An editorial on the War on ISIS

In August 1917, a few months after the United States declared war on the Axis, and  several months before the first American soldiers actually arrived to fight in Europe, President Woodrow Wilson formed a large committee – no fewer than 125 academics and politicians – to set up the framework of the Post-War New World Order of the Ages.  It included an academic committee that wrote proposals for the New Middle East.  Remember, at the time, the Ottoman Empire still existed.   Not one committee member actually was a modern Middle East expert.  Most of the time, they scurried around libraries to get basic information.   The committee chairman was an academic expert of the Crusades. 

The committee’s work had one notable short coming:   no one seemed much interested in the region’s oil.  European Nations noticed the oil and what it meant to modern warfare.  Britain and France managed to carve up what had been The Ottoman Empire into states dividing the tribes.   Therefore, Europe – not the locals -- dominated the region and the oil. 

I do not know who advises The Obama Administration this week, but they remind me of Wilson’s committee.  

I have no tolerance for or connections to ISIS.  ISIS can hardly be considered loveable at this stage of The Great Game.   However, they are not worse than  the leaders of the Ottoman Empire or the colonial managers who ruled the place for England, France, and [eventually] the USA.  Rules of cause and effect determine why the Obama Administration reaps whirlwinds sewn nearly100 years ago.   I seriously doubt ISIS can do sustained damage major or minor to the USA. 

To review:  

 THE USA made a war with troops in 1991 in Kuwait.    We got the oil back, but the war did not solve the overall problem in the region.    The USA mad a war with troops in Iraq in 2002 and for ten plus years thereafter.    It did not solve the problem and in fact made the problem more complicated.  War made it worse.  Insanity is doing the same things over and over and expecting a different result.    How can the Obama administration think that they can take down this organization and make a difference with air strikes and drones alone?   Air strikes and drones will generate more hate in the Iraqis against us ?    If and when we put thousands of troops into this war, they cannot win it.   They have not won so far.

Insanity is sometimes defined and doing the same things over and over and expecting different results. 

You cannot find anyone in the military or intelligence  who believes that bombing more innocent civilians in Iraq and Syria is going to generate positive results

No strategy is probably better than doing dumb things just because the administration must look active and engaged and people are generally anxious and fearful. 

The problems with Obama’s announcement on 10 September should be obvious:   1) It will require a lot of American soldiers in Iraq and Syria.  2)  Once our soldiers are in Iraq and Syria, they are in there for good.   3) The USA  cannot win the war.  

Let’s look at what Middle Eastern needs and goals for the 21st century.   What the people need is  clear.  

1) Fewer nations should evolve as opposed to more of them. 

2) Ideally, there should be a large pan-Arabic-Palestinan-Muslim-Jewish state with equal rights and fair play for all.  

3)  If the locals cannot get that, then 3 or 4 states – tops -- with equal rights and fair play for all..  

4) Modern Iraq should not be one of them.   Iraq’s boundaries were drawn up after World War I to divide the locals and keep the resources in European control. 

5) The resources under the ground are controlled by the locals above the ground. 

I read that Cheney and the hawks want the administration to do “a more muscled response” in Iraq.   Meaning put soldiers in harms way in a cause that we cannot win.  Cheney’s view seems to be that the USA should now be actively engaged in War That Will Not End.  

ISIS would not exist if Cheney and company had not involved the USA in that whole Iraq military mistake.  The anniversary of World War I should remind Cheney that muscular responses take on an uncontrollable life of their own.


THE CALL TO INACTION.

Congress should not reinstate conscription.

Congress should not fund any Middle Eastern Adventures which will not work or which we will not win. 

Congress should insist on its Constitutional right to declare war – and not declare war.