Why Must We?

Horrible Reality (2004), Zeljko Prebeg

Croatian artist Prebeg described his painting as follows: "After long time of the TV watching you can make only such a painting..." So just you watch out, couch potatoes.

When I read the title, "We Can Win This Kind of War, and We Must," I thought my respected McClatchy News service had betrayed me. I disagree with almost all of it. Then I realized this was a guest posting from a West Point grad, and all was forgiven.

In the piece, U.S. Army Capt. Brandon Anderson says past wars were simple.

"Counterinsurgency warfare is difficult, complex and often frustrating, especially in contrast to the seeming simplicity of past wars. We must avoid two extremes in order to understand and win the kind of wars our country is fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq."

They were not simple, but rather, understandable as containing a sort of logic in a world where logic had broken down. In effect, wars served a larger corrective social purpose.

This is not so in COIN operations. Take Afghanistan, which the U.S. INVADED and now occupies with NATO compliance.

It is a kindness to call this a counterinsurgency, since there was not an insurgency when Afghanistan was subjected to the kind attention of the U.S. military invasion. It is more correct to call the insurgency a resistance movement formed to oust a foreign invader, similar to the reactions to the Japanese in China and the Germans in France during WW II.

Afghanistan is, without a doubt, a failed state, but foreign invasion has not undone this Gordian Knot, nor will it ever. The U.S. cannot dissipate its combat power and energy addressing such issues.

More appropriately, this should be addressed through United Nations channels and by letting others set up the puppet regimes. Puppet governments are an outgrowth of totalitarianism, and should be avoided at all costs. America does not need Karzai or Maliki--what is the point?

Anderson next says we mustn't use traditional metrics to determine success, nor must we despair when they don't show success. He says both approaches are "intellectually lazy, and neither is appropriate if we care about protecting our way of life."

The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with protecting our way of life, and everything to do with eroding our hard won democratic values.

They are about inflicting our way of life on unwilling persons. Hence the resistance. which we like to call an insurgency. fighting foreign invaders is a noble cause in the general fabric of history. That is, for those who bother to read history.

"The insurgencies that the West confronts have been fought and won before, in the Philippines, Malaya, Nicaragua and Peru."

And how did the supposed "winning" advance the cause of democracy or "protect our way of life"?

"Understanding how this kind of war is different is crucial."

Of course, this is only a war because we want it to be a war. If the U.S. leaves Iraq and Afghanistan, then the war stops for our forces. internal squabbles of Iraq and Afghanis are not the concern of the U.S. military machine. We have simply served to open Pandora's Box, thank you very much.

Personally, Ranger does not give a rat's ass about Iraq and Afghanistan; it should not be a concern for our combat forces. Doesn't America still have a State department? Don't we still fight only after all political approaches fail?

What horse does the U.S, have in either of these races? No matter who wins or loses in either scenario, America will still be America, and everybody can still remain fat, dumb and obliviously happy. The existence of the U.S. is not tied to either failed state.

"We can win this kind of war, and we must. Our security, and that of our children and our children's children hangs in the balance. The road will be difficult and progress won't look like it did in World War II. But it's just as important, and our way of life is in just as much danger."

Ranger wishes that just once somebody spouting these chauvanistic platitudes would demonstrate HOW this is a true statement.