Is It Worth It?
Tuesday, January 9th, 2007"Absolutely we’re winning." These soon-to-be-famous-last-words escaped he lips of our president in October of last year. What he doesn’t mention is the escalating cost of war in general (never an inexpensive proposition) and this war in particular (now well past $100,000 for every person in the US. How many people are you supporting? How would you pay a bill that large?) Some costs, of course, can never be recovered, mainly the cost in blood and suffering.
From Dahr Jamail:
According to the U.S. military newspaper Stars and Stripes, service members with "a psychiatric disorder in remission, or whose residual symptoms do not impair duty performance" may be considered for duty downrange. It lists post-traumatic stress disorder as a "treatable" problem.
Steve Robinson, director of Veterans Affairs for Veterans for America told IPS correspondent Aaron Glantz that "as a layman and a former soldier I think that’s ridiculous."
"If I’ve got a soldier who’s on Ambien to go to sleep and Seroquel and Qanapin and all kinds of other psychotropic meds, I don’t want them to have a weapon in their hand and to be part of my team because they’re a risk to themselves and to others," he said. "But apparently, the military has its own view of how well a soldier can function under those conditions, and is gambling that they can be successful."
From CNN:
The problem is larger than mere displacement, a U.N. news release states, as women are increasingly forced to resort to prostitution and reports of child labor problems are on the rise…
"The longer this conflict goes on, the more difficult it becomes for the hundreds of thousands of people displaced, and the communities that are trying to help them — both inside and outside Iraq," U.N. High Commissioner on Refugees Antonio Guterres said in a Monday news release. "The burden on host communities and governments in the region is enormous."
According to UNHCR estimates, there are between 500,000 and 1 million refugees in Syria; about 700,000 in Jordan; about 80,000 in Egypt; and about 40,000 in Lebanon. Turkey is hosting an unknown number of Iraqis, the news release states.
But the war could last years longer, according to the NY Times
The new American operational commander in Iraq said Sunday that even with the additional American troops likely to be deployed in Baghdad under President Bush’s new war strategy it might take another “two or three years” for American and Iraqi forces to gain the upper hand in the war.
The commander, Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, assumed day-to-day control of war operations last month in the first step of a makeover of the American military hierarchy here. In his first lengthy meeting with reporters, General Odierno, 52, struck a cautious note about American prospects, saying much will depend on whether commanders can show enough progress to stem eroding support in the United States for the war.
“I believe the American people, if they feel we are making progress, they will have the patience,” he said. But right now, he added, “I think the frustration is that they think we are not making progress.”
[…]
He said he understood the failing confidence among Americans, including some of those who had lost sons and daughters here, that the war was worthwhile. The general’s own son, Capt. Anthony Odierno, a 28-year-old West Point graduate, lost an arm when a bomb detonated during a patrol in Baghdad in 2004.
As a father as well as a commander, the general said, he did not doubt the sacrifices had been justified. “I believe it’s worth it,” he said.
He’s on duty, what else can he say? He wants his promotion to full general to go through. He’s a professional soldier, he understands that having an opinion is not required to do his job.
We’re not in Iraq to stop Terrorism. We’ve made it a terrorists playground and training field. We’re not in Iraq to spread Democracy. A key component of Democracies is it’s viral nature - it spreads itself. The common citizen must accept it before it will work. Democracy spreads from the bottom up. Forcing it upon an unwilling populace is top-down Democracy which is dysfunctional.
No. We’re in Iraq to secure oil for the West. We’re in Afghanistan to build military bases atop the Caspian Sea oil pipeline. We’ve build the largest military complex in the world in Iraq, and we’re there for the long haul. We’re exchanging blood for oil and to our leaders, it doesn’t matter how much blood is spent. Nor does it matter whose blood is spent - so long as it is a stranger’s.
Is it worth it? Hell, no!