No Glory, No Spoils, No Closure - The Double Whammy of Rip-off Wars

[unhappycamper]

http://www.opednews.com/articles/No-Glory-No-Spoils-No-Cl-by-Robert-S-Becker-121225-431.html



No Glory, No Spoils, No Closure - The Double Whammy of Rip-off Wars
By Robert S. Becker
12/25/2012 at 21:02:29

Today's easy riddle: what will cost more, last longer, and accomplish less than our troop-heavy, anachronistic, perpetual overseas occupations? Nothing, nada, rien -- certainly not annual deficits, Bush tax cuts, or formal defense budgets. Put aside human suffering and unbelievable dislocation: we've all shouldered a four trillion dollar price tag on two failed wars, plus the double whammy that both Iraq and Afghanistan remain unstable havens for mayhem. Is any fiscal cliff that might happen worse than two indeterminate rat holes that have happened?

When outcomes are set against costs, would not every payoff-to-price ratio indict our Asian land wars as absurd, if not obscene, devoid of socially-redeeming value? You'd think by now anti-war rage would defy the yet-to-be-rejected, neo-con mindset of shoot-first, ask-questions-later belligerence. Widely perceived as continuing crusades against Muslim populations, these wars send "messages to evil-doers" all right, but they only wither our prestige, fuel a generation of anti-American fury and taint our national soul.

What von Clausewitz justified as an "extension of politics by other means" is now a crude bludgeon that should be openly condemned, then dumped on the garbage heap. Right, next to Birtherism, creationism, homophobia, taxation hysteria (by hawks!), Biblical literalism, and the hoax of climate change. Yet these wars are treated like invisible elephants, AWOL across two full years of a three-ring election circus. Where's the Constitutional amendment chatter not against overdrawn budgets nor abortions but indefensible wars? These days, I'd take a modest New Year's resolution from any major official: how about one year without invasions?

What war of choice (that is, all of them) since Vietnam doesn't felt creepy within months of the first wave? After bombing some unfortified nation into submission, we then sit tight, inviting ambushes as conditions disintegrate. Is that a plan or insanity? The Iraq war eviscerated any old war cries of "no guts, no glory:" for without heroism, losing your guts or legs becomes a nightmarish joke, with a delayed stinger that impoverishes the next generation. All that John Wayne soldiering withers when there's no glory or spoils, vindication or closure. A reincarnated Frank Capra, whose WWII film cheered on "Why we fight," must re-title, something like "Why war sucks" because no one wins anymore and the gross enterprise stinks.

[xchrom]

1. du rec. nt

[tilsammans]

2. War. It's what we do.

No matter the cost to anything else.

War is all that matters.