Bigger Military or Better Strategy
Our commander-in-chief says that we need a bigger military in order to win the "war on terror," which will be a long war. Maybe we do need more troops to fight in various areas of the world. But what we need more than troops is a way to win the hearts and minds of Muslims and others who hate us. Instead of beefing up the Department of Defense, we should beef up the Department of State so that we may talk, discuss, negotiate, run conferences and help faltering states.
According to the International Herald Tribune:
President George W. Bush has said that the United States should expand the size of its armed forces, acknowledging that the military has been strained by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and would need to grow to cope with what he suggested would be a long battle against Islamic extremism.
"I'm inclined to believe it's important and necessary to do," Bush said Tuesday. "The reason why is, it is an accurate reflection that this ideological war we're in is going to last for a while, and that we're going to need a military that's capable of being able to sustain our efforts and help us achieve peace."
Bush says that we are in the midst of an "ideological war." Yet he is using only military means to conquer the extremists. It's amazing that with all the social, organizational, informational, commercial, medical, technological (non-military) and judicial resources at our command, we fight with only arms. Such an approach is guaranteed to make this the longest war in history.
The Baker-Hamilton Commission said we need to talk with our enemies. Why not? Talking will not hurt. Talking does not mean giving in. Talking means give and take, agreeing to some things disagreeing with other things. As Representative Kucinich says:
The war in Iraq cannot be won militarily. The war can only end through diplomacy. You cannot have diplomacy when you do not talk. By refusing to talk to Iraq’s neighbors the Administration is slamming the door to the only path to peace in Iraq.
More than the Defense Department, we need to beef up our State Department. We need more linguists. Of 1000 people who work in the U.S. Embassy in Iraq, only 33 are Arabic speakers and only six speak the language fluently.. We need negotiators. We need media people to spread the word about world facts and about democracy. We need officials presenting the American point of view on Al Jazeera and at other foreign media outlets. We need to build a caucus of democratic nations to work together to push our ideas in the UN and in other international organizations. We are already helping in disasters, but we need to do more to show the world the kind of people we are.
Let's add to the budget money for fighting the terrorists. However, we should put most of the money not in the Department of Defense to boost the military, but in the Department of State to work on a better strategy for reducing the terrorist menace.
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