Speaking of Hamdan

One of the qualities that distinguishes the war against Islamofascism from others like World War II is the lack of unity behind it, to state the obvious. But just think about that for a second. I wasn't there at the time, but it looks like every major element of society was on board and pulling in the same direction. The military wasn't operating alone, but was backed by politicians in both major parties, the press, the courts, popular music, Hollywood, you name it, and that's how we won. A little different now.

I fear we'll regain that unity in the worst possible way, as I am reminded by a long and well-written post at The Smallest Minority. Kevin recounts what he and others call World War IV, up through 9/11, and pauses to say:

What's stands out in this?

That we didn't get serious until a lot of American civilians got killed, and got killed here on our own soil. We seem to expect that our service members and government employees face violent death on a regular basis, but not our civilians. We seem to accept that being in a foreign land is risky, but we're supposed to be safe here. Nick Berg was kidnapped in Iraq and beheaded. We were outraged, but restrained. Four Blackwater contractors were murdered and mutilated - again, we were outraged, but restrained. Just this week two soldiers were kidnapped, tortured, murdered, and mutilated, and still we are restrained....

Until, that is, we're attacked at home and then true hell breaks loose. The Post goes in other riveting directions, but I want to focus on this, where Kevin quotes the ever-serene Ace at Ace of Spades:

One more. One more fu***** mass-murder. Go for it, boys. Give us the excuse. Some of us suspect it's inevitable and the only way to finally get it through your primative heads that we will no longer put up with being murdered by savage animals, but we need the moral pretext. We need the hot anger of fresh provocation.

So do it. If you are incapable of sharing the earth peacefully, then we will have to absent you from it. And when the nuclear fire rains down on you, you can cry out to your God and ask him "What have we possibly done to deserve this?"

No sane person wants that to happen. But I have often thought that all the Lilliputians binding Gulliver, from the Kossacks to Reid and Pelosi and Eric Lichtblau and James Risen, have never understood they're bringing us closer to that day.

Comments

[Kevin Baker]

"Long AND well-written"

I'm used to "long." Thanks for the "well-written"! ;)

[Christopher Fotos]

Well, excellent post, I was looking for something more memorable than "well-written" but it had the advantage of being true!

[AMac]

Wretchard wrote The Three Conjectures on this subject a few years ago. "The terrible ifs accumulate."

[Christopher Fotos]

Thanks for the pointer, AMac.

[EvangelinaDuran]

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