Joanna wrote:
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> What the U.S. is doing however is to intensify and distort the struggle. That's not necessary. It is also setting up this situation as a justified intervention, which will make future ones more likely, and it is diverting much needed resources to war.
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> So, while I agree that the attacks are based on native intelligence, I disagree that the U.S. must make itself the armory of tribal warfare.
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Precisely! Every time the U.S. invades some area spreading mass destruction, liberals and armchair leftists form a chorus: The U.S. must repair the damage it has done before it leaves; Troops Out Now is too unnuanced a principle. We need more analysis. On and on it goes.
Barrington Moore pointed out nearly ahalf century ago that the stable modern democrcies all had one feature in common: they had been able to fight out their civil wars free from outside intervention. Outside intervention into an area of civil strife, regardless of how the "intervenor" (fucking aggrssor that is) carries out the intervention, the fissures in the society will become deeper and deeper, more and more antagonistic. This is why 19th-c imperialism left behind such chaotic societies.
For U.S. leftists there is only one (uqualified, unnuanced) slogan proper for any occasion when U.S. forces are active outside the U.S.: Troops out NOW! Any other slogan is unintentioal but still vicious collaboration with the aggression.
Carrol