(There ARE worse things than was, William.)
I’m a reaganite. He beat out enemies through deterrence and containment, not war. You’re obviously a Bushite, big on looking for excuses to invade and blow trillions of dollars, and send thousands of Americans to their graves. How’s that Iraq war working out for you? And the Afghanistan war — a real success!
Reagan won the cold war by outspending the Soviets. He spent so much on defense that the Soviets gave up the Brandenburg wall, and allowed the citizens to “tear down this wall.”
War had nothing to do with it.
The FEAR of war had a lot to do with it, though.
That was supposed to say “war” not “was”.
Also, I must say I don’t appreciate being smeared with labels. I most certainly do not appreciate being smeared with George Bush’s name, although I imagine that I don’t have quite the disdain for him that you do.
If I am any kind of “ite” I am a Hayekite. So what?
While we are clearing things up, it would be worthwhile to distinguish between properly and well executed wars and wars bungled with inchoate war goals and self-defeating tactics on the ground. Neither the Iraq war nor the one in Afghanistan needed to be as long or as costly as they have proven to be if they were fought to win, the old-fashioned way.
All wars, whether in the 7th century or this one, MUST be fought without restraint, but with intelligence, and massive and irresistible force; most importantly the war must not end until the enemy is utterly defeated, seen to be utterly defeated, knows itself to be utterly defeated; is left supine, exhausted, alone, unable to resist, spent and done. Anything short of that is not victory and is a simple waste of life and treasure.
After such a war, the victors rule the defeated and can build any kind of subsequent society they choose to - at the expense of the defeated. Fail, and leave behind a resentful, undefeated population ready to resume whatever nefarious activity led to the confrontation in the first place, just as soon as they have sufficiently rebuilt.
So don’t throw a bungled war at me as a justification for preemptive surrender. And don’t try to sell me the silly notion that we can fight the threat of Islam with the strategy that worked against the Soviet Union. That’s sophomoric, to say the least, and most importantly it just won’t work.