Sadly, the Plural of "Fiasco" Requires No "E"

[cal04]

But the world desperately needs an "E" for EXIT from the march of folly toward a wider Middle East war that is increasingly likely to result from plural US foreign policy fiascos - in Iraq, Israel and Lebanon, for starters; in Syria and Iran for the next stage. Fortunately, Webster's does allow the insertion of an "E" and that's precisely what we must now do. We need to make a prompt exit from the endless string of fiascoes that have the Middle East marching to calamity.

If we do not take a sober look beyond the carnage of the last few weeks and weigh the reaction of still others in and outside the region, I fear there will be no exit. Perhaps it would be wise to start with a brief review: Who led our march into this modern-day Valley of Death?

(snip)
Many years ago, Army Colonel Harry Summers learned the hard way not to use this one. At the end of the war in Vietnam, Summers received orders to negotiate with North Vietnamese Army Colonel Tu the terms of the withdrawal of US forces from Vietnam. Summers could not resist reminding Tu, "You know you never beat us on the battlefield." Colonel Tu paused for a moment: "That may be so," he said. "But also irrelevant."

Many of us in Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) have been writing and shouting for 33 months that this war is UNWINNABLE. It is now time for Americans interested in justice, sanity and peace to draw the appropriate conclusions and summon the courage to stick our necks out. For it is simply not right to ask our troops in Iraq to play referee between factions and "stay the course" for us, on the off chance we might get lucky and "reshape the entire region."

Ray McGovern
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/080106A.shtml