Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jacob Snyder who wrote (136670)	6/14/2004 9:05:21 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Well, here's an outline of the Powell doctrine. pbs.org We spent every diplomatic effort, over the course of 13 years, endeavoring to make Saddam abide by his cease-fire and disarmament obligations. War was the last resort in the face of Saddam's on-going intransigence in abiding by those binding resolutions, in which his continued rule after invading Kuwait was contingent upon his adherence. We used overwhelming force (since the government and major armed resistance collapsed within two weeks). We have an exit strategy focused upon creating a viable (and hopefully democratic) state in Iraq. We aren't willing to play "patty-cake" with any supporters of armed resistance in Iraq (as was the case with N. Vietnam), or to limit the scope of the war to merely a limited engagement, but total victory. We're creating a government that is hoped will be self-sustaining and stable, broadly representative of the major power interests in the country, and in the future, popularly elected. We've issued a statement that US forces plan to withdraw by 2006, dependent on the overall situation. The only violation I can see is not having a series of alternative post-war contingency plans in place to deal with unexpected resistance.. And we also did not hasten to capture all Baathist leadership and Special Republican Guard members and place them in custody pending vetting and adjudication of their future status. But neither of those are part of any Powell doctrine. Hawk

To: Jacob Snyder who wrote (136670)	6/14/2004 9:24:02 PM
From: Andrew N. Cothran	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

MAINTAINING ONE'S PERSPECTIVE It is safe to predict that war will be our greatest threat in the twenty-first century, but we cannot say what kind of war, fought where, to what end. For the United States, now, the danger comes from the Islamic world, which has what seems a nearly unstoppable weapon, in some ways the ultimate weapon. It is the man, woman, boy, or girl willing to give up his or her life. In World War II, the U.S. Navy took its most severe losses at Iwo Jima and Okinawa--some 20 percent of all Naval losses in the war. The Kamakazes got them. There was no machine then, and no computer now, that can respond as fast or as accurately as the human eye and brain. Suicide bombers are relatively easy to train, difficult to stop, and all they have to do is walk--or fly--to their targets. We are now engaged in a war which will not end with the killing of this or that Islamic leader, or the destruction of Arab headquarters on the West Bank, or any other temporary triumph. This war must end the way the wars with Germany and Japan ended, when Islamic nations begin educating their women, allowing everyone to vote, encouraging freedom of religion. This is being done in some Muslim states. Some say it is impossible to nation-build in the Islamic world. That is not true. Some 1.2 billion people are Muslims, which means that 600 million are women. The vast majority of them are not allowed to learn to read or write. But think of what a constituency that is. It is a war between modernity and medievalism. As things are now, whenever an Islamic militant sees a Muslim woman without a veil, or a Muslim woman watching TV or driving a car, they blame the United States. The fanatics among them want to be in absolute control of their women, their children, their economy, their religion, their society, their politics. There is nothing the United States can do that will satisfy these authoritarian extremists, short of transporting our country to another planet. From Stephen e. Ambrose TO AMERICA, Personal Reflectons of an Historian, Simon & Schuster