A Few Shiny Pebbles

These next few months are unspeakably important in the war the West is waging against the Islamofascists. I mean that literally. There are no words that could do justice to the danger our country and the rest of the West are facing in this war. But we each of us have to do what we can to form arguments and point to evidence in support of our “side” in this war. In the past three days, in searching for information on Ken Joseph, Jr. for my previous post, I came across four incredibly informative and, I believe, important articles that should be read, but before I point to them, I would like to say something.

We all look at the Iraq war and see many different things, but none of us see the war in its actuality. This is because the Iraq War exists simultaneously in several arenas. Some of these are: Time: at a minimum, several decades in the past and a few in the future (where the war’s history will be written). Place: in Iraq, in the Middle East, on the Eurasian Continent, involving many countries on Earth, in the news, on TV and cable, in newspapers and journals, in books, and in the human mind. Strategy: As a military task rather than a crime involving courts and police, as political, and as behavior to be judged. And so on.

No one has a grasp of the entirety of this particular nexus of human interactions, no one person ever could, and most people know only a little, which is why most people have to look to others to give them enough information for a judgment to be made. We turn to the leaders and pundits we trust, and there we take our stand.

With the Iraq War, most of the people actively supporting the war are facing two kinds of opposition. One of these is those waging what is usually called the international War on Terror, the war between the West and the Islamofascists. The other opposition, whose status is problematic, is the Left in America, along with their sympathizers in the Democratic Party, all of whom want to regain power in Washington D.C. The first group is an extremely dangerous and savage threat. The second is, in my opinion, the biggest reason that fighting the first group is a great deal more difficult than it should be for us.

I think it is true that people look at Iraq and see Vietnam. The Left sees the Vietnam War as a blueprint describing how to use the Main Stream Media, certain grassroot efforts, and the power of the Democratic Party to bring defeat to the US military, not on the battlefield, which the US military won, but on the homefront. The Right sees the Vietnam War as a blueprint describing how the Left used the Main Stream Media, certain grassroot efforts, and the power of the Democratic Party to bring defeat to the US military, not on the battlefield, which the US military won, but on the homefront.

The Left is trying to follow the blueprint and the Right is trying to prevent the Left from following the blueprint. Though the Left denies that this is what is happening, most people know perfectly well that that’s what’s going on, and what information does come their way they evaluate as to whether it furthers the Left’s power or the Right’s power, and thus accept it or reject it as valid.

There are two twists to this. The attack on 9/11 means that some in the Middle and on the Left see the value of fighting in Iraq, while the fact that the Iraq War has gone on as long as it has means that some in the Middle and on the Right are growing weary of it all. We Americans are used to clear-cut victories and happy endings, and we’re used to there being a short time between the start of something and what we see as the inevitable happy victory.

These last two factors may force the issue to the Right—if the 9/11 Middle and Left holds on and the weary Middle and Right have a new birth of commitment. So for them, and for those of you reading this who recognize the importance of participating in the marketplace of ideas about the Iraq War, or who want to find more support for the Right to convince the wobbly in this, I’d like to suggest these four articles. Only two of these articles were written recently, but the two that weren’t are significant. They are worth reading in order.

“How North Vietnam Won The War”, originally in The Wall Street Journal, August 3, 1995, but when I searched for it I finally found it posted on 04/23/2004 by robowombat. In it, Stephen Young interviews Bui Tin, the man who received the unconditional surrender of South Vietnam on April 30, 1975. Excerpt:

Q: How did Hanoi intend to defeat the Americans?

A: By fighting a long war which would break their will to help South Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh said, "We don't need to win military victories, we only need to hit them until they give up and get out."

Q: Was the American antiwar movement important to Hanoi's victory?

A: It was essential to our strategy. Support of the war from our rear was completely secure while the American rear was vulnerable. Every day our leadership would listen to world news over the radio at 9 a.m. to follow the growth of the American antiwar movement. Visits to Hanoi by people like Jane Fonda, and former Attorney General Ramsey Clark and ministers gave us confidence that we should hold on in the face of battlefield reverses. We were elated when Jane Fonda, wearing a red Vietnamese dress, said at a press conference that she was ashamed of American actions in the war and that she would struggle along with us.

“Who Lost Iraq?” written in 2005 by Ken Joseph, Jr. (This is the man who went to Iraq just before the war in 2003 to become a human shield and found out the Iraqi people with whom he spoke wanted the war to come, as I wrote about in my last post. This one should raise a few eyebrows. But also, his descriptions of the American Military fills my heart. ) Excerpt:

Who betrayed Iraq? . . . . [One of the groups was]`The opportunists`. These were many of the people working in the CPA - Coalition Provisional Authority who were there not to see Iraq restored, but simply to get a good line on their resumes and to get a job in the new administration.

A year ago [2004] those who were hoping for a job in a Kerry Administration had every incentive to see Iraq fail. While it is very difficult to point to specific instances, put yourself in the position of a staffer desperate for a job in a Kerry administration in January. The best way to insure it? For Iraq to fail!

“The State of the Union: What is America—and is it worth defending?” by Victor Davis Hanson, January 23, 2007. Hanson points out that since 1991 there have been 5 “Iraq Wars” as we dealt with Iraq from Kuwait to this moment in time. Excerpt:

We can learn lessons from these five wars. First they are — and are not — over oil. The United States does not wish to steal Iraqi oil — indeed we gave back to both the Kuwaitis and Iraqis themselves complete control over the petroleum that Saddam had appropriated when we had it in our power not to. Rather, the United States does not want one of the world’s chief supplies of energy to fall under the control of a madman nor the resulting petrodollar bonanza once more recycled into frightful weapons.

Why Iraq?

Second, Iraq is the linchpin of the Middle East, sitting in the middle of the oil-exporting Gulf sheikdoms, Israel and the Palestinians — and an unpredictable Iran.

“Anatomy of Iraq” by Victor Davis Hanson. Excerpt:

How did a serious country, one that endured Antietam, sent a million doughboys to Europe in a mere year, survived Pearl Harbor, Monte Cassino, Anzio, the Bulge, Tarawa, Iwo and Okinawa, the Yalu, Choisun, Hue and Tet, come to the conclusion — between the news alerts about Britney Spears’ shaved head and fights over Anna Nicole Smith’s remains — that Iraq, in the words of historically minded Democratic senators, was the “worst” and the “greatest” “blunder,” “disaster,” and “catastrophe” in our “entire” history?

I believe these four articles are extremely enlightening.