I’ll have some things to say about Israel’s long overdue response to Hamas’s thousands of rockets, lobbed into civilian areas for many many months. But, as luck would have it, I happened to receive an email from an American soldier in Afghanistan, which goes right to the heart of the matter. Like so many of our men and women on the battlefield, he is a very thoughtful person, and so it came as no surprise when he started his email saying
I’ve spent a considerable amount of time in the last ten months, contemplating the necessity of my being here. Some days it feels as though nothing we do will make a difference. That this country is doomed to remain in poverty and violence and there is nothing anyone can do to change its irrevocable course. That no amount of American blood or treasure will ever deter or change the minds of those who have decided that America is a great evil, enforcing its will upon the world. That America is the cause of their hatred. That we Soldiers were sent to fight on ‘bad intelligence’ or for the wrong reasons. That we are in Afghanistan for vengeance and Iraq for oil. That if we just left, these countries would return to a blissful peace, free from American oppression. And through many nights, in a pitch black that is only possible hundreds of miles from electricity, I have questioned the mission. I have questioned if Afghanistan is worth it. I have questioned whether or not my being here has made a difference.
This is the hallmark of the civilized man, constantly questioning the reasons for his behavior, wondering if there is a better way, searching for that better way, putting himself in the position of “the other,” trying to understand it all. This man got his answer.
Today I received my answer. Today a suicide bomber drove his truck into a crowd of children at a checkpoint. At last count, over 20 children were killed instantly when his car detonated. As of 30 minutes ago frantic mothers and fathers were still calling the American base to see if their child was at our hospital. We could only say ‘no, no children were brought to the hospital. None of the children’s bodies were recovered, none survived the blast.’…In Saving Private Ryan, Tom Hanks reflects on the Soldiers he’s lost. Comparing each one lost under his command to a dozen saved by his command. Today dozens of young, innocent, unspoiled lives were lost. There is no other way to describe it other than a massacre.
Freedom is America’s brand. Many members of our political, media and academic elites have forgotten this fact. You and your soldier correspondent see things clearly.
All the best.
Brilliant letter from the soldier in Afghanistan. But I am not so sure if OUR LEADERS see it the way we do. They see it differently and are too PC to say where the real threat is from. I wish these so called leaders see that the removal of the Mullahs in Tehran will greatly HELP fight this war against Islamic supremacy. Defeating the regime in Iran will send a clear message to the tyrants of the world. The same message that the fall of the Soviet Union sent around the world. But I am not so sure any more. Though I would like to remain hopeful that freedom will come to my motherland, Iran, one day again. Thank you for this post, michael. It was the best post of the week. Thnx
Your penultimate paragraph is almost a credo. If that is what it means to be a “neoconservative”, then I am happy to be one.
YES PROF. LEDEEN. YOU ARE OUR FATHER AND OUR BROTHER. I CANNOT IMAGINE THAT “WITHOUT YOU” GOD FORBID. YOU ARE OUR DEAR, WE LOVE YOU. GOD BLESS YOU PROF. MICHAEL.
However, if some said that USA gone to the Middle East only for oil! I ask them, Did Kuwait liberation war it was a war only for oil?
When the United States led the Balkan war with its allies from the NATO, at that time the US has supported Muslims against Christians in the Balkan war in the1990s, Did was for oil too?
The United States gave and gives a lot of help of Muslims when a nature catastrophe happens in their area, then we can see the US always in the first stand to help Moslems in their agony, Did that human help for oil too?
No doubt, The Middle East is oil-rich area of vital economic and strategic interest to the entire western world, especially to the United States economy. The Middle East just possesses more than 74 % of global oil “only in Arab world more than 64 %”. In other words, today only more than 74 % of global Oil is under Islamist fascist’s footfall, the terror Leaders and pro-evil States, Let alone Indonesia. Venezuela’s Chavies has more than 6 % of global Oil. On the other hand, you can NOT deny that “the lifeblood is under domination of the Evil regimes and the extreme fundamentalism communities, which hate the Westerners and their values as “Saudi Arabia, Arabian Gulf States, and Iran”. Obviously that nations possesses more than 74 % of global energy, but they still extremely late nations and violent and form real threat on the US security.
Of course today we live with global terrorism and atrocities, terrible acts and killing of innocents ruthlessly everywhere on the earth. All terrible acts issue in this era only from the Islamic world and in the name of Allah. The Arabs have sowed culture of the suicide and explosion at the other Islamic nations such as Afghanistan, Chechnya, Pakistan, Kosovo, India, Philippines and the many countries of the world even in the heart of the west. Most of the combatants came from Saudi Arabia, U.A.E, Kuwait, Syria, Algeria, Egypt, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, Jordan, Palestine and Yemen. The only language they discuss with others only the violence language.
Surely there are warm relations between regimes that dominate oil extraction in the Middle East and which are pro-evil against the United States as “Chavies, Ahmadinejad, Castro, Bashar Al-Asaad, Gaddafi Libya, Alexander Lukashenko, Kim Jong in North Korea, Mugabe Zimbabwe, and the wealthiest families in Saudi Arabia”. All rogue States aforementioned are challenging the existing world order their blunt statements perceive the current world order as the personification of the United States Imperialism and Zionism, which is in the State of Israel.
Obviously all Evil leaders are megalomaniacs and evil military hysteria. Through their union they intend to vanquish Zionism and the Benevolent Imperialism “USA”, just if they will be stand together against the Axis of Good. All that hatred toward the United States together with common interests in the sphere of oil, their stance against “the Benevolent Imperialism, Capitalism and Zionism” is tangible common denominator of hatred toward the United States, is surely one of the central reasons for the formation of the alliance between them especially between Chavies, Ahmadinejad, Bashar Al-Asaad, Kim Jong and Castro. Rudely they all despise the United States influence in the Middle East and everywhere on the earth. On the other hand both opportunistic neutrals China and Russia are quite content with their evil behavior toward the United States for economical strategy purposes in order to spreading their red influence on the earth “Evil ideology”!
However, the United States of America is a very unique State is not an ordinary State, the United States is a Benevolent Empire. The United States has a moral principles able qualifies it to drive the world. Therefore the United States of America MUST BE imperious, ruthless, and relentless as unique State in the World, as a moral superpower on the earth.
I would like to tell the humiliating western policymakers, that the civilized free world today among two serious options:
1-SUPPORT of freedom and democracy in the Middle East at any cost, even if there were NO Iranian nuclear program that is through the Security Council and courageous political decisions. OR
2- Leaves the world security into the hands of terrorists and their masters “The Evil Regimes.
WE JUST NEED WILL-POWER, COHERENCE, AND COURAGEOUS POLITICAL DECISIONS. THEREFORE, NO COMPROMISE WITH THE THE US SECURITY AND NO COMPROMISE WITH THE WORLD SECURITY, WAKE UP, PLEASE!!!
God Bless American Freedom Fighters who protect USA and Humanity in all those nasty places
We will win this war and they will come back to their families safe and sound.
What’s ironic is that all we have to do to win is stick around, yet due to to a lack of political will and international support, we’ll be gone from Iraq sixteen months. We’ve now taught other countries that they can defeat the mighty USA simply by inflicting an average of 1-2 casualties a day and waiting us out until the next election.
Well there are reasons to believe that USA was dragged into Iraq by a very careful and long lasting special operation of kremlin strategists
the reason: put USA down in international perception and in the eyes of naive Americans. EXACTLY the same as was done in Vietnam war when soviets spent 85% of resource at the anti-war propaganda active mesures
The neighbors of Iraq needed USA to protect them from Sadam. Now they did not. Iran became the most powerful player in the area. And there are other disadvantages.
But we can not roll back the time, so we have to stay and i would say the best path would be to increase our influence in the region:
we should finish regimes in Iran, Syria and may be some more.
Obama is a new guy and world trusts him. So he ‘s got to do it in the mosty aggresive way
Anthony: I don’t know what a “neocon” is, but it has always struck me as odd that, in the current lexicon, people like me who support revolution against tyranny are called “conservatives.”
On the other hand, people who defend tyrants against democratic forces are called “progressive.”
Nuts.
Michael,
As a veteran of the Marxist Left from many years ago, I know exactly the purpose of the label “progressive.” For the record, I never went along with it, which refusal got me constantly in trouble with the true leaders of the Gramscian Marxist movement. I would refer to myself as either a Marxist or a socialist, and was told to NEVER use those descriptions of my ideological orientation. I was often told to use the new label for the package called “progressive.” The word did have a history on the Left some decades before, and its use was revived in the Seventies in order to make our ideology more appealing and less threatening. It grated on my sensibilities, since I was a bookish, academic type. But the activist leaders truly do drive the movement. They have become experts at roping in useful idiots.
So glad I broke with Marxism in 1987.
Today the Left tosses around the word “neocon” to mean a lot of things that are negative. It means anyone who is in favor of our war against Islamic jihad. And it also is used to mean “dirty Jew.” The Left has devolved into a nether world of ugly demons who revel in murder and mayhem.
We keep the chaos and evil of the nether world at bay because of the young soldiers like the one who wrote the above thoughts.
I think the “clash of civilizations” meme makes a good quote but actually most civilizations get along just fine. I haven’t seen too many Hindus beheading journalists, or Jamaicans driving bomb-laden trucks into buildings. Islam’s the one that can’t seem to get along. But that’s primarily the fault of Islamic leaders using politics and religion as public platforms, political cover, recruiting devices, fundraising strategies, etc similar to the way that Lenin and Stalin used Marxist ideology and class warfare as cover for their own power grab – and had the support of the American and European left in the process because their ideology was pure.
A better way to look at the situation is that the middle east just has many of the characteristics that make for revolutionary and violent environments, including weak governments, poor economic development, historical rivalries, and valuable resources. Those conditions will draw in any wannabe dictator that wants to gain power at the point of a gun. You could say the same thing about many parts of Africa or SE Asia or Latin America, and its more or less why & how Khomenei and Saddam Hussein came to power.
Where the “clash” occurs is that the US has economic interests in the middle east and defense ties to Israel, and just can’t afford to let the entire region become an Islamic fundamentalist super-state. But projecting US power a continent away is difficult militarily, economically, and politically, and the wannabe dictators know that and have no trouble using US occupation as a recruiting point and then waiting us out.
However I think one often overlooked point in our favor is that the Arab man-on-the-street really is not as radical and aggressive as his leaders pretend. Yes, there are lots of radicals out there, but they’re a small percentage. That’s why both Afghanistan and Iraq collapsed like a house of cards when we came in force. The exact same thing would happen in Iran – few would care if their leaders were killed tomorrow and replaced with someone a little friendlier to the US. That’s not to say that groups wouldn’t move against us – they would of course – but the average person is not going to put their lives on the line to kill Americans.
Yeah, as Ron Paul reminds us every chance he gets, there’s nothing “conservative” about democratic regime change. Good. There doesn’t need to be.
As for our leadership, I have less faith in Obama than I did in Bush. Bush lost his mojo, alright, but he could have been much worse. A man of lesser political courage would have thrown in the towel in Iraq in ’04 or ’05, and especially in the dark days of ’06. While he never went full steam ahead — to win the larger war — changing strategies with the surge, and salvaging Iraq will go down in history as an act of foresight and political courage.
I don’t see too many people on the GOP side who “get it,” either. Giuliani does, Fred Thompson does, Gingrich does… I’m not sure what their political futures hold, however. It seems like the new crop of GOP leaders — Palin, Jindal, Pawlenty, etc. — have good instincts, but are more rooted in domestic political philosohpy. They’re no Reagan, who spent his entire life thinking about his hatred for communism.
Nowadays, our presidents are young, popular governors or senators who have domestic appeal. If the Palins and Jindals of the world surround themselves with good foreign policy people, I don’t see why this soldier’s hope and vision cannot come to fruition.
Jassem Othman : Thank you for your comment. I wish there were more like you in the Middle East. If there are, we never hear about them – only about the thugs and crazies and the Westerners who excuse the vilest actions of terrorists.
Thanks Ms/Mrs Donna , We also SO MUCH happy that West has people like you and like Prof. Ledeen. We need you , we need brave people like prof. Ledeen. WE HAVE TO ADVOCATE THESE PUNDITS against the humiliating policymakers, and against the sanctimonious scandals sellers in the West.