A man goes to the doctor and says. “Doc, it hurts when I do this”. “Then stop doing that,” says the doctor.
BA-BOOM!
A journalist goes into a hostile combat zone
and is brutally murdered. Then a second
goes in and he is also murdered. A third
tries as well with the same outcome. “Stop
doing that!”
The murders of American and British
journalists are no joke. My prayers and
sympathies go out to their families and loved ones. Still, they are grown-ups freely and knowingly
engaged in risky business just like mercenaries and gun runners.
A nation does not go to war over
adventurous risk takers who also happen to be its citizens. It does not risk the lives of its young men
and women because a remote foreign nation is cruel to its own minorities and
dissenters. If that were the case,
America should be at war with about half of the nations on Earth.
A nation goes to war when faced when
with an existential threat. Short of
that, a nation commits to war only when its vital national interests are in
jeopardy.
Since ISIS presents no existential
threat to the United States, Americans must ask, what vital interest is it that
we are defending? The default answer is
always, “oil”.
Middle East oil is no longer a vital
concern for America.
Time Magazine reports that U.S.
oil imports are falling.
This is attributable to increased energy production
driven by fracking as well as to more
fuel efficient vehicles. Forbes Magazine goes as far to project that
the U.S. will be able to fully
meet its energy needs by the end of this decade.
In the meantime as we move towards
energy independence, let’s not lose sight of the fact that the preponderance
of U.S. oil imports come from within the Western Hemisphere, not
the Middle East.
So once again we ask, what vital
interest are we defending if not oil?
Not only is it foolish to go to war
without a clear interest to defend, it is criminally irresponsible to do so
without definitive objective or a strategy for achieving it.
Destroying ISIS will not solve the
problem that the U.S. is held in low esteem throughout the Islamic world. Bombing will not win the win hearts and minds
let alone the war. It will only kill
innocents and invite blowback terrorism making life in America less safe.
Boots on the ground can only lead to
another decade long quagmire as in Iraq and Afghanistan. Like Whack-a-Mole, America will “crush” one
enemy only to see two or three or four more pop up. Patrick Buchanan breaks down the futility in
recent blog, The
Forever War.
Unlike Whack-a-Mole, sending young
Americans to die for no good reason is no game.
Wasting a decade’s worth of time, talent and treasure with no clear
objective or realistic plan for victory is no joke.
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"Half the people are stoned and the other half are waiting for the next election.
Half the people are drowned and the other half are swimming in the wrong direction." - Paul Simon
Half the people are drowned and the other half are swimming in the wrong direction." - Paul Simon
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