Michael, re: "I am saying that this WOT will force us to fight again, so i have to believe its winnable, so why was iraq not, even if it was more effectively fought."
We won the war in Iraq. It was a war we didn't have to fight, it was a foolish war against a outmanned, outgunned and out teched opponent and it was a war without a valid goal, but we won it.
What we didn't "win" was the mission to hold Iraq. For us Iraq is like a young woman bought for a wife by an old man's money. Pain and misery will be the price he'll pay for trying to possess her youth. Eventually he'll lose her and regret the years of needless suffering.
In the case of Iraq we didn't even get the obligatory honeymoon.
And we WON'T EVER WIN the war on terror. Life doesn't work that way. But we won't lose it either.
It's not even a real "war." Like disease, crime and bad weather, it just is. If it ever lets up it won't be because of something we've done to "fight" it, it will be because some of the factors that lead people to employ terrorism diminish.
And, no, we won't "win" in Afghanistan either.
"We" don't win wars of occupation. We've not been sprinkled with "what's right for you to do" dust, have we?
Or maybe having our soldiers run around in body armour shooting up people who "might" be threat is a good thing for the Afghans, the Iraqis and other people who wonder just how much more "help" they'll have to suffer? Ed |
