Quote:
Originally Posted by bytor2112
We have characterized nations as rogue or as state sponsers of terrorism long before Bush and we were gearing up for a military response to 911. Previous administrations had been soft spoken and done nothing with regard to the growing terrorist threat. A little tough talk aimed at nations that encourage terroristic aggressions is way over due.A policy of doing nothing will yield results such as 911 and the attack on the Cole. Th threat of terrorism is real and should be dealt with as aggressively as possible and the nations labeled by past and present administrations should be warned of impending consequences if corrective actions aren't taken. The argument over patriotic or unpatriotic is distasteful to me and is a lot of hype and political posturing on both sides of the aisle. Burning the President of the United States in effigy and some of the ridiculous slanders that are presented by so-called anti-war groups are nothing more than an attempt to divide our country. Take a hard look at some of protest groups and see who they really are and what they really represent.....
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This makes evident some fundamental distinctions. The first is that the persons involved in the 9/11 attacks did not and do not constitute a state or nation, but are citizens of a state acting on their own. Second, their actions are not the result of U.S. soft spokenness against terrorism or the specific cause of certain terrorists, but rather they are the result of U.S. interventionism.
The designation of "state sponors of terrorism" and the policy of war against such designated states is a doorway through which conflict can be infinitely multiplied. It is an audacious and ridiculous notion. The logic would have us invade every country from which illegal drugs are imported. Perhaps a single murder could be considered an act of war to which a military effort for regime change would be the response.
I will quickly admit that the doctrine is not new. Let the slaying of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and the accusation of "state sponsored" assassination serve as our reminder of the possible dangers of such designation. Perhaps a better policy could have avoided the tremendous bloodshed that followed.
Let those who argue that the first World War could have developed without the introduction of that murder and the subsequent alliance of Austria-Hungary with Germany against the Serbians remember that their argument still admits that a singular act of violence only needed to appear to be aligned with a usurpation of some balance of European power to precipitate the war through attempts at intervention by any given alliance.
The disassembly of diplomatic relations with Serbia, the delivery of an ultimatum, and the propagandizing of Serbian/Austria-Hungarian tension fueled public support to military action against Serbia and Serbian support for the military repulsion thereof.
Bin Laden believes that he can use the same tactics on the west as he did on the Soviet Union. He hopes to draw us into war and into bankruptcy, just as he did the Soviets. Now, we can either show the world how tough we are and spend the fortune of future generations policing the world and trying to prove Bin Laden wrong and the Austria-Hungarians right, or we can demonstrate as did Reagan the ability to know when to say when.
-a-train