I just came upon a revelation today while in my Social Deviance class, one that I found to be so profound that I had to write about it. Let me give you some background on my position with the war in Iraq–I was completely against it. Actually truth be told, I’m still against it, why you might ask. Simple, the war doesn’t make sense. 9/11 happened, and it was tragic, but that doesn’t mean that we start in one part of the world and move to another–it doesn’t mean that we start with one bad guy and without finishing our task move to another. It means we start what we intend to start and finish whatever that is we started.

What we did in Iraq is more sever than what we did in say Vietnam. Look at present day, even though we don’t have great relations with Vietnam, we don’t walk around the street’s saying to each other “Look at that Vietnamese person, I wonder if they are up to something?” Why? Because the war was something that we came away with holding our tail between our legs saying we messed up and we are sorry. President Johnson did something that while it gave him the impression of being a wimp, saved face for the United States in the international world. Now fast forward to today, what President Bush is now and what he is relentlessly continuing can be compared to the blood feuds that occur in Africa, no matter the reason, no matter the purpose we are there and we are there to stay.

Before I would say, no no, let’s make a stand and take ownership of our problem, and pull our troops home. And that sounded reasonable. In fact it sounded so reasonable, that you pull up YouTube and you can type in a search for the CNN/YouTube debates, and a lot of the candidates were for pulling the troops out. This was one of the early points where I supported Obama, and not Clinton. But you might ask yourself, well then, why the change?

After closer examination, I have to ask myself, what will come of things if we do pull out? Sure in the short term it serves a purpose, get the troops out, and stop a conflict that we were never suppose to be in–but what is the collateral in doing so.

First off, we move the war from Iraq to the United States. How you might ask? Simple, we pull out of Iraq, and the “terrorists” the ones that DO NOT reside in Iraq will come at us with everything they can think of, and believe you and me, after 9/11, I’m MORE than concerned with what they can think of, and so should you. Long past are the days when war’s were fought on a battlefield with clearly defined rules of engagement. Wars happen in your backyard, like an out of control drive by that ends up with nobody as the victor and victims on both sides. Is that what we want? We want to be terrified that the actions that go on at home, could result in a building being blown up, or biological weapons being used, or something else that we can’t think of coming down like the 10th plague of hell, all the while we ask ourselves, is this what it means to pull out of Iraq and bring our beloved troops home? I’m sure they would gladly stay out and fight if it meant to keep the war in Iraq.

Second, let’s look at it in terms of the Iraq, you are bring a new system of government to a region that knows nothing about the values and what makes it tick. Its like trying to transplant an organization from Europe to America, without proper guidance and side-by-side coaching, the American’s will act like American’s and what was special within the organization in Europe will not have an opportunity to flurish and take hold. We call that the spirit of the organization, but that makes a big difference in the success of that new business unit. While the people are certainly going through the motions, unless there is buyin at all levels and a swift adoption to learn the process and be a part of the process you are not going to be able to make this work. Look at what it took for America to stand behind our government, we still talk about him today, it was one man that we think about, Mr. George Washington himself. So finally you need a leader, someone who the people believe to be strong and will legitimize the government. The last thing we want is another Grenada in which the people of Iraq split and a sub-party gains enough control to take over the government. You know what happens then–Civil War. Look at what we did, now we HAVE to stay in the region, because if we leave, we will most certainly turn that area into a civil war ground. I don’t know about you, but I can’t have that on my conscious.

Let’s face it, we got ourselves into a deep pile of shit, and the only way to get out of this, is to sit back and figure out what we can do to make the most out of a really bad situation. We care so much about our troops, then let’s show this by giving them the proper resources that are necessary to carry out their mission SAFELY and proficiently. DO NOT send them in with low grade body armor, and weapons that are not the best of the best. Think before you act, and surely we can all get out of this conflict and save some face in the process. We need to focus on adoping a type of government that will be legitimized by the people–there is a difference between democracy and forced democracy.

Forced democracy looks an awful lot like a dictatorship. Also let’s not discount the value of the Iraqi culture and religion, as this plays a strong part to legitimizing the government. Let’s look at our own government, even though it has a separation of church and state, we still are one nation under God. The same has to be said in Iraq. The ideals of America are not what we are looking to instill in the Iraqi people, but instead a sense of fair government, fair play, and mutual respect. We aren’t doing this people, so in all your ranting and raving, can’t you see that we are just adding fuel to the fire without moving anywhere with the cause? Shit or get off the pot, and I would say that it is now America that we show the world what we are made of and that we are willing to put in the hard work and get our hands dirty, cause God knows that we have certainly done a number on this one.