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Sunday debate: America in Afghanistan Good can mitigate horror
Published: 09:22 p.m., Friday, December 4, 2009
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Let me begin this opinion piece by advising you the reader of my personal perspective.
I was born into a Republican family in 1953, and to this day I consider Dwight Eisenhower a fine president. As a retired General, he had an unique perspective on the subject of war and peace. Like other Generals who preceded him, Robert E. Lee comes to mind as a good example, Eisenhower knew what it was like to send American children into battle to slaughter and be slaughtered. He understood the true cost of war, and understood that nations should use war only as a last resort.
Additionally, I consider myself to be a pacifist -- at least as much as a person can attempt to be. Many Christians like myself, many Jews, many Muslims, many Buddhists, many Atheists and many agnostics also share this spiritual goal.
Along with many other Americans who respect Republican Presidents like Dwight Eisenhower, Abraham Lincoln and even Gerald Ford, I watched in horror as the National Republican Party went from being the party of the aforementioned three presidents to being the party of Jerry Falwell, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Glen Beck, Sarah Palin and George W. Bush.
I mention George W. Bush in particular, because he reacted in a very measured way immediately after September 11th, 2001, setting out what appeared to be a careful strategy to attack those who attacked us.
As we all know, that strategy was thrown by the wayside when America was lied into an invasion and occupation of Iraq by the Bush Administration.
Regardless of individual Americans' political persuasion, it is nearly universally agreed that Afghanistan was the war we should have waged, and Iraq became a misadventure which has caused the death of over 4,000 of America's children, fathers, mothers, grandfathers and grandmothers.
It also caused debilitating physical and mental injuries to tens of thousands American heroes. A president who avoided military service during Vietnam could never know the horrors of war the way that Generals Eisenhower and Lee knew them.
It also has caused the death of hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi citizens through the bunker-buster bombs dropped during "Shock and Awe" and six years of occupation and a civil war that followed the end of the Saddam Hussein's regime.
It also emboldened the government of Iran, which no longer has its long-standing enemy Saddam Hussein counter-balancing them.
It has added what will likely be well over a trillion dollars to our national debt, as the Bush Administration and a Republican Congress never factored the cost of the war into the annual budget.
Back to the question of Afghanistan.
Afghanistan had been a wound festering for seven long years when President Barack Obama replaced George W. Bush as commander in chief.
What had been an opportunity for both America and for Afghanistan -- had become a country without strong leadership, a country without other strong international allies, a country without hope.
President Obama, as he pledged during his campaign for President, had shifted America's focus from Iraq to Afghanistan. As troop levels have been reduced in Iraq, troop levels in Afghanistan have been increased.
Progress has been slow. The cost has been high.
Americans like myself have been saddened by the deaths of both American service people and Afghan civilians. And my personal feelings -- all the while knowing that Jesus Christ would not agree with me on this matter -- is that the good which can come out of this effort to help the people of Afghanistan may mitigate even the horror of war.
I stand with good and dear friends of mine at Rogers Park on Saturday mornings from 10:30 until noon, led by the heroic group Veterans for Peace.
There is some obvious disagreement on President Obama's decision, but I personally believe that if America's allies do their part to help America and Afghanistan, Afghanistan can be the country it has never been in its thousands of years of history.
As I've said to both those who agree with me and those who disagree with me -- if they (our allies) don't, we can't win.
The Soviet Union fell partly because of its misadventure in Afghanistan, and I don't want my country to suffer the same fate.
Until we know how those other nations will react, I believe this is worth the effort.
David A. Stevenson is a Bethel resident and a participant in weekly anti-war protests at the War Memorial in Danbury. |
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