The difference in Iraq
I am attaching a link to a page that lists the differences in Iraq before and after Saddam Hussein. I am also attaching a link in which the writer is proud of the comparisons between Vietnam and Iraq. It is a very fresh perspective.
Those who think this war was not worth waging need to read and heed. Our history is filled with sacrafices we have made as a collective nation to ensure freedom and liberty for others. We set them free. We liberate. As the Special Forces motto states, ""de oppresso libre", translated "To Free the Oppressed".
We have freed an oppressed people. Sure, there are a lot who want a return to the status quo. There are those who would start a civil war. There are those who would institute a theocracy. Like any society in flux it is convoluted and confusing but it just does not happen overnight.
It took us as a nation over 80 years and a Civil War before we settled down and became the fore runners of who we are today. The French had a revolution and another 40 years. We liberated France and after that it was about 10 years for them to return to normal. Germany was a country we invaded. We took it by force, dismantled the government, disbanded the Army, and started over. It took 8 years of occupation and rebuilding for them to become a stand alone entity and they are much more like us that Iraq. They already had some of our values and had already been a democratic society. Everyone seems to forget that the Nazis were elected into power.
Iraq is starting from scratch. It is a amalgamation of tribal lands made into an un-natural country by British mandate after WWI. They fought against the Allies in WWII on the side of the Germans! Everyone has forgotten that too! There has never been democracy here, no equal rights, no rights at all.
We sacrafice, we pay in money and blood. We do it to make ourselves safer in the future but we also do it for the most noble of causes. We do it for an idea. We do it for someone else, free of charge, and without remorse. We do so willingly. We have guilt, we grieve our dead but no more or no less than those of past conflicts.
No one talks about the magnatude of sorrow inflicted on our nation in WWII. We call them the "Greatest Generation". When these fine people are interviewed they always say that they were just,"...doing their jobs." So are these kids over here. They just do their jobs. They fight, they die, but they persevere.
In WWII the general staff knew that we needed to start taking the war to the Japanese. They chose the island of Tarawa to invade. There was no media there to cover our mistakes and no media to harp on the fact that we lost over 3000 Marines in 3 days to take a 2 square mile patch of coral. There were no photos of the mangled American bodies littering the beach. Serious miscalculations were made. The tide was low and the tracked assault vehicles got hung up on the coral. They were the wrong vehicles. The kids did their jobs and died in the thousands. Our general staff learned and the mistakes were never repeated.
Our general staff protected these mistakes and corrections as a secret and did not let our enemies know what our weaknesses were. They kept the public in the dark and our enemies. These days every mistake is covered by the MSM in minute gory detail. The general staff in WWII kept the photos out of the press because they knew that if the general public knew the details they would suffer in morale. Instead of harping on the losses and horrors they triumphed the successes and the victory.
I keep hearing and seeing casualty counts like it is a scorecard or something. That does not matter as much as winning. We suffered over 50,000 dead (combined losses, all Americans) at Gettysburg and still fought for two more years. We suffered over 400,000 dead in WWII and it was for 5 years. This was is at a pittance of the human cost compared to this war yet the importance of this conflict is just as great as in either of those two mentioned.
The MSM does not say this. Lessons Learned don't make good news lead ins but bad news and blood does. Stabilization, freedom, and prosperity don't make the evening news. There is a lot more of that around than the MSM tells you about.
Link to a Vietnam Vet's take on Iraq.
http://www.homeofheroes.com/talkingpoints/0311_vietnamVSiraq.html
Link to the difference in Hussein's Iraq and now.
http://familiesunitedmission.com/letter/thenandnow.pdf
Those who think this war was not worth waging need to read and heed. Our history is filled with sacrafices we have made as a collective nation to ensure freedom and liberty for others. We set them free. We liberate. As the Special Forces motto states, ""de oppresso libre", translated "To Free the Oppressed".
We have freed an oppressed people. Sure, there are a lot who want a return to the status quo. There are those who would start a civil war. There are those who would institute a theocracy. Like any society in flux it is convoluted and confusing but it just does not happen overnight.
It took us as a nation over 80 years and a Civil War before we settled down and became the fore runners of who we are today. The French had a revolution and another 40 years. We liberated France and after that it was about 10 years for them to return to normal. Germany was a country we invaded. We took it by force, dismantled the government, disbanded the Army, and started over. It took 8 years of occupation and rebuilding for them to become a stand alone entity and they are much more like us that Iraq. They already had some of our values and had already been a democratic society. Everyone seems to forget that the Nazis were elected into power.
Iraq is starting from scratch. It is a amalgamation of tribal lands made into an un-natural country by British mandate after WWI. They fought against the Allies in WWII on the side of the Germans! Everyone has forgotten that too! There has never been democracy here, no equal rights, no rights at all.
We sacrafice, we pay in money and blood. We do it to make ourselves safer in the future but we also do it for the most noble of causes. We do it for an idea. We do it for someone else, free of charge, and without remorse. We do so willingly. We have guilt, we grieve our dead but no more or no less than those of past conflicts.
No one talks about the magnatude of sorrow inflicted on our nation in WWII. We call them the "Greatest Generation". When these fine people are interviewed they always say that they were just,"...doing their jobs." So are these kids over here. They just do their jobs. They fight, they die, but they persevere.
In WWII the general staff knew that we needed to start taking the war to the Japanese. They chose the island of Tarawa to invade. There was no media there to cover our mistakes and no media to harp on the fact that we lost over 3000 Marines in 3 days to take a 2 square mile patch of coral. There were no photos of the mangled American bodies littering the beach. Serious miscalculations were made. The tide was low and the tracked assault vehicles got hung up on the coral. They were the wrong vehicles. The kids did their jobs and died in the thousands. Our general staff learned and the mistakes were never repeated.
Our general staff protected these mistakes and corrections as a secret and did not let our enemies know what our weaknesses were. They kept the public in the dark and our enemies. These days every mistake is covered by the MSM in minute gory detail. The general staff in WWII kept the photos out of the press because they knew that if the general public knew the details they would suffer in morale. Instead of harping on the losses and horrors they triumphed the successes and the victory.
I keep hearing and seeing casualty counts like it is a scorecard or something. That does not matter as much as winning. We suffered over 50,000 dead (combined losses, all Americans) at Gettysburg and still fought for two more years. We suffered over 400,000 dead in WWII and it was for 5 years. This was is at a pittance of the human cost compared to this war yet the importance of this conflict is just as great as in either of those two mentioned.
The MSM does not say this. Lessons Learned don't make good news lead ins but bad news and blood does. Stabilization, freedom, and prosperity don't make the evening news. There is a lot more of that around than the MSM tells you about.
Link to a Vietnam Vet's take on Iraq.
http://www.homeofheroes.com/talkingpoints/0311_vietnamVSiraq.html
Link to the difference in Hussein's Iraq and now.
http://familiesunitedmission.com/letter/thenandnow.pdf
posted by flythemig29 at 9:46 AM
1 Comments:
I don't want to split hairs, but they fought against the allies on the side of the German's in WWII. In fact, they overthrough the Sunni Arab monarchy that was installed by the British after WWI and the break up of the Ottoman empire.
The Ba'athist ideology is a knock off of Nazi ideology.
Just wanted to help you out with info when people are reading because the gist of your discussion is correct. Expecting miracles is insane and short sighted. I'm not sure which is worse. But, you know, some folks will read what you write and figure since you made a mistake in writing WWII you don't know what you're saying. Or they pretend that anyway because it makes them feel better.
However, I do want to say that it's an excellent post in reminding people they need to get a grip on their emotions and put things in perspective.
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