Micah Timothy Holmquist wrote:
>
> So what do people think the real goal of the policy is?
I've never really understood this in any satisfactory way either. My first (and recurrent) impulse during and after the Gulf War was to speculate that the real focus of the attack was the "Vietnam Syndrome," that is the disenchantment among the U.S. public to further foreign adventures. A quick and glorious war (the imperialists thought) might get the U.S. public back in shape.
Now I'm wondering if some more complex equivalent of that might be the case. As long as Hussein remains in control, and as long as a U.S. resolution against him can be kept, then the U.S. can repeatedly use Iraq as a demonstration of its "right" and willingness to slaughter around the world. This can't quite be right as articulated here, but I think its a direction worth considering. It parallels Sartre's analysis of the Vietnam War in his "On Genocide" (a marvellous essay I read in *Ramparts*. I don't know if I still have that issue hidden away in my basement or not.
Carrol