The bottom line is it may take a generation to determine what sort of
failure or success there was in Iraq. Not even. The war was a massive net gain for the U.S. 1. We now have the first Arab democracy and the first Arab free press, which
show the rest of the region what’s possible if you’re willing to fight and
change your hidebound way of doing things. 2. The Shi’ites now govern a country, which gives hope to the oppressed
Shi’ites all over the region and therefore alleviates simmering sectarian
tensions. 3. Al Qaeda is totally discredited. 4. We’ve created a de facto Sunni Arab alliance against Iran. 5. The U.S. is much more involved and influential now than it was under
Clinton. 6. The U.S. and its military have utterly destroyed our image in the middle
east as paper tigers that can’t take casualties. 7. The U.S. military is now the most combat-hardened force on the planet,
able to fight both conventional wars and asymmetrical wars. This experience will
sustain us for decades.
|
RTWT.
And of course since most people aren't capable of abstract thought they also don't stop to consider what the likely outcomes were if we continued to let the Oil For Food scandal destroy the sanctions regime against Iraq. There were such sunny options as another Iran-Iraq war or a WMD armed Iran-Iraq alliance against Israel among others...
Posts
