Who Has The Answer?

During my Saturday morning dog walk this morning I got involved in a political discussion with another dog walker. Reflecting on the terror attack in London, this person stated that an event like that proves Bush right with his decision to invade Afghanistan and Iraq as answer to 9/11. I said that war, respectively violence, can never be the answer to terror because it just produces more bloodshed and terror (and I mean terror caused by war - shownshock). "So, Europe did nothing after 9/11," was my opponent's response. I agree. However, if you don't have the answer or the cure for terrorism, isn't doing nothing better than doing the wrong thing?

When I spontaneously participated in a candlelight vigil in San Jose, one evening after 9/11, I got a taste how the answer could look like: Jews. Arabs, Atheists, Pagans, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, old and young, rich and poor, blue collar and white collar, all together holding their hands and sharing their pain about what had happened. There was no conflict of interests, but the spirit of together we are stronger than terror. I am convinced that dialogue and sharing feelings with eachother will be the path out of war and violence. Isn't that what the religious people hear in their churches? Offer your left cheek if you get hit on the right one? Bush and gang seem to be avid church goers just like most of the Mafiosis. They should listen to their spriitual leaders more closely if the can't find the answer to terror outside among the ordinary people who keep on demonstrating how to make peace with eachother.

Comments

[Tom Guarino]

Very interesting discussion you encountered. It seems everyone blurs Afghanistan and Iraq. The correlation with Afghanistan and 9/11 is much more relevant. One other point, had George's father let Schwartzkoff complete the last mission - we wouldn't be in this mess today.

TG

[rich]

The problem is that invading Afghanistan and invading Iraq are not the same event. The argument can be made that invading Afghanistan was the right thing to do because it was an open training center for terrorist.

Invading Iraq seems like settling an old score, at least to most people. The problem is seeing these two events as having the same goal. I now feel that the goals were different.

However, if you don't have the answer or the cure for terrorism, isn't doing nothing better than doing the wrong thing?

No. The problem is that there is no cure for terrorism. There is nothing you can do to set the world so everyone will think it is a just place. You need to do what you can to reduce the number of people who think they must take violent action. I do not think invading Iraq fits into that catagory.

[Berry]

Very interesting discussion you encountered. It seems everyone blurs Afghanistan and Iraq. The correlation with Afghanistan and 9/11 is much more relevant. One other point, had George's father let Schwartzkoff complete the last mission - we wouldn't be in this mess today.

TG

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True, we'd have been out of there by now. But it'd have been the same mess, with the same resulting global terror sprung from the rubble--it just would've happened sooner. And if the invasion was just an oil grab, it's a failed one.

[Silvia]

Following Rich's argument, "The problem is that invading Afghanistan and invading Iraq are not the same event. The argument can be made that invading Afghanistan was the right thing to do because it was an open training center for terrorist," I logically would have to approve to declare war to Europe as the London attacks were planned by a European terrorist center, called the European Al Quaida, correct? In order to eliminate a terrorist camp, you cannot eliminate a dirt poor people like Afghanistan in a war or, which would be the same thing, rich Europe.

Tom's argument that Bush senior missed to finish his mission: I am not sure if it would have eliminated all the trouble we have now, however, it would have at least been more legitimate as Iraq definitely was the invador at that point of history. I still think that with more talented politicians, this war would have been avoidable as well.

[Berry]

I logically would have to approve to declare war to Europe as the London attacks were planned by a European terrorist center...
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Europe's safe: it has no oil.

[Eric A Hopp]

Invading Iraq and invading Afghanistan were two separate and unrelated events. The invasion of Afghanistan was certainly a response to the al-Qaida attacks on 9/11. Al-Qaida was operating terrorist camps in Afghanistan with the consent of the ruling Taliban government. Both al-Qaida and the Taliban were working together. The Taliban was warned to remove al-Qaida from Afghanistan. The Taliban refused, therefore both were considered legitimate targets for invasion and destruction.

As for the European al-Qaida group that was responsible for the London bombings, I'd seriously doubt that the British government would openly allow such a group to operate within their borders, and had the British government known of their existence, they would have shut that group down and either arrested or kicked their members out of the country.

The invasion of Iraq is a completely different story. Iraq was certainly governed under a tyrannical dictatorship of Saddam, who certainly terrorized his own people. But Iraq was a secular Arab country with a secular Arab leader, although Saddam could play the religious card when it politically suited him. But Saddam would have never allowed terrorist groups to operate in his country's borders--especially the Islamic fundamentalist groups who could attempt to overthrow Saddam's regime and institute a religious theocracy. Saddam's terrorizing his own people inside his own borders is an internal matter within his own country, of which the U.S. had no internationally legal right to get involved. There's the argument that Saddam certainly provided monetary rewards to families of terrorists who attacked Israeli targets. But if I recall, doesn't Israel have their own military--one of the finest military forces in the world--to defend their country? Finally there is the old threat of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. In the first Gulf War, we pretty much destroyed Saddam's WMD program as well as his army. While he had ten years to attempt to rebuild his program, Saddam was constrained oil and trade embargos against him in response to his delaying tactics against the UN weapons inspectors. Finally, we had Saddam contained with the No-Fly Zone in central Iraq. Time and containment policy was on our side. So there really is no reason why the United Stated invaded Iraq, except for the possible Machiavellian schemes that the Bush White House and the Neocons have in converting Iraq as a base for projecting American military and imperialistic power throughout the Middle East.

One other point, had George's father let Schwartzkoff complete the last mission - we wouldn't be in this mess today.

When the first Gulf War took place, I, along with many other Americans, actually wanted the U.S. troops to go into Baghdad and finish the job. But George Bush Senior refused. I think Bush Senior didn't want to end up in a messy occupation in a country fractured into three ethnic and religious divisions--Shiites, Sunnis, and Kurds. Bush Senior probably figured that without a unifying secular dictator as Saddam in charge, the country would have degenerated into a civil war. That is foresight. Bush Senior was right.

[Silvia]

Europe does not only exist of France, Germany, and England. How about Turkey, Albania, Bosnia Herzegovina? I wouldn't put my hands into the fire that they wouldn't allow a little training camp in exchange of hard currency. Are we going to nuke them now?
Afghanistan and Iraq weren't separate issues at all. Afghanistan as you might know is the area where the new oil pipelines are meant to get built planned by the Bush team for an easier access, and Iraq is the country where the oil comes from. There are several states who openly admit that they host terrorists such as Jemen and nobody is invading them - well they are not part of the big oil plan.

[perfectlyGoodInk]

I do think that war is sometimes the most appropriate response to terror. But it ought to be a last resort, as it involves many risks and casualties.

I think Bush invaded Iraq because Afghanistan was over too quickly and easily to 1) sate the American public's desire for vengeance 2) provide much long-term political gain. The neocons saw it as a way to democratize the Middle East, and Rove probably thought it'd be a way to claim progress in the WoT without having to catch OBL.

Of course, they all thought it'd be easier than it was, so it backfired. Well, kinda. They still won the election, after all.