![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sobriqueI was going to write a rant about compensation culture. Or another witty and insightful piece about how you'd change the world.
That kinda went out the window. I was in the gym this evening, and one word made me change my mind. "Fallujah". Right now 'precision' munitions (yeah right, as if 2000 pounds of high explosive is ever going to be precise) are demolishing this city.
Sadly, following the election results it was inevitable. The old truth is this. You do not win a war by subjugating the opponent. You win a war by making them your friends.
A war has been declared on terrorism. But you can just bet that if another country invaded this one, there'd be people resisting the oppressors with everything they had, even if it were bricks and catapults.
It didn't work in Vietnam. It hasn't worked in Israel. It didn't work in Afghanistan. It won't work in Iraq.
A just war it may have begun. Deposing a dictator, safeguarding national oil interests. Valid reasons for a war some may say. But Iraq is in anarchy. And will be so for many years yet. Every thud of a 2000 pound precision munition brings this country that little bit closer to the stone age.
The people of iraq may make the comparison, between life under Saddam, and the last several months without power, sewage disposal, water. Where the invaders shoot to kill, because they fear the freedom fighters.
The war in Iraq won't be over for many years. It'll take that long to pick up the pieces. And for every man, woman or child killed in a 'precision strike', you create another embittered person, who is prepared to take up arms for vengance. Terrorism or freedom fighters are the hydra. For every head you cut, another two spring up. The solution is to stop cutting off heads, and start making friends.
Just another Pyrrhic victory.
That kinda went out the window. I was in the gym this evening, and one word made me change my mind. "Fallujah". Right now 'precision' munitions (yeah right, as if 2000 pounds of high explosive is ever going to be precise) are demolishing this city.
Sadly, following the election results it was inevitable. The old truth is this. You do not win a war by subjugating the opponent. You win a war by making them your friends.
A war has been declared on terrorism. But you can just bet that if another country invaded this one, there'd be people resisting the oppressors with everything they had, even if it were bricks and catapults.
It didn't work in Vietnam. It hasn't worked in Israel. It didn't work in Afghanistan. It won't work in Iraq.
A just war it may have begun. Deposing a dictator, safeguarding national oil interests. Valid reasons for a war some may say. But Iraq is in anarchy. And will be so for many years yet. Every thud of a 2000 pound precision munition brings this country that little bit closer to the stone age.
The people of iraq may make the comparison, between life under Saddam, and the last several months without power, sewage disposal, water. Where the invaders shoot to kill, because they fear the freedom fighters.
The war in Iraq won't be over for many years. It'll take that long to pick up the pieces. And for every man, woman or child killed in a 'precision strike', you create another embittered person, who is prepared to take up arms for vengance. Terrorism or freedom fighters are the hydra. For every head you cut, another two spring up. The solution is to stop cutting off heads, and start making friends.
Just another Pyrrhic victory.
