The brutal killing of Nick Berg yesterday shocked and saddened all of us. Worse, though, it seems to have turned many of us into raving lunatics.
Witness this editorial in The New York Post today.
It can end only with the total annihilation of those who practice butchery and barbarism. Those who have set as their goal the destruction of America.
There is no negotiating with such people. There can be no compromise with those who mean to destroy us.
Yesterday, the White House promised to "pursue those responsible and bring them to justice." That's the least of it.
America has to come out swinging.
And not stop until every last one of the savage thugs is dead.
If that means a resumption of major combat in Iraq, so be it.
Would it mean another division or so of combat troops to get the job done?
Turn to our garrisons in Europe, or Korea, to get them.
In sufficient numbers to get the job done.
To hell with political sensitivities in the region.
To hell with negotiating with radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in Najaf and the Sunni insurgents in Fallujah.
To hell with handing Saddam Hussein over to Iraqis, as some want to do, and risking some reverse - perverse - kangaroo trial that results in his survival.
Evil, cutthroat terrorists need to be eradicated.
Let's face it: This is a job that's going to take overwhelming - yes, brutal - force. There is simply no "nice" or painless way to accomplish this.
As yesterday's slaughter showed (yet again), the enemy is bound by no moral compunctions.
America won't go that far.
But it had better steel it's backbone and get ready to fight like it means it.
It's the only way to win this war.
I don't know where to begin.
Of course I absolutely agree that there is no negotiating with the kinds of people who would do something like what happened to Nick Berg. They should be hunted down. The MAJOR problem with the above ranting is that stepping up our military operations in Iraq will not stop these people, it will surely increase their ranks. This simple-minded rush to violence plays directly into the terrorists hands, isn't that obvious? Does the editorial staff of the New York Post really believe that killing thousands and thousands of Iraqis is going to result in the "total annihilation of those who practice butchery and barbarism?" It's so ridiculous it makes me want to cry.
And what ever happened to foresight? To thinking beyond your immediate, emotional gut reactions? Are these people really prepared to stand behind the statement, "To hell with political sensitivities in the region?" Is it their view that if we ignore the region's history and people, and just kill as many of them as we can, things will just be okay? The world will sit back and say, "Well, that region did deserve to descend into chaos and civil war, dragging the hopes for peace around the world with it. After all, terrorists with no affiliation to any of those countries did kill that man from Philadelphia."
As Senator Lindsay Graham (R - Arizona) said recently, "When you are the good guys, you've got to act like the good guys."
We are not going to be judged based on our ideals if we can't live up to them. We will be judged on our actions, and our actions will rightly be seen to reflect our ideals. We can't have it both ways. We cannot promote democracy, freedom, and the rule of law by running around the world killing people because we're pissed off. The ability to restrain ourselves from going off half-cocked every time something terrible happens to one of our citizens is not a character flaw.
UPDATE :: Oops.. Lindsay Graham is from South Carolina, not Arizona. I always get those two confused. Oh, and it's Lindsey, not Lindsay. Crap.
