Two Conflicting Thoughts = Intelligence

I just finished watching Donald Rumsfeld give a press conference - it seems the Syrians have decided to join the fun and help the Iraqis. Ever since the war began last week, I've tried to put my misgivings about it aside and focus on the task at hand - supporting the troops so that they can do their job quickly, get out, and get on with the rebuilding of Iraq. My misgivings were and are so numerous that recounting them in my mind is like watching a ping-pong match - for each reason on one "side," there's an equally compelling reason on the other. Genius indeed.

Here's a bit of that ping-pong match that's been playing in my head, first shared with AAR staff a week or so before the war began in response to some postings about why so many Americans are angry at the French:

The French government became the Vichy government in WWII in a way many other European nations did not. And, although it hasn't been highly publicized, the French are the only members of NATO not on the defense planning committee.

I think it's very easy to forget that appeasement was the European policy before WWII - for England and for France. The US was isolationist, but then Hitler wasn't knocking on our back door. We know that policy was a failure.

I know it's dangerous to share opinions on this stuff in a "mixed" group such as we are, but I'm personally so conflicted about the whole thing that I don't have any clear answers. William Safire wrote a brilliant OP-ED piece in the NYT last week about French companies selling Iraq contraband items, and this is supposedly behind their refusal to even consider a war resolution, but I read Safire w/a skeptical eye (can't help it - I'm a liberal!).

On the one hand I think Saddam's gotta go, on the other hand why now when North Korea is so dangerous, and would it have been had Bush not called NK/Iraq/Iran the Axis of Evil? On the other hand, so much of the opposition from the rest of the world is because countries like France and Germany are afraid of being neutralized in terms of power and are therefore flexing their muscle (isn't this why Spain is gung-ho, because they want to gain some power?). Then again, Afghanistan is a total mess and we've done very little to help the elected Karzai coalesce his power base. Then again, I do think that some countries purposely like to thumb their nose at the US. Then again, Israel needs to stop building settlements and leave many of the ones they built and kick out Sharon, who's always been little more than a thug.

Then again, ... well, this could go on forever.

My biggest frustration boils down to this: while there's all this focus on how many civilians may have been killed so far, which plays right into the Arab street, there's no "on the other hand" from the Arab street - no count of how many Iraqis Hussein has killed and tortured over the years or even since breakfast. And we seem to live in an age when the anti-war movement isn't against an "unjust" war like Vietnam, the anti-war movement is against any war at all. It would be great if we could all live in peace and harmony, but Saddam and his gang are violent and virulent, and proof of that comes from people who have lived to tell the tale. The rest of their fighting dirty is despicable and yet should have been expected (and some of it was), but executing POW's goes beyond the pale for me. I only hope that his behavior begins to turn off some of those states tacitly supporting him, like the French and the Russians, the latter of whom are selling weapons not only to the Iraqis, but to the Syrians, who now are forwarding that equipment to Iraq.

One of the scarier things I've read is that the rest of the world is more fearful of an unchecked US than they were when the US and the USSR were locked in a cold war. I would have thought the dangers to Europe when the Soviet bloc was nestled up to western Europe would have been far more scary. What's scary to me is that there are countries out there who would rather bury their heads in the sand than try to come up with real, workable solutions to problems. I'm not sure what those solutions are, but I know what they aren't.

Make sure to read everything Fareed Zakaria writes for Newsweek; he understands the region, and though he was for the war, he's a voice that understands where we're making our mistakes. We need to know this and not get caught up in biased reporting on the left or the right that makes it sound as though we're doomed or that it'll be a cake-walk. I disagree strongly with those on the right who would have us believe that we're all being brainwashed by the liberal media into believing we've gotten ourselves into a disaster; I'm smart enough to discern the truth from the variety out there in print and television and I know you are too. It's neither a disaster nor a cakewalk, but it would be a mistake to believe making democracy out of the Middle East is going to suddenly emerge from the war, which is what I think the "biased" liberal media is trying to remind us through their reporting.

War is war - innocent women and children will die as surely as they have died in every modern war, and yet the US is trying extremely hard to prevent civilian casualities. On the one hand, this is the right thing to do, but on the other, well, I won't go there.

TTFN, Laurie Likes Books