VT DAY???

How many people know that May 8 is VE Day? Did you know that August 15 is VJ Day? VE Day is the celebration of victory over Europe. VJ Day celebrates victory over Japan. For my generation and my parents’ generation these are very important dates. Lately I fear these dates have lost some of their import to the younger generations. Maybe it is because of the way history is being taught in schools today or maybe it could be because history is not being taught in schools today. Either way I bring this up because of our current war on terror.

Will there be a VT Day? Will we have a victory over terrorism? Let’s face it. We have been at war in the Middle East for ten years now and we seem no closer to a resolution today than when we began this war. By comparison, our involvement in WWII lasted a total of four years. How will we know when we have won this war and can rest on our laurels? Another question is can we in fact win this war? Can we defeat a worldwide network of rag tag religious zealots who are completely misled, suicidal, and have no allegiance to any particular country? They carry no flag and dress in no particular uniform. They hide behind women and children and kill indiscriminately. I suspect that most of them don’t even know why they are doing what they are doing. Since this all began for us ten years ago, our enemy has probably killed more of their own than we have. This is for sure a different kind of war, but it is a war nonetheless.

These are my thoughts. You cannot have a winner until you have a loser. Seems simple enough, right? We have, for these past several years, been spending millions of dollars and thousands of lives pursuing what appears to be an unobtainable goal. Now I believe we have two basic choices. Either win it all out, or just leave this mess to those Middle Eastern countries that have put up with the nonsense for eons. Of course, if we just leave and “pull out”, these radicals will continue in their attempt to return the world to the twelfth century. All of the free world will be under constant threat of their terrorism.

That leaves us with the only other choice. Win it. How, you ask? Here’s one way. We have the capacity to bring any country on earth to their knees in a matter of seconds. We could, in fact, turn the entire Middle East into a parking lot in seconds. But, I don’t think we have to go that far, thankfully. For our victory over Japan, we only had to use two bombs. Up to that point we had spent millions of dollars and thousands of lives, but when we decided to end it, it only took two bombs.

The enemy we are fighting today is being funded and sheltered by a very few small insignificant third world countries who could ill afford our all out retaliation. And we need to come to understand that war, by its only definition, is an all out, unlimited affair. I sincerely believe that one or at most two well placed nuclear devices would cause a rapid rethinking on the part of those countries that offer safe haven to terrorists. As was the case in Japan, the choice would be theirs whether to continue and risk total annihilation or try to live in peace with the rest of the world.

For war to end somebody has to win and somebody has to lose. Pulling out one’s forces doesn’t end anything. It only serves to extend it.

Personally, I don’t want to kill anybody. I suspect David didn’t want to kill Goliath, but sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do. We have spent enough of our treasure. We have given enough of our best military. Now we just need to end it. I look forward to VT Day.

Ron Scarbro November 21, 2010