Mendolonium

I was listening to NPR recently when I heard a story describing how the Obama administration is “going on the offensive” to counter assertions from conservatives that the administration is soft on terror and, by extension, jeopardizing the safety of the United States.  As a progressive Democrat I am, not surprisingly, frustrated by the accusations.  With respect to preventing and fighting terrorism, I have actually seen very few substantial changes implemented by the new administration.  Conservatives decry the prosecution of the Christmas Day bomber in a civil court, however, they conveniently “forget” that most terrorist suspects, including Richard Reid the “shoe bomber” prosecuted under George W. Bush’s tenure, have been tried in civil courts.   But it was not endless and inaccurate conservative refrain of “Terrorism!  Danger!  Defend freedom! that troubled me.  What disappointed and disturbed me was that the Democrats continue to allow the Republicans to define the terms of debate.  Their “offensive”, appears to my eyes to be defensive – by responding to the accusations they legitimize them.  In much the same way the U.S. government, Republicans and Democrats insist on using the word “war” to describe the conflict between the Untied States and various terrorist factions.  To term the actions of terrorists and our efforts to fight them a “war” is both inaccurate and poor strategy.

In my mind a war is a conflict that can be won.  Regardless of the amount of money that we throw at the problem or the number of troops we throw in front of IEDs the struggle against terrorist is not a winnable situation.  From the very founding of the United States, there have been groups, both domestic and international, that seek to overthrow our government through violent means.  The groups, and their associated ideologies, have come and gone, but they have never left because the U.S. government “won” a fighting war against them.  Furthermore, the use of the word “war” legitimizes and gives quasi-governmental status to a group of people who should be firmly marginalized in terms of political power.  With legitimacy comes funding from sympathetic countries, individuals, and organizations.  With the use of the word “war” parallels are drawn between revolutionary wars and “freedom fighters”.  Let me be clear, I do not in any believe terrorist actions to ever be justified, however, the solution to the problem cannot be found in military might alone.   This should be abundantly clear from the past eight and half years. of U.S. policy.

There cynic in me which wonders if, of course, the U.S. government has thought all of this through and that the use of the word “war” is solely for the “benefit” of the American public.  Certainly, it is much more effective to raise the money to support the “war machine” if there is a war.  I look at my sons and I think about the hundreds of thousands of men and women deployed overseas every day as well as the little boys growing up poor and with little prospects for a successful future in places like Afghanistan.  I think about it every day and I wonder what the future holds for us as a nation when we spend trillions of dollars in war against a group of terrorists who don’t even have a country; a war that cannot be won?  What do you think?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010 at 9:36 pm and is filed under A Piece of My Mind. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.