A Prediction

Posted on April 15, 2003 in War

You can rest assured that if Bush wants his war against Syria badly enough, he’ll get it.

Once he starts the ball rolling, you will hear quite a few bloggers — particularly staunch Democrats maneuvering for position in the belief that by pandering to jingoism they have half a prayer of winning in 2004 — go into a song and dance routine whereby they say that while they think Syria is an evil place, the whole matter of oppression can probably be solved by taking out the leaders by assassination. Or they’ll put their seal of approval on the idea of a war by suggesting that perhaps he should turn his attentions somewhere else, like North Korea. Many will do both.

Of course, he won’t raise trouble in Korea this because NK has The Bomb and China just might get pissed off enough to make a stand as it did in the early 1950s when McArthur tried to rule the world. He will, instead, start showing pictures upon pictures of alleged victims of the Syrian regime. The pundits will say “Well, why doesn’t he go to some other place — like Liberia — where there are even more serious problems.” Of course, GWB will again see the stamp of approval on the idea of having a war for human rights.

He will trot out pictures and other evidence purporting to show that Syria (or whatever other place) has chemical and biological weapons. Some bloggers will again raise the issue of NK and the Bomb. And again, this will put a stamp of approval on the idea of using a war to invade for the purpose of taking down a nation with weapons of mass destruction.

Well, the pundits will say. What about nations like Pakistan which are actually supporting terrorists? Out comes the stamp of approval: the idea of using war to take out Al Quaeda or other terrorist organizations. Bush will smile and maybe mention that Syria produces opium.

He will address the nation: “Syria (or whatever other country) 1.) oppresses its people, 2.) it has weapons of mass destruction, and 3.) it harbors terrorists. We’re going to war.” The blogger-pundits will scratch their heads and wonder just how the hell he outmaneuvered them?

The troops will mass on the Syrian border and invade. The pundits will cry “Support our boys! Support our troops!” because, heaven forbid, they don’t want to be thought unAmerican and against people who are in the armed services, even though every last one of them volunteered for the job. “We’ ve got to do this,” they will whisper and cajole those of us who won’t go with the jingoism, “because people won’t take us seriously in 2004.”

Bombs will fall killing hundreds, maybe thousands of Syrians. A far smaller number of Americans will die in car crashes and ambushes. An American woman might get captured by the Syrians and for days Americans will worry about her alleged virginity. The destruction in Syria will be widespread and crippling. Then, somewhere, a rock will come flying out of a peaceful demonstration and break a window. No one will know who threw it. SEE! The pundits will cry! How can we choose when the peace activists are so destructive!

Our troops will arrive in Damacus, the city will be sacked, and the country will descend into chaos. The ease of the victory will silence the predictable cry that “the lives of our troops will be in danger!” for the next war. The chaos will be invoked as cause for our invasion (shades of Japan in China during the 1930s and Germany moving through Europe in the 1940s). The pundits will scratch their head, wait for Bush to propose his next war, and then go through the same thing all over again without learning a fucking thing.

I keep hoping against hope that getting these so-called liberal pundits to see how they keeping acting to bring about war with their wishy washy positioning statements will prove easier, some day, than teaching pigs to sing or getting the Statue of Liberty to sit down on Ellis Island.