[lit-ideas] Re: The things war never solves

Eric Dean: Is it really such a naive and foolish thing to look for alternatives for handling conflict that do not result in physical destruction? Doing so needn't mean we abandon the capacity to defend ourselves, nor that we inherently reject any argument for war. It only means that we really do try to find alternatives before firing the first shot.
This is exactly what the US warships in Hormuz did recently, by refusing to disintegrate provocative Iranian gunboats. A few seconds of fire from the US Phalanx guns and the Iranians wouldn't even have been floating splinters. 

In this situation, the US Navy was a model of restraint.
This military taunting, by the way, is traditional. It was a regular feature of the Cold War and continues today. Remember the Chinese pilot who slammed into the US spy plane at the beginning of Bush's first term?
Our military is very skilled at restraint. It's a protocol. The exceptions are scandals. Therefore one may assert that trying "to find alternatives before firing the first shot" is a routine function of the US military. 

Qualifying my agreement,
Eric Yost
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