In war and politics, on the left, the right, and the center, and in Iraq, in the USA, everywhere, morale counts for something. A well-grounded hope, for instance, helps sustain the spirit of resistance (and vice versa), while wishful thinking can blind us and plunge us into deep shit (and vice versa).
US leftists will not be able to overthrow the yoke of the empire on their own; no citizens of an empire in history have. The empire won't collapse unless attacked from many fronts at once.
What we will need in order to effectively resist not just this war but US imperialism in general and its economic underpinnings include the following: (A) massive and vigorous international opposition to US imperialism, especially stiff military resistance undertaken on the part of those who are on the receiving end of imperialist military assaults (to the magnitude of the Tet Offensive at least, to the scale of Dien Bien Phu or the Battle of Stalingrad at best); (B) large-scale revolts, conscientious objections, desertions, combat avoidances, etc. on the part of US soldiers (Cf. Richard R. Moser, _The New Winter Soldiers: GI and Veteran Dissent during the Vietnam Era_, Joel Geier, "Vietnam: The Soldier's Revolt," <http://www.isreview.org/issues/09/soldiers_revolt.shtml>, _GI Resistance: Soldiers & Veterans Against the War_, <http://lists.village.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/Book_Contents/GI_Resist_cont.html>, etc.); and (C) mass collective actions of Americans at work and in streets (shutting down streets, sit-ins, walkouts, work stoppages, sit-down strikes, general strikes, etc.). We can and must make efforts to eventually bring about (B) and (C), whether or not we will succeed in doing so soon. Making (A) possible is not in our power -- it is up to foreigners to do so in their own nations. Even so, we cannot but hope that the Iraqis won't meekly surrender and will at least put up stiff resistance, even if they are incapable of defeating the US military at this time. -- Yoshie
* Calendar of Events in Columbus: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/calendar.html> * Student International Forum: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://solidarity.igc.org/>