Terrorism is the New Communism
it is the global (read, it threatens us) "threat" we seek to eradicate, and in so doing, we invade other countries and alienate most of the rest of the world. meanwhile, we weaken ourselves here at home, and become more and more as vulnerable as the marine barracks in beirut became, until, one day, POOF.
Vietnam is to communism as iraq and afghanistan are to "terrorism." geography versus ideology, war of words versus war among armies.
i was watching a program about the vietnam war the other day, and one of the sound bytes was of a politician saying something like "we entered vietnam to stop the spread of communism," which, by the way, did not prevent communism from overrunning that country, and it remains until today.
communism, however, looks almost benevolent compared to the threats we face today.
bush uses almost the same rhetoric, saying that we invaded afghanistan and iraq to "prevent the spread of terrorism," and that's not working out so well, either.
maybe we should pay attention to the lessons of history and change our foreign policy so that we wait for "them" to come to us; fortify our defenses rather than overspend on our offense. "pre-emption" has not been working out so well, for those who hadn't noticed. in iraq, i predict we'll "cut and run" (in the words of our enemies, anyway), which will weaken us even further in the eyes of the rest of the world, and make us more vulnerable to the tide of mini bin ladens that are rising up and being born around the world.
and i just cannot believe that condaleezza rice is continuing to be the only nation to refuse the cease fire. bush is already a pariah, to put it mildly, in the international community, and this pushes him closer and closer to the precipice. it just adds to the enormous, stinking manure pile of reasons why the arab/muslim world hates us so bitterly. i cannot fathom how he does not understand that, nor how a woman as intelligent as rice could continue to be a mouthpiece to such an administration.
i just don't know. it's amazing to me how closely militant islamists were paying attention to the 1983 bombing of our marine barracks in beirut; bin laden referred to it as proof that americans are weak, that we "cut and run" while the terrorists are happy to continue to commit suicide till kingdom come (well, that's kind of the point, for them, isn't it?).
and israel is encountering the same dynamic we did in vietnam, afghanistan, and iraq, and the same one the russians encountered in afghanistan; the enemy is much more fortified, dug in, and elusive than first thought.
i wonder if israel will settle into a moderate-level "siege" of sorts, conducting military operations here and there to root out various hezbollah cells, but never really getting to the core of what's going on, the way we have so far in our "war on terror."
the problem with a war on "terror," and probably also one on "communism," is that we've declared war on something invisible and intangible. we're fighting with an idea, an ideal, and that's incompatible with men and arms and aircraft. it hasn't been "operationalized," so to speak--we have not defined specifically what our target is--a particular group of people, a particular army, a particular leader.
until then, our "war on terror" will continue to bleed into various other categories and corners and projects and missions (pun intended, i guess). we'll keep floundering until we give up floundering, or are made to give up.
in the meantime, i think we are growing more vulnerable here at home day by day to another attack. it's like a time bomb, literally and figuratively.
i'm not sure i think israel is living on borrowed time; i think that would be premature to say. but i do wonder how many lives they have left, of their nine, so to speak, if they were like a cat. as long as we continue to back them, they'll be ok, i suppose, but we're not the overwhelming superpower we once were, and iran and others are gaining influence in the region and the world.
i wish i could devote my education to working on my writing so that when i do write after i graduate i would already have a fluid style and vocabulary, etc. the creative non-fiction writing class if full already, for the fall. i really wish i could take a super advanced writing class of extremely high quality. hmm.
Vietnam is to communism as iraq and afghanistan are to "terrorism." geography versus ideology, war of words versus war among armies.
i was watching a program about the vietnam war the other day, and one of the sound bytes was of a politician saying something like "we entered vietnam to stop the spread of communism," which, by the way, did not prevent communism from overrunning that country, and it remains until today.
communism, however, looks almost benevolent compared to the threats we face today.
bush uses almost the same rhetoric, saying that we invaded afghanistan and iraq to "prevent the spread of terrorism," and that's not working out so well, either.
maybe we should pay attention to the lessons of history and change our foreign policy so that we wait for "them" to come to us; fortify our defenses rather than overspend on our offense. "pre-emption" has not been working out so well, for those who hadn't noticed. in iraq, i predict we'll "cut and run" (in the words of our enemies, anyway), which will weaken us even further in the eyes of the rest of the world, and make us more vulnerable to the tide of mini bin ladens that are rising up and being born around the world.
and i just cannot believe that condaleezza rice is continuing to be the only nation to refuse the cease fire. bush is already a pariah, to put it mildly, in the international community, and this pushes him closer and closer to the precipice. it just adds to the enormous, stinking manure pile of reasons why the arab/muslim world hates us so bitterly. i cannot fathom how he does not understand that, nor how a woman as intelligent as rice could continue to be a mouthpiece to such an administration.
i just don't know. it's amazing to me how closely militant islamists were paying attention to the 1983 bombing of our marine barracks in beirut; bin laden referred to it as proof that americans are weak, that we "cut and run" while the terrorists are happy to continue to commit suicide till kingdom come (well, that's kind of the point, for them, isn't it?).
and israel is encountering the same dynamic we did in vietnam, afghanistan, and iraq, and the same one the russians encountered in afghanistan; the enemy is much more fortified, dug in, and elusive than first thought.
i wonder if israel will settle into a moderate-level "siege" of sorts, conducting military operations here and there to root out various hezbollah cells, but never really getting to the core of what's going on, the way we have so far in our "war on terror."
the problem with a war on "terror," and probably also one on "communism," is that we've declared war on something invisible and intangible. we're fighting with an idea, an ideal, and that's incompatible with men and arms and aircraft. it hasn't been "operationalized," so to speak--we have not defined specifically what our target is--a particular group of people, a particular army, a particular leader.
until then, our "war on terror" will continue to bleed into various other categories and corners and projects and missions (pun intended, i guess). we'll keep floundering until we give up floundering, or are made to give up.
in the meantime, i think we are growing more vulnerable here at home day by day to another attack. it's like a time bomb, literally and figuratively.
i'm not sure i think israel is living on borrowed time; i think that would be premature to say. but i do wonder how many lives they have left, of their nine, so to speak, if they were like a cat. as long as we continue to back them, they'll be ok, i suppose, but we're not the overwhelming superpower we once were, and iran and others are gaining influence in the region and the world.
i wish i could devote my education to working on my writing so that when i do write after i graduate i would already have a fluid style and vocabulary, etc. the creative non-fiction writing class if full already, for the fall. i really wish i could take a super advanced writing class of extremely high quality. hmm.
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