Blogs For Victory

Very interesting result from Pew:

While the overall shift is notable, it is not surprising. After 10 years of intense, overseas military campaigns, the American people are weary of it. What is most remarkable to me is the similarity in both the conservative and liberal viewpoint – 55% of conservative Republicans and 57% of liberal Democrats would prefer a less robust US role overseas. It must be presumed that both sides are working it from different angles – liberals out of general (and immoral) pacifism while conservatives because of a wariness of the ability of the American people to sustain a drawn-out operation.

That is pretty much my view. In hindsight, we went about it with several fatal errors over the past 10 years. If there is one lesson of war to be learned it is that you must go to the heart of the problem. If we are to fight, we must fight all the enemies, all at once. In the aftermath of 9/11, President Bush should have made the case for and requested a declaration of war upon all the terror-sponsoring States. To leave even one of them out of the immediate equation is to provide a safe-haven for the terrorists – a place where they can build, plan and launch their attacks from. Because we left the Islamists safe havens, the efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan have proven costly and grueling. We’ve been fighting for ten years – five or less would have proved sufficient had we gone after the whole problem. Clearly, as long as Iran and Syria are untouched by American power, the terrorism of Islamists will never be defeated.

Additionally, if we fight it must be all out – any nation which is deemed an enemy must be given a choice between surrender and destruction. No two ways about it, no softening of the blow – the entire force of American power to be directed relentlessly until they are utterly destroyed, or surrender unconditionally. In the long run, it is mercy in war to hit with the hardest possible blows – the immediate destruction is worse, but the long run loss (for ourselves as well as the enemy) is less.

We live and we learn. But this lesson, I think, will not be fully digested until the terrorists manage another horrific attack upon us. It is to be hoped that our military and security forces are sufficient to the task of forever thwarting such an event, but it is unlikely we’ll prevail like that. We have to do it perfectly every time, they only have to get it right once. America is entering another period of isolationism, I believe – partially as a result of recent wars, partially because our economic problems are making us look inwards. We will not, however, be permitted to ignore the world forever…we cannot keep out the evil people forever.

HAT TIP: Hot Air

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