Oh, let the sun beat down upon my face

/*I’m not sure about this post.  I’m not sure I conveyed the ideas as well as I’d like to, nor am I confident I know all the facts.  I certainly haven’t tried to make anything up, but with this type of issue, it seems so hard to be sure of the facts.  A better idea than reading this is honestly to read the Obama speech from 3/19/2008.  It is an excellent speech that was swept under the rug because of that whole Rev. Wright thing.  In fact, I think it is such a good speech, I put a bit in this post, and linked it twice.  I think it would be nice to have a President who understands foreign policy better than I do.*/

The WaPo carried an article about recent US strikes into Pakistan. It seems we currently have some sort of agreement with Musharraf for this type of strike, but may loose that ability as he loses power through democratic elections. At the heart of this dilemma are two major issues. How do we reconcile our commitment to democracy with the will of people who oppose our war? How did we get to the point where we are relying on an unstable quasi dictatorial leader to allow us to capture and destroy the men responsible for 9/11?

Instead of fighting this war, we could be fighting the terrorists who attacked us on 9/11 and who are plotting against us in Afghanistan and Pakistan. We could be securing our homeland and stopping the world’s most dangerous weapons from falling into terrorist hands. - Sen. Obama 3/20/2008

We’ve failed to capture or kill the leadership of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. We’ve failed to bring a successful democracy to Afghanistan. And we’ve failed help the Afghani people create a sound economy. We failed in each of these goals for a simple reason. Our President was not committed to bringing the masterminds of 9/11 to justice, nor is he committed to democracy, but rather he committed us to vengeance against Saddam Hussein. Now, instead of destroying our enemies and working towards a free Afghanistan, a beacon of democracy where there had been the oppression of theocracy, we have become ensnared in a country which was not a threat, which did not attack us, and which is not moving towards reconciliations or reconstruction in any discernible way.

“If we find the leadership, then we’ll go after it. But nothing can be done to put al-Qaeda away in the next nine or 10 months. In the long haul, it’s an issue that extends beyond this administration.” - anonymous Washington Post source

Hearts and minds are also important, perhaps more so than our tactical mistake of invading Iraq. The political mistake is that the people of Pakistan, when they elect a free government, believe they have much to fear from us. We have disregarded the sovereignty of Iraq, and turned the country from an oppressive dictatorship into an anarchistic tribal free-for-all. What free country would freely invite us to police them with our military after what President Bush has done? This is the consequence of preemptive war. We are now faced with propping up Musharraf and destroying the hopes of democracy in Pakistan, or encouraging democracy in Pakistan, and facing the possibility that they will not help us destroy al-Queda. If we had taken out al-Queda in Afghanistan instead of preemptively attacking Iraq, we could actively support democracy in Pakistan with no regards for Musharraf.

By invading Iraq preemptively, we’ve made two tribal war zones out of a dictatorship, a theocracy and maybe entrenching anti-Americanism more firmly in the worlds largest Muslin state. And we haven’t destroyed al-Queda. We must not undermine democracy in Pakistan, and we must not let al-Queda continue to exist. We also must find a way to keep these two goals from conflicting. If we undermine democracy in Pakistan, as we’ve ignored it in Afghanistan, our last remaining and only initially credible goal in Iraq, the goal of bringing them democracy become a farce.

But here is the stark reality: there is a security gap in this country – a gap between the rhetoric of those who claim to be tough on national security, and the reality of growing insecurity caused by their decisions. A gap between Washington experience, and the wisdom of Washington’s judgments. A gap between the rhetoric of those who tout their support for our troops, and the overburdened state of our military. - Sen. Obama 3/19/2008