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How Will We Know When We Have Lost, America?
By Nolan K. Anderson
02/17/06 "ICH"
-- -- Is preemption a sign of defeat? Is defeat marked by a
nation’s moral compass becoming erratic or fixed on empire
building and the theft of other’s lands and resources?
What is it that tells us we have lost a battle or a war? Is
victory marked by a nation’s leader dressing the part of a
warrior and declaring, “Mission Accomplished”. Is “loss” defined
by politicians officially reporting victory at least three
times? Is a “loss” the “beautiful people” hanging onto the “last
helicopter out”? Is it a “loss” when the most powerful army the
world has ever seen can’t travel its own six-mile road from its
Baghdad airport to its administrative headquarters? Is defeat an
Army’s friendly fire killing its own military hero and then
lying for months on end about the circumstances of the event?
Does the need to manufacture a heroine like Jessica Lynch mark
the end of a blatantly unjust cause and therefore defeat? How
does a commander-in-chief wage a war when one of his senior
generals says, "I don't know if I have the moral authority to
send troops into combat anymore. I'm no longer sure I can look
(a soldier or a Marine) in the eye and say: ‘This is something
worth dying for.’” (1)
Who knows in this day and age what defeat means or how it is
measured? Is defeat measured in the number of our soldiers that
are killed and wounded or is it the number of innocent civilians
killed? Is defeat measured by the birth defects our soldiers’
children experience from their parents’ exposure to depleted
uranium or is defeat measured by the increase in cancer among
the enemy civilian population?(2) Is the degree of corruption
involving the destruction/reconstruction of a defeated nation a
measure of defeat? (For those with an extremely strong stomach
for corruption, try reading “Sticky Fingers”, The Making of
Halliburton by Jeffry St. Clair in the July 15/17 2005 issue of
Counterpunch.com). Is defeat measured by the loss of world oil
production and the inevitable rise of worldwide petroleum
prices? Do forcing the conquered country to pay for its own
reconstruction and then stealing and squandering its “income
stream” and national assets measure a conqueror’s victory? How
does one measure the success or failure of a war waged by a
moral midget and a totally incompetent Minister of Offense?
Is preemption a sign of defeat? Is defeat marked by a nation’s
moral compass becoming erratic or fixed on empire building and
the theft of other’s lands and resources? Is defeat marked by a
nation choosing the wrong nation for retaliation after being
attacked? Is ignoring international law a mark of defeat? Does
living outside the treaties and agreements between nations mean
that a nation has lost its sense of moral values or is that
nation to be considered the only nation on earth to be
righteous?
When does a nation quit saying, “In God we trust” and start
saying “In our government I trust”. I seem to remember something
in the Bible about justice, punishment and right and wrong. If
we trust in God, it would appear that our actions have already
doomed this War on Terror. If we truly believe in biblical
truths, how does one justify laying waste to a country (without
provocation) that you have befriended, supported and supplied
with money and weapons? Is there really 30 percent of we
Americans who can look his son or daughter in the eye as he or
she leaves for Iraq and say, “this is worth dying for”?
Does rejecting civilized treatment of prisoners and choosing
torture for known innocents as well as the suspected guilty mark
the end of a nation’s humanity and mark it as a pariah and
predator in the world community? Does defeat mean having to
depend upon hypocrisy to overcome an enemy that your army can’t
defeat? What are you really saying when you have to rely on
extraordinary rendition in order to satisfy “liberals” and
“America haters” that you really do not believe in torture?
How are we going to know when we have lost the battles and the
wars? Are we going to use history to define defeat or victory,
or are we going to make the rules for everyone else to live by
as we go along? We made the rules in Nuremberg, but now we know
that only the “America haters” would want us to put Bush,
Cheney, Perle, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Feith, Luty and Libby on
trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
George Bush’s last bastion of deceit in justifying the invasion
of Iraq has gotten down to saying that “if we don’t fight them
over there, we will have to fight them over here”. That theory
took a beating recently in London. The British “have been
fighting them over there”, and now it looks as though they are
going to be fighting them in their own country precisely BECAUSE
they are “fighting them over there”.
I am afraid of another (many other) 9/11 – London type disasters
in our country and for the same reasons as the previous London
and New York tragedies. And, “no, whether or not we treat
prisoners with hoods and electrodes in Abu Ghraib will make no
difference to the suffering we will feel when the time for us
comes again”. They have gone too far; we have gone too far.
There will be no humanitarianism on their part or on ours. Our
government’s policies – unconditional support for Israel,
support of despots and tyrants around the world, the export of
tyranny, terrorism and “regime changes” through the CIA and the
School of the Americas, the purchase of our Congress by Israel
and any other cash wielding PAC or war industry lobby, the
corruption of destruction and reconstruction in our “war” for
the freedom and democracy of Iraqis, insisting that we have
enough troops in Iraq to “win” but having to hire mercenaries at
exorbitant rates to cover the gaps in our troop strength - have
put us in a position from which we cannot win. They (the world
wide Muslim community) have limited ordnance and limited
military capabilities, but they have tied down the most powerful
army the world has ever seen – and they have a potential 1.3
BILLION – man/woman fighting reserve. Even the Chinese would
envy that kind of army. One can safely say that not every Muslim
is a jihadist. But then ask yourself WHY NOT if we are going to
act in the same manner as the despotic rulers whom they know so
well. Ask yourself how only nine, low ranking “bad apples” could
completely destroy the worldwide perception of America’s
integrity and fairness – even in war!
We will know we have lost when we do what we have done in Abu
Ghraib, Guantanamo, Diego Garcia, Bagram and the other entirely
secret and not so secret CIA and military detention centers
round the world. We will know we have lost when the first target
in the massacre of a village or city is its hospital. We will
know we have lost when we don’t bother to learn about war and
about the realities of war. We will know we have lost when we
avoid impeaching a president who allows “his” Pentagon to defy a
federal court order to release photos from Abu Ghraib showing,
among other things, the rape of children and murder of
prisoners.(3) We will know we have lost when our elite military
units use the torture and suffering of their prisoners for sport
and entertainment(4) . We will know we have lost when we don’t
care how similar our methods in Falluja are to those of the
Nazis in Warsaw or the Russians in Chechnya. (No, I am not a
bleeding heart liberal who thinks wars should be fought with
powder puffs and cream puffs, but I am a very disillusioned
American veteran who sees the horrors of Stalingrad, Warsaw,
Falluja or Waco coming soon to a location very near to each of
us).
We will know we have lost when we don’t know where Jose Padilla
is or how long he has been detained. We will know we have lost
when we allow one million illegal aliens to cross our borders
each year – any of which could be a suicide bomber, a
“pilot-in-training” - or just a voter taking a job from an
American non-voter. We will know we have lost when we have a
Patriot Act I and are crafting a Patriot Act II behind closed
doors in our Congress.
Notes:
(1) US 'lacks moral authority' in Iraq - By Pamela Hess
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10539.htm
(2) Depleted uranium: Dirty bombs, dirty missiles, dirty
bullets. A death sentence here and abroad: By Leuren Moret
http://www.sfbayview.com/081804/Depleteduranium081804.shtml
(3) Pentagon Blocks Release of Abu Ghraib Images: Here's Why: By
Greg Mitchell
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000990534
(4) Officer's Road Led Him Outside Army: By Richard A. Serrano
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10394.htm
Nolan K. Anderson is a retired engineer and a veteran of Korea
who was once a “conservative” until he found there was nothing
left to conserve. (He may be reached at nkanders@bellsouth.net
).
Copyright: Nolan K. Anderson
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