The first impression that resonates in the minds of most Americans on the war in Iraq, is why the war in the first place? They do not see any reason, neither has anyone suggested or given a vivid clue for the war. All we hear is that the late Saddam Hussein was a bad leader who
mercilessly killed his people, or had links with terrorist activities and possessed some weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The purpose for the war is not clear to common reasoning, and the current alarming scenario is the hard driven pursuit by the present administration to continue with the war, and now with the adventure of fostering democratic values there with our precious human and material resources, even when there are lots to deal with here at home. Most troubling are young men and women who have lost their dear lives in this war venture, others mentally and physically maimed for life. Before going further, we salute the brave military men and women at crossfire, and those, who have lost their lives and left families behind. We honor their bravery and say they are true heroes of this generation. To their dear families, we express our heart-felt prayers and strength into their good hearts in carrying on the good baton their loved ones have left behind.
Let us respectfully continue. There is another view and a very large one that believes the war is about oil business, which is to serve the pockets of few political and economic cabal within the system. What a costly assumption to make! The following question to this line of thought would be, the oil owners, are they not going to sell their oil? The country, Iraq is sustained from sale of her oil at an internationally regulated standard and price. Therefore, why would people assume to waste lives and great financial resources would be the best option to get or manage the oil from Iraq? This thought process is too ordinary to hold any substantive conclusion. As fact, there is an organization called OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) that regulates oil quotas (supplies) and prices based on prevailing market indices. Meaning, there is a well-established market structure that controls oil production, sale and prices with prospective buyers, and not go there, grab the country’s oil mentality as some assume it to be.
Brothers and sisters of this great territorial space called, United States of America. The necessity for the war, which those in power and few have seen through, but have not been clearly brought to the open for all to have better understanding, but are counting on the judgment of history to prove the present unpopular political cum military option as right to the overall future of this country and Western civilization in general cannot be over-emphasized. Here is the picture and very direct to the point. After the 911 attack, the message became very clear that the texture of open dialogue within the Middle Eastern part of the world was too narrow or possibly non- existent to be overlooked any more by those concerned with the existence of humanity in free, cordial, and positively agreeable and disagreeable complexities of the world. What this means was that the composition of open society, which is not totally embraced in that part of the world was no longer a comfortable atmosphere to live with. The clear message from 911 was the frightening realization that action needs to be taken now to address this critical issue or neglect it and pay the price of annihilation in future. Hmm! It should be stated clearly that not the entire Arab world supported the 911 attack. However, that incidence was a clear message, which was silent but primarily an attack on the values of Western civilization, which are our democratic principles such as freedom of expression, to live, to practice your religion, to pursue happiness, to empower oneself financially, socially and others within civil constituted laws. The prime perpetrators of that act only gave insight of the danger and claim held by others against the Western democratic values. That is, the pursuit to impose their will on all by the use of force. Therefore, the planes into the twin towers were instruments of fear, an attack on the fabric of our common course to live free within civilized laws that breeds on the respect of individual rights. Given the fear factor was allowed to settle in, the next would have been loss of confidence in the social/economic composure of this great country, which eventually would have shaken everyone’s livelihood and led to the gradual strangulation of the values we all cherish, the sustaining power of Western civilization. The fear factor or intimidation runs contrary to the brave and open values of this country. Thus, it was repelled or fought back with love for the innocent lives lost and faith in our objectively accommodating, workable and fair system to all human legal pursuit.
Again, the 911 incident was a wake up call to the consciousness of Western civilization to boldly take action not only in stopping such from happening again, but to use all necessary civilized, but firm resolve to push the agenda of fear back and keep its soul disjointed, which would help to douse its evil plots. It became imperative for both systems to frame out a workable atmosphere where more accommodation of values would exist, even within the differences, rather than the extremist dagger-sword approach. Hence, the Iraqi equation was given birth to as the most viable, broad based, integral solution between the belief systems of the Middle East and West. This means, it became the best possibility with the most rewarding result into the future to all parties. The Iraq equation is like any regular conference or seminar, where all participants may not necessarily agree, but the meeting gives all the opportunity to serve their varying interest in a civilized forum. As a result, those who could play this workable arrangement with the West, has always been the moderates whose views in their systems are either sidelined or driven so far to the background and out of fear of severe consequence can not share their opinions in the open. The calculation was arrived at and firmly too, that this was the right time to aggressively embark on the fence-mending divide between our social, cultural and political textures before it became too costly to handle. The big picture was to steam roll dialogue, accommodation and civil regulations in a central location within the Middle East cultural system. Thereby, sowing the seed that would broaden decision-making processes.
As this in the long haul, empowers individuals to reason out based on their perceptions and having the capacity to express their views freely within civil legal coverage or provisions and not the stereo-structured arrangement only to one common aggregate based on worship.
Again, the country Iraq, with its multi-cultural background and location found itself as the perfect fit for this open and fine tuning agenda. Now, the reasons wiped up for the war venture by our political leaders were not justified. They were not conclusive enough to justify for war and largely were wrong, period. Notwithstanding, going after one individual who master-minded the 911 attack, was not the solution, because the issue was more of an institutional composure and painfully doing nothing after the fruitless pursuit, would not have been the best bargain to the future generation of this beloved country to handle. That would have spelt weakness into the minds of our children. As fact, most people who are against the war today would have screamed weakness to the same political leaders here for doing nothing after the unsuccessful pursuit. Therefore, the necessity for action that is broad base, far-reaching and result prone could not be compromised. The clear message to anyone who harbors or tries to cause undue harm to innocent Americans is that, there would always be great repercussions. As a result, the war became a necessary option to satisfy this long-term goal of pursuing common values, where peace, accommodation and stability of all interests from the West with the Middle East would be reasonably maintained. What we have on our hands is more than conventional war but a reform agenda. This is because the success of a democratic Iraq with good influence of Western democratic values would gradually spread around that part of the world and encourage other moderates to clamor for open dialogue into their political communities, which would then act as internal check on the extremist approaches within their systems against the West. Some would ask, if that is our business? Partly yes, because peace is a global commodity and the present world is a community with lots of critical issues that requires well-grounded resolve to move all towards a good coordinating level despite the differences in our historical, cultural, religious and economic backgrounds. Peace must be aggressively pursued if peace must be sustained or else, we all wallow in anarchy, which may eventually choke everywhere, including your proposed isolated enclave that is, if we follow the narrow suggestion to remain aloof. Peace needs to be enforced if we really love peace and progress in the world. This means, for a true peaceful agenda to reign, we must infuse some measure of equitable firmness and not coercion or else we run the risk of being weak. This is because the line between peace and weakness is very thin and if we cannot distinguish both clearly, then; we may live one for the other, and wrongly contend to be doing the right thing.
Presently, most people only see the war from the negative and they have every right to, because nobody likes loss of lives and properties as we witness from news out of the war. The fact remains that the young men and women who have died and those still in battle, are staking their lives for the freedom and peace of the world. Some may not agree, but that is exactly what these brave military men and women are currently engaged in Iraq. This is because they have taken the challenge into the heart of the storm, which needs every considerable attention and modification. Therefore, they deserve all moral, financial and logistic support necessary to win the war, despite some of our reservations to the defense policy approach currently being applied. The message we should all understand is that this is a very long term investment and attempts by major political players to back off, means we have backed down and mortgaged the future for a higher price. The current issue should be viewed by all above politics, because we are dealing with our survival as progressives and the befitting legacy to our dear children, which is freedom and prosperity. The progress in Iraq will become comfortable to all, 15 to 20 years from now. As I told a group sometime ago, it is more than a 100 years project. That center is strategic for all things good to that area, to the West and World peace in general.
Emotion has nothing to do with this course. It is a realization checkpoint. The checkpoint is this, whether we like to hear it or not, there is a silent war staged and marked by another against Western civilization. Turning your back or being friendly is not and will never be the solution. What we have on our hands cannot and must not be handled with kids gloves. Rather, we must stand firm, to not only resist, but also be decently aggressive in saying no to fear and repression with the power of our collective resolve, which means, though with respect to their values, we should relentlessly influence our democratic ideals into that region and not imposition. We must wake up to our call or lose all we cherish unknowingly by taking the side of weakness. Peace is always for strength.
We must now chart the corrective course that respects the values for others to live and live with us in progress and mutual kindness without compromising an iota of our National Security values. This is because, the stronger the United States remains, the better for peace and stability in the world. If we confuse peace for silence or withdrawal and allow our emotions instead of reality to determine the future, then that is the beginning of the end to all that we dearly hold our torch of liberty.
Whichever side you belong, the God we trust is that of hope and love, and will always triumph.