Winning Wars

We are a nation of wars. The war on terror. The war on drugs. The war in the Middle East may not be ours, although smart money says that it is and the IDF’s munitions are certainly in the main American made. We are having a culture war here at home over “morality” which is having such a polarizing effect that we can’t talk rationally to anyone we disagree with anymore. We are pretty fucked up right now as the image of Israeli girls on the left here would suggest. Hey, at least the economy is OK.

I read an article by a former Israeli soldier that pointed out that among other things that Israel lost this war with Hezbollah. I’ve read a lot of things about the war, but one thing that keeps coming up is that the most powerful military in the world cannot win a war without winning over the hearts and minds of the people. Which people, I’m not always sure of, but either you have to have a strong stomach for killing or you have to actually help somebody gain freedom. If you only bring pain and chaos, you only get pain and chaos in return. This should not be news to a country that lived through Vietnam.

But it is news, and as somebody once said “what a revolting development.” What revolts me the most is willful stupidity. Plain ignorance is somewhat forgivable if not amusing, but willfully aiming the gun at your head is just mean and vicious. We are busy committing suicide and what drives it is our hate. We are in love with hate. As Ren would say, “I like being angry.” But Ren wouldn't say, "I like killing my enemies."

Joe Strummer said that “anger can be power if you know how to use it.” We don’t know how obviously. Neither does Israel. Here’s what you do guys. Start loving. Start helping people, even your adversaries, have decent lives. Don’t be so god damn judgmental. Know what you don’t know. I know one thing. We don’t know shit about winning wars.