Isn’t it ironic that our Armed Forces spend all their waking hours hunting down bad guys in Afghanistan and Iraq, while we are training civilian security forces and a nubile Army to be our allies in hunting down the bad guys? We are training Muslims.
With the assistance of anthropologists, psychologists,(black ops ones), linguists and bankers and civilian security specialists, we as liberators are spending billions of dollars to win the hearts and minds of two Muslim nations while we await our government in a kit program to take hold. Is it not ironic that we need the Muslim people to free the Muslims from the Muslims?
As a Marine, I know our military history has been defined as being liberators not an occupation force. Now, declassified documents will show that the rather sudden deployment of 5000 Marines, about four years ago, was at the bequest of the Marine Command who were concerned that the Cheney-Rumsfeld directives were tipping in the direction of occupation forces in Iraq, and loosing sight of the hunt for the bad guys, whose stronghold was and is known to be the mountains of Afghanistan. This edgy occupation stuff was seen as a violation of a long Marine Corps tradition of getting in and out. With one tactical exception, which was to win the hearts and minds of the common people of Iraq. Meaning literally make friends with a Muslim nation. Given the scene here at home, a bit ironic eh?
The tactic of winning the hearts and minds was created and promulgated inside the Marine Corps, by General Krulak during the Vietnam War. Combined Actions Platoons they were called; CAP Units. Marines were picked to live in the villages and provide security while weeding out the terrorists, (yes we called them terrorists then too), who were embedded in the civilian population. I was assigned to a CAP Unit in 1968 as security. I know well the merits of the program and the dark side, 82% died. We were heading that way in Iraq, like the Vietnamazation program it would have taken decades to refine. No tolerance for that. And the Marines were not in the game of being an occupation force. The irony? We used to say we were saving the Vietnamese from the Vietnamese. Now we are their trading partner. Us and the happy Communists. Irony number 3.
Fast forward to 2010. Isn’t it ironic that we pour billions into four nations to help save the Muslims from the Muslims?
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, our soldiers are returning home to a rising crescendo of extremism that is of the ilk of hatred and insidious racism they just spent 2-4 tours of combat to abate.
Not so long ago we trained Iranian pilots at Davis Monthan Air Force Base. They were Muslim. We train Pakistani pilots and sell them F-16’s. They are Muslim.
We are leaving 50,000 troops,( we always leave 50,ooo, Germany, Korea,), and an undisclosed number of private contractors, men with guns, to complete the training of the marginal security force and the Army of Iraq. They are Muslim.
We built the largest embassy in the history of the United States in Baghdad, so as to have peaceful relations with the Muslim world.
We are spending more money than the GDP of Afghanistan to train their security and Army. They are Muslim.
We are deeply in debt to Saudi Arabia, who hold 11% of our national debt. They are Muslim.
Poor General Petraeus is trying to quell the transition strains of 13 Centuries of Suni rule,with the solicitation and support of the local Muslim people, while the psychiatric aberrancy of hatred for the same people in America escalates. Isn’t it ironic?
Germany, Japan, Russia, France, Mexico, England, Vietnam, China and of course the Native Americans, have all been enemies of our State at one time. All were targets of hate and demonization. Isn’t it ironic that everyone of these nations is now a trading partner or a creditor of the United States. And the beat goes on.
Where are we headed, another Inquisition? T.S Elliot once said, “how much reality can humankind handle?” I might say, how much hate can a nation absorb?
It is still, to this day, hard to imagine that an angry contingent tried to say that Roosevelt was a Jew and therefore could not be trusted. Two lies in one,and,thank God, would now be considered a hate crime.
It was not that long ago, that Catholics scared the crap out of WASP America. Rome, Rum and Rebellion was the siren cry.” Look out for Popery.” they would say. Those Catholics are trying to take over America!
“Its like rain on your wedding day/ It’s a free ride,when you’ve already paid/ Its the good advice that you just didn’t take/ Who would’ve thought…it figures/ Isn’t ironic?
-Alanis Morisette
Is not war the cruelest irony of all?
It seems that the ancient dictum, “anger eats the vessel that contains it,” is prophecy. I do believe the Tower of Babel has arrived. God save the children.
The apparent irony disappears if you look at it as expanding the empire (think “sphere of influence”) while promoting a self-serving and ubiquitous fear and extreme nationalism among the home folks. A time-tested and successful recipe for endless war. On this subject, it occurs to me that this country was at war when I was born and 50-some years later, has been at war somewhere most of my life. Most of us would agree (in theory, at least), that war is not a desirable state of affairs. Doesn’t that beg the question, “What’s wrong here”?
It isn’t irony – it is standard operating procedure for an Empire. And things like the mosque are not real – they have absolutely zero effect on anything in real life or our policy. They are just circuses stirred up to keep the rabble entertained by politicians seeking office.
So..we are hating Muslims in our own country while trying to convince them we respect them elsewhere? Let’s just hope the news of what’s going on here doesn’t somehow get out to the rest of the world!