But, the underlying fact is YOU CANNOT CONDUCT PRE-EMPTIVE WARS!
What eventually happens is you will find a justification for every deed you do.
By that standard, the Chinese have right to attack us, and India and Pakistan each of the right to attack each other.
Also, if Iraq supplying our enemies entitles us to attack Iraq, then maybe the Palestinians should attack us -- since we supply their enemies!
The world cannot, and will not work that way. The US has lost a ton of credibility in a fight that did not need to be fought.
The Arab world is not exactly thrilled at our presence in the Middle East, and every Muslim with a gun knows the exact street address in Baghdad to go to if he wants to haul off and kill one American a day.
But . . .
If you want to read something real funny (uh-oh funny, not hah-hah funny) look up al-Qaeda's original mission staements.
They include:
Removing US troops from Saudi Arabia (almost done)
Attacking America (done)
Removing Saddam Hussein (done)
By the time this whole speil with the Arab world is over, we will have achieved another Vietnam -- numerous tactical victories, and no strategic victory.
The bad part is, Vietnam is one country.
The current global war on terrorism / to expand American imperialism is convoluted and pointless and aimless and it has the potential to engulf a quarter of the world's people.
And, just about the time we have everyone seeing things our way (Afghanistan) we go and do some knucklehead thing like attacking Iraq.
Worse, we leave N. Korea off the hook! This, despite the fact they have a dozen weapons-grade plutonium warheads, and missiles capable of reaching Japan and Taiwan. It won't be long before they test a missile capable of reaching the American West Coast.
I don't think removing Saddam Hussein was a bad thing.
However, we needed to get our priorities straight -- and Saddam was a long way from being our #1 priority.
#1 is al-Qaeda and #2 is N. Korea. Saddam probably makes #5, after China and Russia.
Now, ever time we need to conduct operations, the whole world is going to snicker and go "YEAH! Just like that whole Iraq THING WAS SO DAMN NECESSARY!"
All we have done is fed into what these ridiculous oligarchs like the Bushes, Cheney, and co. want.
They want global war because that is what has built their families' power.
The new economy scares them, because they realize that the military-industrial complex is becoming a dinosaur.
And, like any smart animal, it does what it does well -- wage wars and build new weapons systems.
We can't stop here! This is bat country!
