[lit-ideas] Re: Why us?

  • From: John McCreery <mccreery@xxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Mon, 11 Jul 2005 11:46:24 +0900


On 2005/07/11, at 2:14, Eric Yost wrote:

Impeaching Bush and electing a total cut-and-run US President wouldn't help. Leaving Iraq immediately would spare lots of money and troops, but probably cause many more Iraqi deaths and give the terrorists greater incentive, especially if the terrorists believed that their actions, rather than US internal political mood, had effected the ouster.


There is, of course, precedent for a contrary conclusion. The "fall of Vietnam" did, no question about it, result in severe suffering for those who had allied themselves with the American cause and were abandoned when the Americans left. But a lot of gratuitous violence ceased. And now, some decades later, old soldiers revisit their battlefields on tours guided by the descendants of their enemies and capitalists search with enthusiasm for new labor pools and markets.

The current case is more complex to be sure, Iraq being a "nation" in the same sense as the former Yugoslavia, inhabited by tribes whose vendettas are likely to be bloody, indeed. Still, the argument that our presence alone is a continuing incitement to violence and our efforts to suppress it have clearly and repeatedly failed is a strong one.

The phrase "give the terrorists greater incentive" is also highly ambiguous. What incentives are we talking about? If we imagine our opponents as filled with mindless bloodlust, we may feel that we have no choice but to try to put them down. But how sure are we of this premise: One thinks, for example, of David Ben Gurion, Menachem Begin, or, a better example perhaps, Nelson Mandela. There are any number of examples of "terrorists" who, having won their battles, find themselves confronted with the task of governing, the opportunity to do less bloody things, and, yes, in some cases to enjoy the fruits of corruption. But continuing to risk life and limb to slaughter the defeated enemy....

John McCreery


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