When terrorists flew airplanes into the world trade center in 2001 revenge was the first thought on everyones mind. It sounded good at the time to go to war. We all felt that a great injustice had been done (which was true) but I dont think that we took the time to cool down and give it rational thought. Attacking Iraq was not a rational act to take. Neither was invading the country of Afghanistan. Our natural prejudices took over and we lumped all Moslems in the same category. We perceived that any middle easterner with the traditional Middle Eastern appearance was our enemy. To take it one step farther we perceived Islam to be our enemy so we were determined to wipe out all terrorists. We then attacked with the intent to wipe out al-Qaeda. We felt that we could because we believed in the might of our military. Yes we were able to invade Iraq in the early 90s but Iraq was not al-Qaeda. We were able to go into Afghanistan and fight the Taliban and al-Qaeda there but the Taliban and al-Qaeda are not Afghanistan.

Years later we are still engaged in the war on terror with no discernable depletion in the numbers of al-Qaeda and Taliban insurgents. We forgot to factor in the fact that the Arab Nations would band together and support one another against a Western country which decided to invade their territory. Men are flocking to Pakistan and Afghanistan from all over the world to participate in this so called holy war. We can never eliminate all of the members of the Taliban and al-Qaeda because of this. Yes we have killed many of them but there are always men willing to take up arms and join their cause in this war. If we were to leave these countries then their ranks would dwindle.

Retaliation for the 9/11 attacks was justified but we should have taken time to deliver a more measured effective response. We felt that we had the greatest military in the world (which we do) and we would wipe out the enemy very quickly and come home but things have not worked out that way at all. Our enemy fights with small mobile units and uses hit and run tactics. This is the worst type of war for a large army to have to fight. Our military is built to slug it out with other large sized military forces not play cat and mouse with small bands of foot soldiers.

Many people think that the war against Iraq was a vendetta against Saddam Hussein and I will have t agree that it was. There is one thing that I believe that the Bush administration was right about which was that he did have some type weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt in my mind that Saddam had such weapons but he very cleverly sent them out of country when he knew that the attack was imminent. Remember how he tried to fly his war planes into Iran to save them during operation Desert Storm? This was the precedent for Iraqi Freedom. I really believe that he did the same thing with his WMD during this war. I dont have proof so I wont debate it and I may be wrong but I doubt it.

We did not go into the war on terror with clear defined goals. We just wanted to kill a bunch of terrorists to show that you dont mess with the United States. The result was a war which is still going on nine years later.

The Obama administration did the wise thing when they redefined our goals for success in Iraq and Afghanistan. We needed some realistic definable objectives which would give us the ability to exit and save face. We cant wipe out al-Qaeda so we never should have harbored that thought. We have hit them hard and they know it. We need to keep their operation disrupted. The deployment of the number of troops that we have overseas is not necessary to do this. Maybe this war will be a lesson to us in the future. Military Ring Express