Iraq again
August 13, 2006 at 12:16 AM by Dr. Drang
I just heard on the local news that two more Americans were killed in Iraq today. I went to icasualties.org and confirmed my suspicions. Another sorry milestone has been passed: 2600 US deaths in a war for which there is—and was—no justification.
I can’t understand why anyone would consider the recent arrests in England as support for the US and UK policy in Iraq. Assuming the plot was real (I hate how suspicious I’ve become) and directed by al-Qaeda, it is perhaps the clearest evidence yet that the Iraq war is a policy failure. Because of the shift to Iraq, we failed to achieve the goals of the Afghanistan invasion. Failed to eliminate al-Qaeda, or at least render it impotent. Remember “dead or alive”? How about “root and branch”? The branches are still budding, and the root is still underground, sending us occasional messages.
Our children are being killed at at rate of over 50 per month. To what end? I cringe whenever I read that a fallen soldier died “defending our freedom.” If those words comfort the soldier’s family, so be it, but the rest of us should know better. Our freedom wasn’t threatened by Iraq. Our friends in the Middle East weren’t threatened by Iraq. We invaded because we could.
