Understanding the Enemy

[MikeF]

Concur with all. Exactly right in my experience. No evidence you ever produce will convince most (not all) anti-western Arabs that the Israeli's didn't commit 911, and that the British SIS didn't murder Princess Diana.

Try and tell folks who believe in UFOs that they don't exist.

...and I don't think it is the job of any Army to alter beliefs. It's to make the cost of acting on those beliefs too high, for most people to risk.

With Wilf's valid insight and Goesh's suggestion, where do we go?

Here's how I describe it...

If everything is interconnected and intertwined, all we have to do is connect the dots to comprehend.

Max Weber’s Protestant Ethic and Spirit of Capitalism expresses the crux of American Intervention mirrored in the self-denial conflicted with an internal desire to evangelize. Democracy works for us. Freedom isn’t free. Thus, we must free others with democracy. As good Christians, it is our duty to fix everyone else. One plus one equals three. The ghost of scarlet letters resounds in the western version of Wahabists Shar’iah law, yet we pretend it is not religious. Parables of Pharisees provoked thou screamest loudest as if you know truth. Jesus wept. John joins in joint justification.

In Vietnam, we propped up an artificial government in the hopes that they
would conform. Unfortunately, they only conformed to the corruption. Corrosion of conformity, our opportunity to assist a Vietnam in transition failed when we discarded Ho Chi Minh to salvage our relationship with France.

In Iraq, we tried Maliki.

Today, we strive to save Afghanistan. What are we attempting to save it from? Itself? To what effect? Is Hamid Karzai our friend? We assume that because he dresses well in tailored suits and speaks the Queen’s English that he shares our values, beliefs, and norms. In truth, he may be using us as a comparative advantage to unbalance the balanced opposition much as the Taliban uses al Qaeda.

Twenty years ago, we allied with the Taliban to defeat the Soviets in a marriage of convenience. After the Bear fell, we left. The Taliban did not forget. Kipling echoed for naught, yet we rationalize in the hopes of a natural gas pipeline emerging from the ashes. Phoenix is in Arizona not Kabul. A tendency of good war is oxymoron.

No doubt I weep for the deprived women of Afghanistan, but I must accept that I did not cause their suffering. It existed long before my birth. All I can control is the parameters of my family and closest friends. All I can help are those that first inquire to help themselves. I am neither an isolationist nor anti-war. That reasoning is as foolish as pretending that I am not man. I am simply taking a moment to consider our passion in some form of analysis lest we continue along the foreboding path that shadows and conforms.

Maybe it is time to leave well enough alone.

I am by no means trying to make policy statements. In all actuality, as Schmedlap voices in other threads, I'm sorting through my own personal decision matrix....I would be the first to volunteer for Goesh's expedition....

Ok, with that said, and all the politics aside, what do you think?

There is much validity in Wilf's crushing the enemy as there is in Mortenson's building schools. Where is the intersection point?

All I submit that it is better to discuss the issue rather than remaining stuck. Or rather, as Ken suggest, I'm skeptical of any translation.

Let me know if I've simplified matters too far.

In true detail to other cultures, I'd submit that we must add music...this seems appropriate

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhtcaRRngcw

v/r

Mike