I recently saw an opinion piece citing US citizens post-war-disapproval for the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan as a reason why the US should not take action against ISIS. Essentially: if it turns out we were wrong in those wars... [which is a different statement than the public didnt like the wars, but letting that slide] ...then we will probably regret this, so why are we adding fuel to the fire? Despite flaws in the logic, valid points are raised by this general line of questioning. That being said, what if the US had intervened when Assad starting killing his civilians? Would many thousands of people still be alive? Would ISIS even be an issue? What if we had intervened in Rwanda, early Nazi Germany, or against any number of other genocidal regimes/groups? How many people would we have saved? Would we have regretted those interventions? (Perhaps the bigger Q there is, why do we NOT seem to regret the fact that we did not intervene?) What if we hadnt taken action during WWII or other wars? What if we could have taken out Bin Laden sometime before 13 years ago yesterday? Supposing we had done so, having no idea that we had prevented so many deaths, we might have regretted the fact that we took action. Perhaps potential for regret is not a particularly great measuring stick. Blood is on our hands not just for the actions we take, but for the actions that we dont. Im not saying what the US should do; I dont feel I have the expertise or the impartiality necessary to have an opinion, nor does my opinion ultimately matter in any way. Just rambling along the general lines of the ideas that 1) we need to remember how difficult and important these decisions are, and 2) we need to keep in mind moral imperatives to save lives, a concept that (in my opinion) extends beyond borders. Discussion and disagreement is welcome.
Posted on: Fri, 12 Sep 2014 06:30:21 +0000
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