constitution as is Ted Kennedy or the Taliban.

Reasonable people can indeed disagree. The difference between you and I seems to be that you consider John McCain to be reasonable.

I do not.

L