"the fork in the road America never took"

[vze422fs at verizon.net]

on 3/1/03 10:54 AM, pynchonoid at pynchonoid at yahoo.com wrote:

> "the fork in the road America never took" (GR 556)
> 
> Tackling the 'inevitability' defense
> by Rose Berger
> 
> What do you do with 200,000 soldiers after you've
> called off the war?
> 
> Former Supreme NATO commander Gen. Wesley Clark
> perfectly
> captured the "inevitability defense" on a recent
> Sunday
> morning talk show. He said that he could not envision
> a
> scenario where the United States backs off from war
> with
> Iraq. "It's too late," said Clark, with all those
> troops
> in place, "war is inevitable."
> 
> Conventional thinking (and the higher in a bureaucracy
> you
> go the more conventional the thinking gets) says that
> the
> United States is now committed to war with Iraq, even
> if
> tens of millions of people and most of the world's
> governments are against it. You don't send 200,000
> troops
> to staging areas in the Mediterranean, Kuwait, and
> Jordan
> only to call them back without a fight.
> 
> I agree. It is a waste of time and money. The question
> is -
> What kind of fight?
> 
> One of America's shining military moments occurred
> between
> May 10 and June 13, 1991, just after the Persian Gulf
> war.
> Just as troops were returning home, Cyclone Marian hit
> Bangladesh. It was a disaster. More than 100,000
> people
> died and millions were left homeless. More than 1
> million
> cattle died. Crops on 74,000 acres of land were
> destroyed.
> The soil was contaminated.
> 
> The president of Bangladesh turned to the world for
> help. Within 24 hours President Bush directed the U.S.
> military to provide humanitarian assistance. A 15-ship
> Navy amphibious force returning from the Persian Gulf
> was
> redirected to Bangladesh. When a Bangladeshi citizen
> spotted
> the force arriving from the water, he allegedly called
> them
> "Angels from the Sea." Operation Sea Angel had begun.
> It was
> one of the largest military disaster relief forces
> ever
> assembled. Thousands of U.S. soldiers worked with
> multinational
> forces over the next month to provide food, water, and
> medical
> care to nearly 2 million people. The valiant relief
> efforts of
> the troops were credited with saving as many as
> 200,000 lives.
> 
> What would it take for American to wage an "Operation
> Sea
> Angel" in Iraq, rather than a repeat of the horrors of
> Desert Storm? What would it take to win the hearts and
> minds
> of the Iraqi people? This is the kind of "war" our
> troops could
> wage and win with honor.
> 
> Imagine our 200,000 troops working with multinational
> agencies
> to rebuild Iraqi water systems; rebuild roads;
> transport
> medicine and food to the non-urban areas where access
> is
> severely limited; rebuild hospitals, churches,
> mosques, and
> homes; assist UNICEF's social mobilization for a polio
> free Iraq.
> Imagine our troops serving as teachers, doctors,
> engineers, and
> veterinarians. Imagine them rebuilding Iraq's
> agricultural base
> that has been so badly neglected. Imagine them
> training people
> for democracy. Imagine starting a massive humanitarian
> aid project
> for the people of Iraq now, not after a war.
> 
> Imagine also our troops coming home without
> nightmares, without
> "syndromes." Imagine them bringing home pictures of
> kids they
> helped save, rather than images of children they were
> trained
> to kill. Imagine not having the post-war spike in
> depression,
> addiction, and domestic abuse among our vets.
> 
> Would Saddam Hussein ever allow such a thing? Probably
> not,
> but it's hard to know without trying it.
> 
> Rose Marie Berger is associate editor of Sojourners
> magazine.
> 
> SojoMail 02.26.03
> <http://www.sojo.net>
> 
> 
> ...imagine!
> 
> -Doug
> 
> P.S.  From SojoNews Daily Headlines for 02.27.2003:
> 
> Remember Afghanistan: The U.S. is still far from
> achieving a
> lasting humanitarian victory
> 
> We have spent billions of dollars and lost precious
> lives to
> vanquish the Taliban. Yet the groundwork is being laid
> in
> Afghanistan for a regime that may be almost as
> repressive as
> the Taliban, particularly with regard to religious
> freedom.
> This is occurring with consent and, in some cases,
> help from
> the United States.
> <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8496-2003Feb26.html>
> Washington Post
> 
> Democracy in Kuwait Is Promise Unfulfilled
> Despite the prospect of another U.S.-led war against
> Iraq,
> one that President Bush says will foster
> democratization
> throughout the Middle East, many Kuwaitis look
> skeptically to 
> the example of their own country.
> <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8287-2003Feb26.html>
> Washington Post
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> =====
> <http://www.pynchonoid.blogspot.com/>
> 
> __________________________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! Tax Center - forms, calculators, tips, more
> http://taxes.yahoo.com/

Thanks, Doug.