Nations should fight wars for one reason and one reason
only-TO WIN! Certainly the act of achieving a win is called
"victory," and victory is sought for a number of
reasons most of which are germane to one of the following: To
gain territory, to secure more natural or human resources, to
unite peoples theretofore dispersed and/or to simply control and
dominate peoples for the sake of pure power. Only when war is
waged for one of these purposes can the effort be focused and
concerted and victory achievable. Deviate from these purposes
and a nation will find itself in a quandary, marked by
non-committal actions, unsteady leadership, poorly focused
strategy and a disjointed domestic citizenry. Consider the
examples of American history.
In the Revolutionary War, the American Founders committed
themselves to one purpose upon signing the Declaration-a
complete break with Great Britain. And though at the War’s
onset, they were in the minority of public sentiment, the
fervor, commitment and ideals for which they pursued their Cause
drew many to their side as the conflict wore on. Everything they
did politically, strategically and diplomatically from July 2,
1776 on, pursued that end of unhinging from the Crown. When Ben
Franklin went to France to enlist the support of the French in
defeating the English, he stuck to his mission, his womanizing
notwithstanding. The American goals were so crystal clear that
the French had no trouble understanding Yankee objectives and
their intended means to achieve them.
In the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln had one objective, to crush
the South and reunite the Union. For four years, men like
Chamberlain, Grant, and Sherman pursued that goal to its
victorious outcome. Ancillary issues such as the abolition of
slavery were not the goal of Lincoln, only victory. Had he
allowed slavery and possible job competition for northern whites
from newly emancipated blacks cloud his objective, the South
might have delayed the War long enough until the British or
another power perhaps would’ve aided the Rebel cause. But it
didn’t happen. And in any event speculation into alternative
outcomes is moot. The North won.
In the Spanish American War, conversely, William McKinley and
then Theodore Roosevelt were unsure as to what objective they
hoped to achieve by driving the Spanish from the Western
Hemisphere. What ensued were several years of tomfoolery in the
newly acquired Philippines, chasing Aguinaldo and other Filipino
insurrectionists. No clear aims and nary a decisive decision
from the White House got American soldiers killed and made our
occupation of these islands one of the most glaring examples of
what happens when a country ambiguously wages war to build
nations.
In both World Wars, we had a clear goal and we defeated Axis
Powers and Nazism, while in Korea we allowed an incompetent
world body and ambiguous leadership at home deter us from the
achievable goal of keeping communism north of the Yalu River.
General MacArthur knew what it would take, but his President
wasn’t committed to the task.
Twelve years in Vietnam demonstrated the futility of
bureaucrats running a war from a few thousand miles away.
Signals were crossed, intentions not understood and
consequently, 56,000 Americans lost their lives and Indochina
went the way of godless communism.
The Gulf War victory was certainly commendable on all fronts.
President Bush achieved the goal, the victory by pushing Iraq
out of Kuwait. By that measure, victory was ours, to be sure.
Now what of this latest conflict in Afghanistan? Though not a
"quagmire" as the New York Times stupidly
insists (it’s difficult to be in a quagmire when you haven’t
committed much of anything to begin with). But we are definitely
going about this in such a way as to ensure we never see
victory.
Instead of working first and foremost unilaterally to
forcefully avenge the deaths of 6,000 dead Americans, we allow
Secretary of State Colin Powell and other State Department
utopians weave a tangled web of temporary alliances with nations
hostile to American interests. Every day we hear and read of
another king or prime minister voyaging to Foggy Bottom for a
chat with Powell in the pursuit of a broader coalition and for
what reason?
What invariably happens, especially with those countries
historically opposed to us, is a whole lot of deal making to
ensure their "hoped-so" cooperation. We give promises
to get permission is what it amounts to. All the while we make
it more difficult for our military to do its job because we must
thereafter get the sanction of every friggin’ country around
the globe before we lift a finger!
Witness Secretary of Defense Don Rumsfeld globetrotting every
time one of these "moderate" Arab countries has
reservations about some facet of the campaign. The President
sends Rumsfeld over to pacify our "friends," which
delays action and gives the bad guys (those terrorists or have
we already forgotten these cowards) plenty of time to steal away
to the mountains or wherever it is Islamic supremacists like to
hide.
Indeed, it seems the day has finally come when the great
United States must be granted permission to defend its own
people! Did Franklin Roosevelt ask permission from every candy
corn republic before declaring and waging war against the
Japanese after Pearl Harbor? No. Conventional wisdom used to
portend that when a sovereign nation was attacked viciously and
without provocation, the offended nation had every right to
destroy the offender. But those days have come and gone.
Now we fight for what? It certainly isn’t to avenge the
deaths of a few thousand of our friends and neighbors. If that
were our aim-to destroy the enemy whoever they are to avenge
September 11th and to ensure this doesn’t happen
again-we certainly would have offered a bit more than the
obligatory bombing run a few minutes everyday. It’s nice to
see our awesome weaponry on display at every Pentagon news
conference, but you know those true warriors in the DoD are
embarrassed this is all they have to show for nearly two months
of mobilization. In other words, the main means of achieving
military victory, our Armed Forces (and not humanitarian food
drops), are fighting this war with one hand tied behind its
back. And word is getting out that bombs and special ops will
not bow a proud enemy occupying a state the size of Texas (read
my column on the proper military response).
Furthermore, whenever word of possible escalation from the
United States reaches the press and the Muslim world, cries of
"What about Ramadan" and "save the innocent
children of Afghanistan" rise up. And being sensitive to
those anti-American voices among us at the Washington Post,
the New York Times, the State Department and the
Democratic Party, President Bush and Secretary Rumsfeld are
forced to either forgo operations altogether or at the least
amend strategy to ameliorate the boisterous critics.
That’s why that as of November 6th, the Northern
Alliance have done nothing of note; the Taliban still firmly
controls every major city in Afghanistan; Mullah Omar, Usama bin
Laden and most of their underlings are still alive; and
unintended civilian casualties highlight nightly news reports
instead of tales of American-induced Taliban blood-letting in
the streets of Kabul and Kandahar. Moreover, the situation in
Pakistan is fractured by all accounts and teetering like so many
Central American regimes.
We hear all the time that us Joe Shmoes haven’t a clue,
that Monday morning quarterbacking is harmful and mistaken.
"The government knows what it’s doing and the rest of us
civilians best zip it up," the enlightened classes contend.
Certainly the rantings from the left about this being another
Vietnam and their calls to de-escalate the war (I didn’t ever
know we escalated it) are ridiculous. That perspective is so
misguided as to not warrant a response.
But the concerns of Patriots like myself are valid, for the
very reason that we simply want to increase the intensity on the
Taliban. That’s the only way to win this war or at least take
a giant step towards that end. We want our military to be
unleashed so that it can do what it does best-destroy those that
have attacked us, killing all who wish us harm. Contrary to
leftist peaceniks, we don’t castigate our President as a
tyrannical jingoist who really wants to subject the peoples of
Afghanistan so that a U.S. controlled oil pipeline can be
constructed through Afghanistan and Pakistan (I read this
somewhere in a British paper). We simply want the clueless
diplomats, of which Colin Powell is one, to get out of the way
and let the men wage a war as wars are to be rightly waged. And
no, benefit concerts aren’t sufficient enough to win a war.
Men must be placed in harm’s way and even die for their
country, the enemy must be destroyed and civilians invariably
perish. That is war. If it’s nation building you want or if
you want to feel better about everything, go talk to
Billy Clinton.
The sad thing is, the goal is clear (destroy
terrorists), the enemy is defined (Muslim supremacists
and those Muslim states that harbor them), the aims are
achievable (the Taliban or anyone else cannot stand up against
our military) and we do have a great leader (President
Bush). But somewhere along the way, all of these have been
clouded by tertiary issues: Concerns about the children (that’s
always the old stand by), a desire to win friends and influence
others instead of simply winning a war, and placating terrorists
in Palestine (that violates our moral commitment to Israel and
emboldens these terrorists to commit more atrocities). In other
words, we lack principle, we lack focus and we lack will. All of
these combine to render the world’s strongest, mightiest
military as ineffective as it has been these last several weeks.
The longer this carries on without some tangible victory to
show, the more our collective attention will turn to other
matters. Now while this could be a pleasant development in that
it might allow our military more freedom to carry out its
mission without the insane scrutiny of the press, the chances of
this happening are slim. In this day and age, whatever the press
finds important, the government is compelled to act on, lest
they be painted as uncompassionate and mean. When this happens,
the left will claim the President isn’t concerned about
domestic issues, and that he will not feel our pain. This
snipping will inevitably mean the already struggling war effort
will become more uncommitted, less focused and perceivably
imperialistic to other nations.
So let’s be forceful, Mr. President. Squash that Foggy
Bottom bug whispering sweet nothings in your ear. Hack some
people off and in the process win a place in the history books
as a President who led this great people to noble military
triumph against another evil empire, as opposed to just another
executive who bought into the poison that is internationalism
and utopian nonsense.
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