The Enemy Gets a Vote

This article paints a slightly revisionist history of our presence in the Middle East since Iraq invaded Kuwait. That invasion was largely a response to a botched State Department initiative to Iraq, who was our foil against Iran at the time. When the invasion occurred and the decision was made to drive Iraq back, the Arab nations were NOT initially supportive. The last thing anyone wanted was a large western military presence in the area. The deal was made contingent on our pulling out immediately after the status quo ante was reestablished. But we didn’t. We stayed and bombed Iraq for 10 years. For years prior to 2001 we had been warned by various groups to pull back. We didn’t and got 9/11. The perpetrators were our own trained insurgents from Afghanistan where we intervened to oust the Soviets. We started the guerrilla wars we are now fighting. Now the French are fighting in Mali against arms we sent to Libya. We just don’t seem to learn.