As Yogi Berra once said, “It’s like déjà vu all over again.” Just a month ago a vast segment of the American public were totally unfamiliar with names and places like Yazidis, Sinjar Mountain, Persh Merga, ISIS, caliphate, Mosul Dam, and Erbil.
Suddenly, with the reemergence of the more strident and violent incarnation of Al Qaeda, known as the Islamic State, murder, genocide and chaos are prevalent in Iraq. U.S. policy and an ill-informed administration should have known that the total removal of a U.S. presence in Iraq would leave this crippled nation extremely vulnerable to terrorist forces. Military and political chaos has quickly developed in Iraq and other critical Middle Eastern countries.
One can argue that the seeds of the modern continuous conflagrations in this part of the world were created in Paris in 1919, with the Paris Peace Conference at the end of WWI. It is there that modern countries such as Iraq, Israel, and others were carved out, and others haunt the world to this day.
The Obama administration is delusional or dreaming if they think a few “pin point” air strikes will decimate ISIS. The Islamic State is a serious, dangerous, and well-financed terrorist organization with quite an army of vicious fighters. This group is a serious threat to Europe and the United States. Make no mistake, they want to kill us and destroy our democracy, religion, freedom, and society.
Where is the bully pulpit the president of the United States should be using to rally the support of the free world to destroy ISIS? Does the United States have a salient foreign policy? What is this era about and how should the United States both lead and/or react? Have we become the “too little, too late” former leader of the democratic nations of the world? These are hard questions that need concrete answers—NOW. Not just politically motivated news snippets from Martha’s Vineyard.
As most anyone can discern, the chaos in the Middle East will last for a long time. It already has seen continuing strife for an extraordinary amount of time. The conflicts today directly threaten the homeland security of the United States in numerous ways. From direct attacks to cyber security, America may now be even more vulnerable due to the rise of ISIS. Where was the intelligence information the United States should have had in this matter and the implications of a total U.S. withdrawal from Iraq? The administration must have a better plan than “just not doing stupid stuff.”
The exodus of people in the Kurdish region of Iraq to escape being executed is a wake up for Christians everywhere. The Islamic extremists, such as ISIS, must be stopped and destroyed.
Spawned in Syria, consolidated in Iraq where opportunity abounded, ISIS is now perhaps the fastest growing ultimate threat to America’s homeland security. ISIS is indeed a terrorist army.
This is a mounting time of growing concern and worry. America must not endure another 9-11.
BobHallsr says
Fletcher, many good points, it’s time to put this vicious machine into a tailspin.
THE MIDEAST CONFLICT TAKES A NEW AND DANGEROUS TURN
OR, The Road to Chaos
In 1905 Najib Azouri, an Arab Nationalist, in his “The Awakening of the Arab Nation” made this prophetic comment: “There are two movements ongoing – the awakening of the Arab nation – and the effort of the Jews to reconstitute the ancient kingdom of Israel…. These movements are destined to fight each other continually until one of them wins.”
The reality of this conflict may be that these movements are
destined to fight each other, continually, until both of them lose.
Now the Middle East is faced with a major escalation of the conflict between Shiite and Sunni Muslims in Syria and Iraq, that is threatening to spread sectarian violence throughout the Middle East, exacerbating an existing vacuum of power and creating an unimaginable atmosphere of terror and strife. Now, let’s re-visit Azouri’s comments:
The reality of this conflict may be that these movements are
destined to fight each other, continually, until everyone loses.
Carol Voyles says
Deja vu’? It’s the same Middle East we’ve had for decades, even centuries.
Going to war under false pretenses and destroying a delicate, if less than ideal balance may be water under the bridge; but history tells us that to stay and police a population that isn’t ready to end its centuries-old sectarian strife is a fool’s errand.
Because of our culpability in the matter, however, humanitarian and strategic assistance can and should be provided.