John Kerry asked a question several days ago in a statement that quoted his statement in 1973 in reference to the Vietnam War. This question is a catch phrase among certain people.
"How do you ask a man to be the last to die for a mistake?"
Yet this is precisely what he would do -- an example again of one of his kind hurting those he claims to help. We establish a timeline for withdrawl, and we have surrendered. But we will keep fighting until that surrender becomes effective.
That is asking several hundred thousand American soldiers to fight for one more year for a mistake -- fight an enemy who has been informed they will win in exactly 13 months. How can you do that to a soldier?
If this war is lost, and if it is a mistake, and you must make an end, then, for pity's sake, end it now. But, as I suspect most of these men do, you know that an end cannot be made of it tomorrow because of the disasterous results, then the war is not lost, and you owe a debt to those who gave their lives to fight on. The gutless will never make a hard call. Instead, they will open the veins of those who depend on them, and let them bleed out slowly. Because it requires a man of courage to either fight like a lion, or face the consequences of a lost fight. The cowards will stand by.
There is only one option.
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1 comment:
Well said.
Unfortunately I am speaking from the comfort of home -- that is, I'm not in the war myself -- but I can still say that there's a curious misunderstanding of war nowadays. If a war is not over in 6 months, and if more than 2 Americans per day are dying, then the war is a mistake.
Short wars are nice. Wars with few deaths are even nicer. But that is not how to judge success or failure. Bush has an ideal: spread democracy to a place that was in Very Bad straights. The fact that democracy is only slowly taking root (or even may never take root) is beside the point. Also beside the point is any mistakes that he has made. I challenge any historian or politician to find for me a Commander in Chief throughout the annals of history who did not make big mistakes.
Judgments for success are today based upon whatever particulars are a hot point. True success in war, however, is measured by ideals and objectives. And a war lost does not mean a war should never have been fought.
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