The political establishment is fuming; Wikileaks has done it again. Matt Drudge labeled what they did on his website as a nightmare. The Obama administration and top military brass have strong words as well.
Wikileaks has released more than 90,000 classified documents pertaining to our doomed involvement in Afghanistan (the documents can be read on this website: http://wardiary. wikileaks.org).
The big shock from the documents is they don’t say anything that hasn’t been already known – that is, our occupation has been a disaster.
Some interesting things include collaboration between the Pakistani government and the Taliban, American hired mercenaries (called contractors in the media) paying the Taliban protection money for arms running, and the Taliban using heat-seeking rockets against our helicopters that we gave them in the 1980s. It is unlikely that this disclosure will cause any real change in our policy. It could help sway public opinion and change the parameters of the debate which is needed.
Michael Steele got attacked from every angle by his party for saying the one true thing he has ever said: that the war in Afghanistan is doomed. War supporters objected, saying that this type of language will hurt our troops’ morale. The same logic could be applied to patrons on the Titanic; don’t tell them that their ship is sinking and try to get off the boat as fast as possible, that might hurt their morale.
The big problem with the morale cry is the one thing the leaked documents did not reveal: why we are in Afghanistan. Ask 10 different people, you will get 10 different reasons. The Obama administration and the military have not been forthcoming about why we are there.
There is one reason that we can eliminate right off the bat with no debate: that we are in Afghanistan to protect Americans from jihadi terrorists, to route out al-Qaeda and prevent a safe haven for terrorists. Apparently, all the world’s terrorists are concentrated in Afghanistan.
Americans do not know why we are there. We don’t know who we are fighting. We also don’t know who is fighting us.
If American soldiers and Afghani and pakistani civilians are to continue dying for a cause that our government refuses to address, the only morally acceptable position is complete and total opposition to the war.
Robert Sabatino
East Yorktown Drive, LaGrange
The best way to let terrorists know that they will not change our way of life is to not change it ourselves because of them.
Also, realize that in its lumbering, 1000 lb. gorilla way, the U.S. has done grievous harm to a lot of innocent people and some of the terrorism is very understandable, standing in the other shoes.
I am not a pacifist. I think non-violent methods are most effective at causing changes in society, but being non-violent takes more bravery than being violent. Because of this, “non-violence” is often used by people to defend their own cowardice by eschewing violence. I agree with Ghandi when he said that if you do not have the guts to be non-violent, then using violent means is more than justified.
Your defense of our war follows a pattern I've noticed about our country's squandered foreign endeavors. Defenders of the Vietnam War when it was well understood that our involvement was doomed (I recently watched a video of Bill Maher give the following defense) said it was necessary because it is a “fight against communism” and a “fight for democracy” and that we must show the Soviet Union that we will “not sit back” while freedom hating communism takes over the world. This was of course nonsense, and it can be extended to the whole Cold War as well.
The biggest dolt in modern political writing, Thomas Friedman, said that our mission in the Iraq War was to tell the Muslim world to “suck on this” (an exact quote and you can watch it on youtube). This was of course after it became common knowledge that Saddam Hussein had no involvement with 9/11 or Al Qaeda and didn't have any WMDs.
Whether it be a “battle against communism”, or telling dead Iraqi children to “suck on this”, or to show terrorists that we will “fight to maintain our way of life” in a country that our generals admit have less than 100 Al-Qaeda operatives, I just don't by it. I would like to know of a single war in modern history (American or not) where the intended purpose for fighting for it was due to ideas and abstract philosophical concepts. Wars are not fought on the basis of abstractions, but they are fought for solid material goals. Even though I asked in my letter why we are in Afghanistan, I think I have a pretty good reason why – geopolitical power. Afghanistan has been being fought over for centuries because of it's strategic location and the power having a presence in the region wields. The Soviet Union did this 30 years ago – why is it different when we do it?
You also say that “the people of the middle east” have only known “ heavy handed, forced submission to authority” for “thousands of years.” What do you base this on?
"The fight for morals and ethics trumps any other?" That seems a little contradictory. What is moral and ethical about killing hundreds of thousands of civilians? What is moral about heavy handed, forced submission to authority? What is moral about war? What is moral about funding both sides of the war? What is moral about fighting? What qualifies as morals and ethics?
Mike