Posted on 07/20/2007 8:30:20 AM PDT by oldtimer2
Train of thought: A letter to Sen. Arlen Specter
By Diana West
July 20, 2007
Dear Sen. Specter: I'm writing today because I didn't get a chance to respond to your parting comment as you left the train last week in Philadelphia. If you recall, we were both riding the Acela out of Washington; I was the columnist sitting across the aisle from you (both literally and in a Washington way, often, figuratively). I introduced myself and offered you that day's column for your reading pleasure.
You can't blame a gal: How often do the ink-stained wretched get a U.S. senator as a virtually captive traveling companion? No office aides to intervene, no floor votes to run off to: just a nice long stretch of time to pass, sort of together.
Wondering how best to take journalistic advantage of the situation, I realized the column was the key. Not a big intrusion, but maybe an icebreaker. Or maybe not. After you accepted my column on Iraq -- an op-ed lamenting the futility of "surge" and "withdrawal" plans in Iraq that fail to address the menace in Iran (and elsewhere) -- you read it. That was nice. I sat up a little, hoping for a senatorial reaction, but didn't get one. Then again, maybe I did: You turned to another newspaper. Still no reaction. Then you fell asleep. Nothing. Then you woke up. Still nothing. Then you had lunch. Oh well. We were almost into Philadelphia.
And then, gathering your belongings, you said: "So. You just want to bomb them?"
Let me explain. Sufficiently intrigued, you sat for the whole harangue. Securing enough of Iraq so Iraqis "reconcile" is not a strategy; it's a pipe dream even a rudimentary understanding of Islamic culture can pop. Meanwhile, the dream becomes a nightmare once we notice that American blood and treasure are creating just another sharia state in Iraq. This one being majority Shiite, it's more than likely to become a natural ally of Shiite Iran, whose genocidal nuclear ambitions and terror exports go unchecked by our current efforts. Indeed, it is Iran (and other regional jihadist centers) that should come into U.S. military focus. Of course, given the limitations of the "limited war" to which we hold ourselves, can the United States ever get it together to really save the Free World?
Phew. Nodding at intervals, you asked questions, mainly about my personal tolerance for civilian casualties -- theirs, not ours. You asked me something like: At what number do civilian deaths -- theirs -- become intolerable? How many people -- not ours -- have to die before I (me) say it's too much? So now I ask: Was that Diyala, or Pennsylvania you represent? Uppermost in your mind were Iraqi (or, for that matter, Iranian) casualties, a likely consequence of the aggressive actions under discussion -- since this was, in fact, war we were talking about. Another likely consequence of such actions -- warfare, right? -- is the achievement of American war goals, which strikes me as preferable to just bleeding our nation to death. But maybe I've been reading too much history. Somehow, American war goals have become a secondary consideration when America wages war. As Command Sgt. Maj. Jeff Mellinger put it to The Washington Times: "We could absolutely crush every one of (our enemies in Iraq), but would you be happy with what is left?"
Well, it sure sounds better than asking American troops to knock on doors, card terrorists and drive over IEDs for the next 20 years. But not to the powers that be. In our new age, in our post-modern culture, American war goals -- American self-preservation -- are secondary to war casualties, and I don't mean our own.
That's who we are -- socially humane, expendable and increasingly impotent. It's not who our fathers and grandfathers were. The men who decimated German and Japanese cities as part of the effort to win World War II as quickly as possible would have been perplexed by descendants who now send American troops house to booby-trapped house and expect to achieve anything but more war, "limited" though it may be.
Talk about waste.
You rose to go. I asked whether anything I said had made sense. Your conclusion: "I don't think we're prepared to take the kind of civilian casualties that you describe."
And you were gone.
Here's what I wanted to say next: If that's the case, senator -- and I'm afraid it is -- we'd better get out of the business of trying to project power. We have forgotten how.
This poor woman had to sit on a train all the way from Philadelphia to DC with Arlen Specter? How hideous.
She has a point about projecting power. We decimated the Germans and Japanese and haven’t had the stomach for a full fight since.
Did I miss anything?
Congressman Billybob
The best option, by a mile, would have been to leave Saddam in power.
We never had to spend a dime to supress radical clerics and their followers. He was happy to do it on his own and happy to keep Iran in check as well.
I’m sitting here waiting to take my granddaughter to the movies. So I’ll ruminate and pontificate.
Americans are great people. Sure, I’m one so I might be prejudiced but truly, Americans are great. Pay no mind to the fools protesting and marching during those so-called summits, every human on the planet, given a choice, would choose to be an American.
It takes a lot to make Americans want to go and kill people. To kill people of any nationality, religion, creed or theology...really. Sure we did what we had to do with the Japanese and Germans, you’re right.
But there was a mighty impetus that propelled our reaction. First, Germany had those concentration camps going on and once Americans got wind of this there was little patience to sit around and talk about it. Second, the hapless Japs got it into their head to attack our fleet in Hawaii. In both of these cases, Americans had no problem with taking our big feet and stomping the hell out of those people.
Yes, we got attacked on 9-11 and our retaliation wasn’t near as drastic but we DID react. However, THIS particular enemy isn’t like Japan, or Germany. They are not confined to a geographic region. Let’s say all of the terrorists lived in....Warzastan...just making up a name. You can believe we wouldn’t be in Iraq nitpicking with those IED’s not to mention the many 2-faced Arab despotic regimes that stab us in the back for control over their country’s oil. We’d have drop a big bomb on Warzastan OR, just as likely I surmise, Warzastan would have surrendered toot de sweet.
I think America has the courage to do whatever necessary to protect itself. And it will be AMERICANS....not Arlen Spector or any other Lord in the House of Lords, who will make that decision. Much like it was AMERICANS who rose up and put their collective thumbs on that joke of an immigration bill.
It’s us common people who control all of this, don’t let US forget this though a Lord named McCain and a Presidential Lord named Bush might forget this from time to time. We carry this country on our backs, we abide by the laws, we pursue our happiness and we’re very busy raising the citizens and soldiers of tomorrow. We might not have one mighty voice what with so many of us but we got voices and with the Blogosphere and forums like this, we got more power than ever.
Sometimes, nay often, it’s like herding cats to get the American public to agree on anything. But I truly believe that given time and circumstance, Americans would not slink away from what’s required to protect this country’s children and future. Perhaps I’m too optimistic and hey, I do have the prettiest little granddaughter here and by me, she’s what this is all about.
The congress critters get away with stuff because they spin and deceive. While we’re all out here working, carrying the country on our back, raising the future soldiers and citizens, populating the juries and determining guilt or innocense based on our very practical common sense, well sometimes we might miss a huge slumber party in the House of Lords over nothing.
Let the American people “get it” and hey, shit happens.
It’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
This is astonishing! He was clearly talking about civilian casualties on the other side!
When our leaders equate American casualties with enemy casualties in a war, we have grave need of new leaders.
***Jeff Mellinger put it to The Washington Times: “We could absolutely crush every one of (our enemies in Iraq), but would you be happy with what is left?”***
What did we do in other wars?
Sounds good to me Fishtalk. We just have to make sure that we are willing to win before we start fighting.
Are you willing to accept the American casualties that will result from the nuclear attacks which will be waged by Iran and other Islamist nations on American soil?
Are those intentional, American civilian casualties somehow preferable to the unintentional, civilian collateral damage of an aggressive war on Iranian soil???
“The men who decimated German and Japanese cities as part of the effort to win World War II as quickly as possible would have been perplexed by descendants who now send American troops house to booby-trapped house and expect to achieve anything but more war, ‘limited’ though it may be.”
Hey, a lot of those guys are still around. Are they perplexed that this administration has resisted creating mayhem among the civilians of Iraq and Iran?
I think the columnist shouldn’t presume to speak for them.
In 1936 we would have been horrified to think about carpet bombing Berlin or Tokyo. But after 3 years of of war nearly all Americans decided to do what we needed to do to win the war.
Many Americans today would never decide to do that today. If they are a majority, we may not deserve to continue as a free country.
When my brother was serving in Iraq, he emailed and informed me that his group did not have much of the equipment they needed (night vision etc). I called and emailed both the offices of Santorum and Arlen Specter.
I heard back almost immediately from Specter’s office, followed by emails detailing what was needed, where the group was etc. My brother received a letter from the DOD a few weeks later followed by all of the supplies requested.
I never heard a peep from Santorum.
Great staff work.
Somewhat irrelevant but ... I just hate the word treasure used in this context.
They’re taxpayer dollars, dammit !! Not something you dig up that the pirates buried a few years back !
And keep on flying those "no fly zones" while he took pot shots at us until he died of natural causes? Or maybe we should have let him roll on into Saudi Arabia after Kuwait? He certainly would have kept his thumb permanently on Iran had we done that. Not to mention the entire western world once he controlled most of the M.E. oil. Yeah, probably we should have just ignored old Saddam and let him do whatever he pleased because our economy runs on hot air, not oil. /s
Of course he is. He has a safe place to put his butt, if necessary, and it isn't like the Chinese or the Russians are going to blow up the entire U.S. and make it unlivable. I'm sure Specter agrees with Soros, the UN, etc., that getting rid of a bunch of us peons would improve the country and make those remaining much easier to manage than we are now.
Those who think this way should think a little harder. The most likely targets on US soil also happen to be the most liberal: large cities.
It will be much more difficult to get elected, as a liberal, if all your big city supporters have been vaporized.
Not if all big cities are like Specter's Philly where the dead already vote. Every census, Philly's population shrinks; every election year, Philly's %age of voters grows (at least 112% or better of eligible voters cast a vote in '04.)
I would have thought that 9/11 would have clarified the thought processes of some liberals, but there's no indication it had any effect on the remaining inhabitants in subsequent elections.
“But after 3 years of of war nearly all Americans decided to do what we needed to do to win the war.”
I wasn’t born until 1951, but from reading about WWII, I really doubt that most Americans had any idea what we were doing as far as bombing European cities. They certainly didn’t know about our nuclear bombs. Soldiers’ letters home were censored of information about military activities. So American citizens had no direct influence on decisions about what was, and what was not, acceptable in waging WWII.
The only reason that popular opinion is getting mixed up with strategies and military tactics in Iraq is that there has been such a drastic discrepancy between expectations and what has actually happened. If the American people had been prepared for a long, long hard slog lasting for decades, and encouraged to participate in making sacrifices for victory, the picture would be different now.
Americans are confused, because they were led to believe that Iraq would be independent by now, and that Iraqi oil would pay for the rebuilding of Iraq. This has led to a loss of trust in President Bush, and ridiculously detailed scrutiny of military tactics by civilians who have no experience.
I blame Rumsfeld for this situation, although I know that many here don’t agree with me.
But seriously, I would love to know the results of a poll of Americans over the age of 81 on the war in Iraq. Do they think we are being too soft on civilians?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.