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…with influences and actors who have a burning passion to see every ideal expressed in the Gettysburg Address laid to ruin. At first, while still under the blood lust which arose as we watched the twin towers collapse, we were lucky to have an enemy that we could see and readily connect with our collective hurt. Retaliation was in order, and I am not sure that there are many among us who would then, or even to this day, disagree. But the visible enemy, the one who was so vivid in our minds, so clearly implicated and well defined, faded away.
But, they’re still there, wherever “there” is, waiting to martial the forces in the nurturing environment of some failed state somewhere else. There are many failed states to chose from, perhaps as many as thirty in Africa alone. And, yes, we have created yet another possibility in Iraq. Our enemy has been fractured perhaps mostly by the original blows received in Afghanistan, but embolden with new purpose and even greater hatred.
True. The invasion of Iraq was as pointless and counter productive as throwing gas on a fire that we intended to extinguish. And yes, we’ve made the fire worse, but the fire was there to begin with. It is the same fire that was burning in September 2001, and it burns with vigour to this very day. And though you may rightly label the invasion of Iraq as being pointless, you are simply wrong about the war.
The soldiers that are in harms way, right now, are fighting a noble war not a pointless war. And they are doing it with absolutely minimal resources…,extended tours of duty…, the heartbreak of “stop loss”. And, yet, the message that I have heard consistently from them, both living, and those who’ve have fallen, is one of compassion for the Iraqis and a plea to get the job done. God bless them all.
