Hawk, I believe I understand the way your mind works.
Take one of the worst visions of world future you can imagine:
(Why not one where we're all ruled by oppression and all freedom is lost and, for good measure, throw in the loss of millions of American lives getting there?)
Of course that sounds a little science fiction/video game, chicken little farfetched. But wait, what if:
(We postulate a Hitler/Stalin-like figure in the Mideast supported by a billion or so radical Islamists?)
But the realities of conquest and invasion are so technological in these times that even armed with "hordes" of crazy-eyed soldiers they'd fall like toppling rows of dominoes in the face of air and missile power...and then, of course, there are those wmd nukes that we possess in mass quantities. And you can't buy that kind of huge bang, even with oil money.
So....in their relative stone age technological stage of development they really couldn't invade and it's not likely they'll make up the tech gap since, as a society, they seem implanted in the "believe in creationism or die" camp instead of the "scientific" camp. But there must be something....?
(Hey, as you say, "It's called insurgency and terrorism. They don't wear uniforms anymore... They just filter into whatever country they can find support in, and conduct operations.)
But that's no way to invade and occupy. That won't lead to a threat to end civilization. That won't lead to a future where they control our lives and oppress us. In fact, they won't find this a "country they can find support in, and conduct operations."
Back to the drawing board, Hawk.
Just because you fear it, doesn't mean you can find a logical way that it could happen. At least not a way that makes any kind of probability sense.
And, of course, you still have that pesky problem with your "solution" of using ham handed aggressive force to "make them" change their ways, for their own good, of course. You know, the problem with the cure not working, the cure making the disease worse and the cure violating the basic premises of sovereignty, cultural and religious choices and the rule of law.
Of course you really don't have to talk about that; you simply say, "We have to do something" ...after all, we're talking about a bunch of Muslims coming to power and ruling the world. And we know that's how it could be because, hey, that's what some of them have said they want.
Hawk, you seem to be a lost cause in the "move the debate forward" category and I'm pretty well done talking to you. When you actually stop talking in generalities and "what ifs" and begin to address the nuts and bolts of how, in some kind of probable future, the nightmare you posit could actually occur or, alternatively, begin to address how your desire to use massive force would not fail, as it has thus far, I'll be happy to continue.
While you sputter and fume about silly things like how Saddam wouldn't allow inspections and how he needed to be invaded because he couldn't prove that he "certainly" had no wmds, however, it's a waste of time. Ed |
