In Bush's second term, I implore him to be more mindful of our allies and to re-cultivate the relationship. The fact of the matter is, is that we need allies, plain and simple. I will attempt to put this analogous form.
When I was in junior high and high school, my friends and I would spend a lot of time at the Minnesota State Fair, so I will try to use that as my analogy.
Say you (U.S.) are standing around at the fair with some of your friends (N.A.T.O.) in front of the butter sculpture exhibit. Some little punk (Osama) comes up and blindsides you with a couple of punches. Maybe because he doesn't like your shirt or maybe it is because he thinks you were looking at his girlfriend wrong, but either way, he had no legitimate reason for cold-cocking you. He intended to knock you out with his surprise punches, but you are the biggest, strongest guy at the fair. He bloodied you up a bit, maybe knocked out a tooth or two, but he didn't knock you out and now you are just plain ol' pissed. You friends are horrified by what just happened and they are pissed also. So, you all decide you are going to find this guy and make him pay. You all head off to find this guy. Along the way, you run into another guy that you have a beef with. He is a bully (Saddam) and an all around jackass but at the current moment is no threat to you. You are pissed off so you decide to take some of your anger out on him. Your friends say, "hey, we are with you on getting the guy that hit you, but we don't want to get into a fight with this other guy right now. It is going to get really messy if we do. Lets take one issue at a time." You tell them to screw off, you are going to take this other guy out with or without them. They think you are being hot headed and arrogant. They tell you again to back off, but you refuse. Now they are pissed at you because of the way you are acting towards them. So, they decide that they'll just sit it all out. Now, you get into the fight with the bully and he turns out to be a lot more scrappy than you thought. And now, instead of spending your time trying to find the little punk that hit you, you are in a fight with someone else. Now, for the sake of argument, lets say you finish the fight with the bully. He lays on the ground and you stand there ready to continue the pursuit of the little punk. But, it is only you standing there. Your friends are gone. You have lost your posse. You can only cover so much ground by yourself, where, if you had your friends, you could have spread out and quadrupled your ground. Not only do you not have extra eyes and ears, you have no one watching your back to make sure the punk doesn't come up behind you with a 2x4 and try to finish the job. You might get lucky, but your odds of getting the guy and protecting your back would have been much better if you didn't piss off your friends. Yeah, it may have felt good to take out the bully, but the greater cause is hampered. It would have been a whole lot better to get the punk first, keep your buddies and then think about what to do about the bully.
Basically, you have to think about your actions before you act. What is the objective? Will my actions help or hinder my objectives? The little punk is still out there. He is on the run, but he is looking for a 2x4 and waiting for us to look in the wrong direction for just a second too long. If it were up to me, yes, Saddam would still be in power. First, I want to take out the guy with the 2x4 with someone watching my back before I take out Saddam. We could have dealt with him later.
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3 comments:
Good analogy but it fails to mention that only 3 of the so called friends, we'll just name them Franz, Hans, and Ivan, refused to help out. 30 others stood by and applauded while you pummeled the bully and his little buddy, 3 others (Chap, Ozzy, and Polly) actually gave a kick or two.
Later you find out that the so called three friends were going behind your back and trading cards with one of the bullies who you all said you would stop trading cards with until he stopped bullying.
Now because you're such a nice guy you are willing to clean up one of the ex-bullies, bandaging his wounds and offering to buy clothes that he never had before and the 3 buddies want to come in and help with the nice guy activities keeping a buck or two for going to the clothing store and buying a new outfit.
We're these three really friends in the first place?
Thank you for you comment. I know I used an analogy and an analogy is a very simplified explanation, so you points are taken. But I will reply with these notations.
1st - I am not necessarily talking about France, Germany and Russia, even though they are important to us. I am talking about countries like Tanzania, Kenya, Nigeria, Morocco, Indonesia and many other nations where the terrorists may be plotting their next attack. These are the areas where the new terrorist camp will be located. These are the countries that al Queda fled too from Afghanistan. These are also the nations that were extremely cooperative after 9/11, but have become very less so after the war in Iraq. We NEED these countries to be our eyes and ears on the war on terror
2nd - Most of the coalition of the willing have pulled there fighting and humanitarian forces out of Iraq. The only substantial partner left is England.
3rd - Yes, Saddam was a man that should have been dealt with, but it was just not the right time. We had other jobs, other priorities that should have been finished first, not postponed.
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