A Lesson in History
by Sven at My Silver State
Wed Jun 11, 2008 at 12:46:09 PM PDT
Much is made of John McCain's answer to a question regarding troop withdrawal from Iraq today.
Watch for yourself:
Of course much of the progressive blogosphere has jumped on McCain's statement that bringing the troops home is "not too important." Well, that's barely news coming from "let's stay 100 years in Iraq" McCain. So, it was inevitable that someone would jump on the bloggers and some Democratic politicians, like Marc Ambinder did, and say they took it out of context and what McCain is really saying is we need to bring down casualties so all can be forever happy like in Japan, South Korea and Germany.
As a German and a student working on his master in history, I say: fine let's look at the context:
- Iraq is neither South Korea, Japan, nor Germany.
- The United States defeated Japan and Germany in which the latter two were the aggressors.
- South Korea was actually liberated by the US from Japanese occupation.
- Germany and Japan were almost totally destroyed. Almost all major German cities were totally bombed out as were several Japanese cities. Two of them, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, were hit by nuclear bombs.
- The citizens of Germany and Japan were subsequently utterly demoralized.
- The Japanese got to keep their emperor.
- The US were on West Germany's and South Korea's side during the cold war and acted as protectors. The US fought a war with the South Koreans against the communist north and the Soviets.
- Neither South Korea, Japan, nor Germany had civil conflict between two religious factions.
- The American troops in Japan, South Korea and Germany were ultimately accepted or at least tolerated.
- In Iraq the Americans were the aggressors, not the liberators. Iraq faces no immediate danger from the outside like West Germany and South Korea did/do. Iraq did not get to keep it's dictatorial ruler. In Iraq the inner power balance between the two religious factions changed. The American troops in Iraq are still a sign of an aggressive, maybe even unjust war. Now they stand between the two warring religious factions. Ergo: The US troops in Iraq will never be tolerated or accepted as they were/are in South Korea, Japan and Germany. Therefore, troop withdrawal is the only way to bring down casualties. And, coming back to my first point: Iraq is neither South Korea, Japan, nor Germany.
And all this from the man who talked about President Putin of Germany.
Never thought I'd be a teacher but the Republican nominee may just turn me into one.
Cross posted from My Silver State.
