Ron Paul Statement on the Iraq War Resolution
Do you agree with Ron Paul the biggest red herring in this debate is the constant innuendo that those who don’t support expanding the war are somehow opposing the troops?
Statement by Ron Paul
This grand debate is welcomed but it could be that this is nothing more than a distraction from the dangerous military confrontation approaching with Iran and supported by many in leadership on both sides of the aisle.
This resolution, unfortunately, does not address the disaster in Iraq. Instead, it seeks to appear opposed to the war while at the same time offering no change of the status quo in Iraq. As such, it is not actually a vote against a troop surge. A real vote against a troop surge is a vote against the coming supplemental appropriation that finances it. I hope all of my colleagues who vote against the surge today will vote against the budgetary surge when it really counts: when we vote on the supplemental.
The biggest red herring in this debate is the constant innuendo that those who don’t support expanding the war are somehow opposing the troops. It’s nothing more than a canard to claim that those of us who struggled to prevent the bloodshed and now want it stopped are somehow less patriotic and less concerned about the welfare of our military personnel.
Osama bin Laden has expressed sadistic pleasure with our invasion of Iraq and was surprised that we served his interests above and beyond his dreams on how we responded after the 9/11 attacks. His pleasure comes from our policy of folly getting ourselves bogged down in the middle of a religious civil war, 7,000 miles from home that is financially bleeding us to death. Total costs now are reasonably estimated to exceed $2 trillion. His recruitment of Islamic extremists has been greatly enhanced by our occupation of Iraq.
Unfortunately, we continue to concentrate on the obvious mismanagement of a war promoted by false information and ignore debating the real issue which is: Why are we determined to follow a foreign policy of empire building and pre-emption which is unbecoming of a constitutional republic?
Those on the right should recall that the traditional conservative position of non-intervention was their position for most of the 20th Century-and they benefited politically from the wars carelessly entered into by the political left. Seven years ago the Right benefited politically by condemning the illegal intervention in Kosovo and Somalia. At the time conservatives were outraged over the failed policy of nation building.
It’s important to recall that the left, in 2003, offered little opposition to the pre-emptive war in Iraq, and many are now not willing to stop it by de-funding it or work to prevent an attack on Iran.
The catch-all phrase, “War on Terrorism”, in all honesty, has no more meaning than if one wants to wage a war against criminal gangsterism. It’s deliberately vague and non definable to justify and permit perpetual war anywhere, and under any circumstances. Don’t forget: the Iraqis and Saddam Hussein had absolutely nothing to do with any terrorist attack against us including that on 9/11.
Special interests and the demented philosophy of conquest have driven most wars throughout history. Rarely has the cause of liberty, as it was in our own revolution, been the driving force. In recent decades our policies have been driven by neo-conservative empire radicalism, profiteering in the military industrial complex, misplaced do-good internationalism, mercantilistic notions regarding the need to control natural resources, and blind loyalty to various governments in the Middle East.
For all the misinformation given the American people to justify our invasion, such as our need for national security, enforcing UN resolutions, removing a dictator, establishing a democracy, protecting our oil, the argument has been reduced to this: If we leave now Iraq will be left in a mess-implying the implausible that if we stay it won’t be a mess.
Since it could go badly when we leave, that blame must be placed on those who took us there, not on those of us who now insist that Americans no longer need be killed or maimed and that Americans no longer need to kill any more Iraqis. We’ve had enough of both!
Resorting to a medical analogy, a wrong diagnosis was made at the beginning of the war and the wrong treatment was prescribed. Refusing to reassess our mistakes and insist on just more and more of a failed remedy is destined to kill the patient-in this case the casualties will be our liberties and prosperity here at home and peace abroad.
There’s no logical reason to reject the restraints placed in the Constitution regarding our engaging in foreign conflicts unrelated to our national security. The advice of the founders and our early presidents was sound then and it’s sound today.
We shouldn’t wait until our financial system is completely ruined and we are forced to change our ways. We should do it as quickly as possible and stop the carnage and financial bleeding that will bring us to our knees and force us to stop that which we should have never started.
We all know, in time, the war will be de-funded one way or another and the troops will come home. So why not now?
If all the candidates were as honest on an issue as tough as the Iraq war as Ron Paul is, and stop worrying about their popularity all the time, it would make for a very interesting race. So far it’s been Ron Paul vs. the Republican clones.
I forgot to say that yes, one of the biggest issues is that if you don’t support the war, you’re unfairly labeled as an unpatriotic leftist who hates our soldiers.
Suzan,
You get two “AMENS” from me re your posts # 1 & 2. I agree completely!
if one believes the rightwing canard that you have to support the war to support our troops, we’d still be in Vietnam. After all, how could we not support that war?
Had the military-industrial-political complex been held accountable for Vietnam, W&Cheney may have thought twice about their new Vietnam, their longtime occupation of Iraq.
FYI
As Loved Ones Fight On, War Doubts Arise
FORT EUSTIS, Va., July 11 — Cpl. April Ponce De Leon describes herself and her husband as “gung-ho marines,” and in two weeks she deploys to Iraq, where her husband has been fighting since March.
But she says she stopped believing in the war last month after a telephone conversation with him.
“He started telling me that he doesn’t want me to go and do the things he has been doing,” said Corporal Ponce De Leon, 22, speaking by telephone as she boxed up her belongings in their apartment near Camp Lejeune, N.C.
“He said that ‘we have all decided that it’s time for us to go home.’ I said, ‘You mean go home and rest?’ And he said, ‘I mean go home and not go back.’
“This is from someone who has been training for the past nine years to go to combat and who has spent his whole life wanting to be a marine,” she continued. “That’s when I realized I couldn’t support the war anymore, even though I will follow my orders.”
In voicing her shifting view on the war in Iraq, Corporal Ponce De Leon is not alone. In the past few weeks, President Bush has faced defections within his own party over his handling of the war by Republicans who have cited a growing weariness among military families as having played a central role in changing their opinions. At a news conference last week, Senator Pete V. Domenici, Republican of New Mexico, who had been a staunch supporter of the president’s handling of the war, said he had sensed a shift among some military families. He recounted how a father he spoke to recently said his son was proud to serve.
“But then this man said, ‘I’m asking you if you couldn’t do a little extra to get our troops back,’ ” Mr. Domenici said, recalling the conversation. “I heard nothing like that a couple years ago.”
Experts cite three causes of eroding morale among military families: longer and multiple deployments, the continued chaos in Baghdad, and the growing death toll — April, May and June were the deadliest three months for American troops since the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.
Among military members and their immediate families who responded to a national New York Times/CBS News poll in May, two-thirds said things were going badly, compared with just over half, about 53 percent, a year ago. Fewer than half of the families and military members said the United States did the right thing in invading Iraq. A year ago more than half held that view, according to the a similar poll taken last July. The May poll had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 7 percentage points.
Recruiting efforts are also suffering. Despite granting more waivers for recruits with criminal backgrounds, offering larger cash bonuses, loosening age and weight restrictions, and accepting more high school dropouts, the Army said it had missed its recruiting targets in May and June. Pentagon officials say resistance from families is a major recruiting obstacle. Membership is also increasing among antiwar groups that represent the active military and veterans. Military Families Speak Out, one such group, which was started in the fall of 2002, now has about 3,500 member families. About 500 of them have joined since January.
Nancy Lessin, a founder of the group, said it was noteworthy that about a hundred military wives living on bases had joined in the last three months. Wives living on bases, she said, are more reluctant than parents of soldiers to speak out.
For Beth Pyritz, 27, who recently joined the group, the turning point came last month when her husband, an Army specialist, left for Iraq for his third deployment.
“I voted for Bush twice,” said Ms. Pyritz, seated with her five children in their home at Fort Eustis near Virginia Beach. “I backed this war from the beginning, but I don’t think I can look my kids in the eyes anymore, if my husband comes home in a wooden box, and tell them he died for a good reason.”
She said her views began changing late last year as the administration seemed slow to release information about the chaos unfolding in Baghdad and crystallized when military deployments were extended to 15 months from 12 months.
Paul Jones, 51, a social worker who for three years has been counseling members of the National Guard and Army Reserve, said he had seen a growing number of troops who were angry and on edge, which is fueling dissent within military families.
“The soldiers have come home from a war zone with a whole different perception of how things are,” said Mr. Jones, 51, who did not want to divulge the base where he works to protect the soldiers’ confidentiality.
Don,
I’m no expert on Vietnam, but it was Congress who stopped Gen. Westmoreland from crossing into North Vietnam and finishing the war in a very timely manner.
Aubrey, Dick Nixon and LBJ were commander in chiefs, not Congress. The reason we could not across into N.Vietnam, was because those 2 presidents were convinced that both the Soviets and R.Chinese would send in massive ground troops (just as we had done)and if they started to lose, would introduce nukes. Vietnam was not worth that chance, therefore, Nixon bombed like crazy but never crossed the line.