Quote:
Originally posted by Undertoad
But we can't declare war on them because we aren't really sure who they are. The "they" in all these sentences is what? Is there a smart missile smart enough to target it, all over the world? [/b]
|
That, in a nutshell, is why this "war" is thoroughly pointless. Until "they" is defined and, more importantly, _why_ "they" are so intent on attacking us is worked out, all our military responses are doing is perpetuating the cycle.
My take: it's a war where "they" are whoever we declare to be "terrorists," whoever it is politically expedient to sic our bombers and our soldiers on, and whoever we can target without jeopardizing relations with nations our leaders (or our oil companies) would rather be social with.
Now, we (as a nation) can take stock of _why_ there is so much anti-American sentiment around the world, and what we can do (or should do) to eliminate some of it. We can question why Afghanistan was Target 1 and the hawks are circling Iraq like cat stalking a mouse, but nobody says boo about anti-Americanism in Saudi Arabia. We can ask whether bombing the shit out of Afghanistan did much of anything that was productive, or whether it killed more people who had nothing to do with the WTC than those (if any) who did, and helped reinforce the America The Bully image among those who loathe our country. We can ask why when these kinds of accountability questions are asked of the current administration, the response is often hostile and contains veiled accusations of "aiding the enemy" or "helping the terrorists win."
Or we can go back to bed and watch Everybody Loves Raymond.