Fighting them over there

Jeff Huber at Pen and Sword:

Young Mister Bush has been boasting of late that we're on the "offensive" in our so-called "war" on terrorism. What Bush and his key advisers don't seem to understand is that "offense" in warfare isn't always a good thing. In fact, by fighting them "over there," in their home field, and on conditions that they dictate, we've actually handed "them" the initiative.

[...]

America has been on a wartime footing since 1941, mostly justified by the "fighting them over there" meme. And just how much good has fighting them over there actually done us? More than fifty years after the Korean War, we can't get a handle on North Korea. Vietnam doesn't pose an immediate threat to U.S. security, but then again it never did. Our proxy incursions into our backyard in Haiti and Grenada did little good. Fidel Castro still holds power in Cuba. Reagan's power play in Lebanon was a bust, as was Clinton's escapade in Somalia. Bush senior's incomplete "victory" over Iraq led to the prodigal son's Operation Iraqi Freedom bungle.

At this point in the American experiment, "fighting them over there" is making us less secure, both physically and economically, "over here." And we're paying a ludicrous premium for buying into the "over there" myth. According to Jane's, the authoritative source on military matters, the U.S. now spends as much on defense as the rest of the world combined.

Read all of part 1

Fighting them over there (Part 2) is here