Drum beat for another war

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Peninsula readers' letters: March 31

From Daily News Group readers mercurynews.com
Posted: 03/30/2012 08:43:44 PM PDT
March 31, 2012 6:52 AM GMT Updated: 03/30/2012 11:52:46 PM PDT








Drum beats for another war

Dear Editor: One neo-conservative had predicted the invasion of Iraq would be a "cakewalk." The war has killed well over 100,000 Iraqi civilians, cost nearly 4,500 American soldiers their lives, maimed many others and incurred costs that could reach more than $3 trillion before the last invoice comes due.

Yet here we are nine years later and once again the drumbeat sounds for war in the Middle East. This time the bullseye is Iran, and many of the bloodthirsty cries come from the same lusty throats that agitated a decade ago for invading Iraq. Now the neo-con armchair warriors call for hitting Iran before it builds a nuclear bomb to drop on Israel -- a scenario that remains in doubt.

One would refer to Afghan history here -- this is simply not a place that accommodates foreign invaders who think they know how to run the place better than the local population. Some neo-conservatives believe that somehow we are responsible for the Arab Spring, that it was a natural outgrowth of the Iraq war and the George W. Bush freedom agenda. That's nonsense. The origins of the Arab Spring come from within Arab nations.

Ted Rudow III,MA