'Eye On The Wrong Ball!'



Wrong Strategy for the Wrong Country!...


In my estimation, we have our eye on the wrong ball in Iraq.

We are so intent on sticking a thumb in Iran’s eye, that we are not looking around at the other more serious challenges that we face.

If Bush wants to make allusions to the threats posed by the Nazis and Hitler , let’s begin with where the analogy holds up. Using Hitler is now fair game. But in fact, Hitler lost the war for his country through pursuit of insane military policies and strategies. And we are likely to do the same. Policy driven by this White House is doing precisely the same thing. We lost on every single change of strategy in Iraq. We lost because we didn’t understand the people or what motivated them. We lost by pursuing insane strategies that any military man worth half his salt would have abandoned from the git-go. We are wrong on virtually every score. From our failure to seriously negotiate with the other parties to our failure to see the handwriting on the wall.


The real crisis is not in Iran; it’s not in Turkey. The Kurds can take care of themselves and we don’t belong enmeshed in this no win situation.

Where we do belong is where we started. And although we have said over and over again that bin Laden is not important, the fact of the matter is that based on everything, he is very important. He has shown that he can give us the finger whenever he wants with impunity and our vaunted service is no nearer putting him down.

In fact, the Tailiban has grown immensely stronger; it has regrouped and a large body of Tailiban fighters have emerged near Kandahar in the south. This has not happened since we drove the Tailiban into the mountains.

Afghanistan is a disaster. We are not winning. And the government we try to prop up is barely hanging on with every appointment a disaster. Poppy growing has not been discouraged and now the Tailiban are getting a cut of the profits.

Moreover, the real concern is not Afghanistan; it’s Pakistan.

Pakistan is really the tinder box that is likely to blow any day now.

Musharraf is not going to last; that much is clear.

And, increasingly, the areas around Waziristan and the borders, once home to the Pashtun, are now over=run with mercenaries loyal to the Tailiban and Al Qaeda.

We are in grave danger there and everyone seems to know it except us.

When Musharraf finally goes, the fact is that we have no remaining friends in Pakistan; and a country with perhaps as many as forty nuclear weapons and delivery systems.

What then?

Why are we fighting with Iran when it is Pakistan that’s the real worry.

Iran doesn’t have nuclear weapons; Pakistan does.

With Bush calling the cards, and being as inept in strategy and thinking as Hitler was when he lost the war for the Nazis, don’t be surprised if we wake up one day to discover that Pakistan is the real unknown with forty weapons on long range North Korean or Chinese missiles pointed directly at us….

If you want to play Gottcha!, you got to make sure that you’re not the victim.

Right now, nobody impresses me with the depth of their understanding of the problem and it is only due to get worse.

Let’s end the War with Iraq and get our troops back into Afghanistan.

Let’s put the Tailiban out of business and decimate bin Laden.

Let’s do it now before they get us!


Les Aaron

The Armchair Curmudgeon