Posted on 05/16/2007 9:18:38 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
A renowned professor and prominent critic of the Bush Administration's invasion of Iraq has now lost his son to the war. Lt. Andrew Bacevich, Jr. was killed by a suicide bomber on Sunday.
A local Boston station reports that the younger Bacevich's captain said in an e-mail to the family that he was killed by a suicide bomber in a white sedan his unit had stopped on a main highway south of Samarra.
The DoD's official release of the incident reported on Monday that, "1st Lt. Andrew J. Bacevich, 27, of Walpole, Mass., died May 13 in Balad, Iraq, of wounds suffered when an improvised explosive device detonated near his unit during combat patrol operations in Salah Ad Din Province, Iraq."
Andrew Bacevich, professor of International Relations at Boston University, has a long list of publications supporting his self-label of conservative, but he became disillusioned by what he viewed as an overreliance on military power driving foreign policy choices by "conservative" neocons of the Bush Administration.
In a conversation discussing his latest book, The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War, Bacevich responded to a question asking if the neocons "believed too deeply in the hype of American hyperpower?," with the interviewer clarifying, "Ruling groups, even while manipulating others, often seem to almost hypnotically convince themselves as well."
That's why I myself tend not to buy into the charge that Bush and others blatantly lied us into this war. I think they believed most of what they claimed.
(Excerpt) Read more at iraqslogger.com ...
God bless Lt. Andrew Bacevich and his family - may they embrace their fallen soldier’s life and sacrifice with love, for he died doing what he believed was worthy...
God bless this fallen hero. RIP!
From the continuation...
Bacevich responded:
That’s why I myself tend not to buy into the charge that Bush and others blatantly lied us into this war. I think they believed most of what they claimed. You should probably put believe in quotes, because it amounts to talking yourself into it. They believed that American omnipotence, as well as know-how and determination, could imprint democracy on Iraq. They really believed that, once they succeeded in Iraq, a whole host of ancillary benefits were going to ensue, transforming the political landscape of the Middle East. All of those expectations were bizarre delusions and we’re paying the consequences now.
“All of those expectations were bizarre delusions and we’re paying the consequences now.”
True. Remember good old Wolfie? The Iraqis will pay for the whole thing? These neo-cons are terrible, our republic can’t take much more of this “leadership”
My response to that is to ask why he believes it is a bizarre delusion? Germany and Japan were rebuilt successfully after WWII and the USA has reaped tremendous benefits. Is there something specific about the Middle East - and Islam - that prevents those societies from being reformed and transformed? Is that the point that Bacevich is unknowingly making? The problem isn't that we tried to transform Iraq, it is that you can't transform a corrupt culture unless you utterly destroy it first, which is exactly what happened to Germany and Japan. In Iraq we have tried to build on a corrupt, militaristic, violent, and backwards culture.
It is conceivable that the Administration deluded themselves into thinking that democracy could be planted in Iraq, and thus lead us into a quagmire. This is certainly a better, more intelligent argument than "BUSH LIED!".
The problem is that nobody really knew how hard the Iraqi people would fight for their own freedoms. It was an honest assertion that the Iraqi people wanted to be free and most Iraqis would fight for that freedom. It is disingenuous to claim that this was a delusion from the start.
Prayers for the family and our thanks to another hero. May God rest his soul.
Unfortunately, the son paid for the sins of his father.
May He bless that brave soldier for ever.
Iraq is a success on many levels and the fight for liberty there is far from over. While there are numerous points of failure in the past and likely points of failure in the future, the global trend toward democratic governance continues. Labeling the war as machinations of Neo-Cons is a cop out. It's an off switch for a brain unable to digest the scope of the disease, much less a cure.
Smart Bomb mania has been an increasingly dominant phenomenon in our military and politics for decades. It's foolish to pin these bizarre disillusions on the Bush Administration when most of the world has bought into it. Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney and George Bush know history... They know their place in it. They will find themselves in good company with Lincoln, Churchill and more. All of the second guessing and reluctance seen through the lens of history will look pathetic. The Bush Administration will rightfully look courageous.
I do not envy this father one bit. Not because his son died fighting for justice in an American war. That is an honor. I do not envy him because he does not believe in this war. People who do not believe in anything will always live in fear of the people who do. True believers aren’t afraid of anything. That is how I know his son did not die in vain.
God Bless You, Andrew Bacevich Jr.
The Iraq Liberation Act of 1998
October 31, 1998
STATEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT
Today I am signing into law H.R. 4655, the "Iraq Liberation Act of 1998." This Act makes clear that it is the sense of the Congress that the United States should support those elements of the Iraqi opposition that advocate a very different future for Iraq than the bitter reality of internal repression and external aggression that the current regime in Baghdad now offers.
Let me be clear on what the U.S. objectives are: The United States wants Iraq to rejoin the family of nations as a freedom-loving and law-abiding member. This is in our interest and that of our allies within the region.
The United States favors an Iraq that offers its people freedom at home. I categorically reject arguments that this is unattainable due to Iraq's history or its ethnic or sectarian make-up. Iraqis deserve and desire freedom like everyone else. The United States looks forward to a democratically supported regime that would permit us to enter into a dialogue leading to the reintegration of Iraq into normal international life.
WILLIAM J. CLINTON
THE WHITE HOUSE,
October 31, 1998.
Ummm... Colonel Bacevich is a West Point Grad who served in Vietnam and the Gulf War.
Here we go again.
Let me spell it out. OBL and others have declared that America can be defeated because their country is full of defeatists. The Internet and America's pacifist news media are useful tools for militant Islamics to encourage that defeatism and bolster their own fighters.
Bacevich Sr. emboldened the enemy by telling them that America is being defeated and we don't belong in the Middle East to begin with. Bacevich Jr. was killed by those receptive to that message. The son paid for the sins of the father.
Interesting to note that you think Bush better fits the description of the sinner, of the one that encourages our enemy to kill.
“People who do not believe in anything will always live in fear of the people who do. True believers aren’t afraid of anything.”
I think you have the wrong guy...
Colonel “Bacevich graduated from West Point in 1969 and served in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War from the summer of 1970 to the summer of 1971. Afterwards he held posts in Germany, the United States, and the Persian Gulf up to his retirement from the service with the rank of Colonel in the early 1990s.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Bacevich
Benedict Arnold served valiantly at Ticonderoga and Saratoga.
Read some of what the Colonel has written. I disagree with him on Iraq but I respect him greatly. Certainly wouldn’t call him a traitor.
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