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Friday, April 02, 2004
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GIVING PEACE A CHANCE: BEEN THERE, DONE THAT, BOUGHT THE T-SHIRT AND COUNTED THE CORPSES
1."Contractors wear hardhats and carry lunch pails - These guys are mercenaries."
2."Death to ALL mercenaries. The beer is on me.
3."Sad, if I were the wife I would have said hell no you won't go; the wife must have said great pay-check and the hubby, yeah, can buy a Hummer when I get back."
4."These swine were MERCENARIES. Paid Hessians. Murderers for hire. They're worse than Al-Queda. At least Al-Queda is fighting for a cause.I say "too bad, so sad, bye-bye."
5."They are Mercenaries - They are in it for the money, they are thugs and hoodlums, working outside the boundaries of the law. And yesterday the Resistance got even with 4 of them in a barbecue ceremony, that alas pushed the bounds of good taste."
6."mercenaries - These men are just serial killers with a good retirement plan. They deserve what they get."
The above are comments that Michele of A Small Victory found on a Democratic Underground blog. Those six quotes refer to the murder of four American contractors in Fallujah, Iraq on Wednesday and the descration of their bodies by the townspeople. It continually amazes me that any American could write so joyously about the murder of their own countrymen. While I understand how divisive the Iraq war has been within the United States, I can't comprehend people being so gleeful over the senseless, brutal murder of their fellow citizens. Particularly when they feel this way in the name of "peace."
Michele wrote a particularly interesting essay about this phenomenon this morning. I will add my two cents here.
While I understand and share some of the concerns about the wisdom of the Iraq war, I do recognize that it cannot be undone at this point. It is far past time to put the toothpaste back in the tube. Even the most strident anti-war presidential candidates (Dean and Kucinich) have not advocated the immediate withdrawal of American forces. The question at hand is how best to manage the situation until such a time that full soveriengty, in whatever form, may be returned to the Iraqi people.
As I've written in this space before, I'm skeptical of the chances of democracy as we know it flourishing in Iraq. A country does not move from a Stalinist dictatorship to a Jeffersonian democracy overnight, particularly when that nation has a 2,000 year history of authoritarian government. That is not to say that I don't believe that Iraq is not better off for Saddam being deposed. It clearly is. While I doubt that Iraq will be governed by something resembling the Dayton, Ohio City Council, I believe that a government that is not a threat to its neighbours and respects at least some of the freedoms of its citizens can be established there. Is it ideal? No, it isn't. Is it possible? Absolutely.
What disturbs me the most about the outcome of this war is the emergence of a particular kind of anti-war movement. As I've noted, thoughtful people may disagree as to the wisdom or tactics of the war. To those who disagree peacefully with this war, I have nothing but respect. And I do believe that the majority of the opposition is peaceful and thoughtful. However, they are not the most vocal element. The most vocal element, the people who take to the streets, destroy property and revel in the murder of American citizens are rapidly becoming the face of the anti-war movement.
These movements are not new. Even the names they adopt, such as the Democratic Underground, are throwbacks to the Vietnam era. It is therefore advisable to go back and study these movements from the late 1960's and early 1970's and the consequences of the "peace" movement then.
The "peace" movement of the late 1960's turned out to be more about politics than it was about peace. Groups such as Students for a Democratic Society and the Weather Underground were more about either overturning the admnistrations of presidents they opposed of reforming American society itself. Even within Congress itself, several who supported the war under the Kennedy and early Johnson admistrations changed positions as LBJ grew more unpopular and solidified upon the election of Richard Nixon. Nixon, who was elected with the knowledge that the war was lost and sought "peace with honor" and began withdrawing forces gradually, was faced with a Democratic Party, several of whom supported the war under Kennedy/Johnson and the pro-war candidacy of Hubert Humphrey, united in the call for the immediate withdrawal of the United States from Vietnam regardless of the consequences.
The signing of the Paris Peace Accords in January 1973 was only possible due to the "secret side agreement" assuring South Vietnam American air support to repel any North Vietnamese violations of the peace. When the North launched an assault in early 1975, President Ford went to the Congress to seek supplemental funding to abide to the American commitment. Not only did the Congress refuse the supplemental, it cut off all funding to the South not tied to the immediate evacuation of American personnel in Saigon. On April 30, Saigon fell and the Vietnam war ended. Two weeks prior, the US supported government of Cambodia was toppled.
The consequences of the peace were immediate. Nearly 1 million South Vietnamese who collaborated with America were either summarily executed or sent to "re-education camps." the most brutal police state in the world was established. Vietnam became the poorest nation in the world and engaged in wars with Cambodia in 1978 and its former patron, China, in 1979. In Cambodia, upwards of two million people were killed by the Khmer Rouge government. The response of the activist left, who carried signs proclaiming, "War is bad for children and other living things" was silence. Following the "peace" in Vietnam, an estimated 1 million people fled in rickety boats. Did the anti-war left lobbying the American government to offer refuge to the boat people? No, they did not. Fearing that these refugees would take their comfortable union jobs, they demanded that they be turned away, which the Carter administration did.
It is indisputable that the peace in South East Asia killed more people in the first three years than ten years of war did.
This historical example is instructive in so far as the current anti-war movement is using many of the same slogans and tactics as their predecessors did. American soldiers are being branded as criminals by the far left. The most violent of the Iraqi insurgents are being cheered. And there is no reason to believe that the fate of the Iraqi people will be any different than that of the Vietnamese should the left triumph. As a matter of fact, Iraq without coalition forces could end up being far worse.
When Saigon fell there was a government, such as it was, in Hanoi prepared to take over and establish order. Iraq does not have that. Both Vietnam and Cambodia were homogeneous societies with only political differences separating them while Iraq is a multi-ethnic society whose components are traditionally antagonistic. Without an American presence in Iraq, there is every reason to believe that it will quickly dissolve into a genocidal civil war with an untold number of potential refugees. The question is, where will they find refuge? The Arab countries since 1948 have shown little interest in accepting Palestinian refugees and there is no reason to believe that they will open their borders to Iraqi ones. A good percentage of Iraq's 25 million people could be slaughtered if the radical left gets their way.
Despite what the left is currently arguing, Iraq is not Vietnam. Not yet, anyway. But should the Democratic Underground succeed, it could be much, much worse.
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