The wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time

American Security is undermined thanks to Bush's liberal idealism and Republican hypocrisy


In 1999, one Republican Congressman after another lined up in denouncing President Clinton's multilateral war against the biggest butcher of our time, Slobodan Milosevic as a war that was not in America's National Security interest. These Republicans stated that fighting a war on the European continent alongside our Western European allies in the same region where World War I began was undermining the American military. These Republicans felt that the interests of the United Kingdom and German were disperate from that of the United States, despite a century of shared foreign policy concerns and interaction. Yet, six and a half years later, many of these same Congressman are supporting a war that has lasted over two and a half years which at its outset had little geopolitical security impact and seemed more about settling old scores than protecting America's vital interest in the Middle East and around the world. If the President were serious about protecting American interests in the Middle East and fighting terrorism, he would have taken a much more proactive posture, with broad International support towards Iran and Syria in 2002 and 2003 rather than mobilize for a war against a boxed-in, weak Iraq run by Saddam Hussien.

In May 2003, George W. Bush staged a landing on the USS Lincoln to declare "Mission Accomplished in Iraq," and that major combat was over. Bush did state in his speech that day two and a half years ago that American troops would oversee the transition to a Democracy in Iraq. Yet two and a half years later, the mission and focus keeps shifting and while a Democracy which is contrary to American security interests has been put in place, American soldiers are fighting and dying against an enemy who will never meet them in the traditional field of battle- an enemy which is coalition of disparate factions and interests resorting to hit and run tactics. Like in Vietnam, the American military cannot win against an enemy who resorts to urban warfare and tradtional tactics used in civil wars around the globe.

A continued American military presence in Iraq is working to strengthen not only Al Qaeda, but more importantly Iran who possesses Weapons of Mass Destruction, and also has exported its form of radical Islamic fundamentalism to neighboring nations. This Islamic fundamentalism at its very core detests the existence of the United States and any Western nation with a Christian majority, like our own, whose secularism and diversity threatens the religious zeolotary emanating from Tehran. Yet Bush, the idealistic liberal is less concerned about reigning in terror and winning a war on radical Islam, but more concerned about using the American military to safeguard a fledgling Democracy in a nation which is not in itself very meaningful on the geopolitical scene. The only meaning Iraq has globally has been created by two and a half years of war between the United States and the local population.

Through the years, Presidents both Republican and Democrat have not used the American military in the fashion Bush has with regards to Iraq. Creating a Pluralistic Democracy in Iraq is always a noble goal, but simply has no bearing on the larger interest of the American nation. For Bush to continue to keep over 150,000 American troops in Iraq while threats globally are increasing and our military is spread thin because the political will to reinstitution the draft is not prevalent is itself a compromise of American security unknown in contemporary times. George W. Bush's presidency and misguided priorities have been the best thing for Kim Jong-Il and the rogue North Korean state as well as Iran, Syria and other nations whose leaders use the American bogeyman to maintain autocratic control over their nations.

Bush's key allies in this fight- hypocritical Republican Congressman who fail to understand history and America' global interest, as well as liberal idealistists who are advising this President are terribly misguided and are sinking America deeper and deeper into a hole that will make Vietnam look like a blip on the American military radar screen. If we do not solve our situation in Iraq, the United States will lose whatever credibility remains for us in the International Community and make our nation its most isolated since before world War I.