After reading Lew's great article today, I started poking around for libertarian endorsements of Bush. There are more out there than I suspected, and they're all crazy. But one Objectivist site caught my attention with this paragraph:
"The battle of Iraq is part of a greater war, which, regardless of the stage of Saddam’s WMD programs, was a valid military option. Even the positioning of our military on this particular sand dune by taking out the local tyrant puts us in the center of evil: Iran, Saudi Arabia and Syria. During WWII we lost 3000 men in the very first campaign of the European theatre when we invaded North Africa – and those men were killed by the French whom we were trying to liberate. No one specifically remembers those details or the reasons to take North Africa. Nor do people remember the reasons for invading mainland Italy one month after Mussolini first fell only to find ourselves bogged down trying to occupy and subdue Italy for a year. In any war, it is not unusual to secure hill A before hill B, even though the main enemy is behind the latter. And with regard to the battle of Iraq, the real issue in this political campaign isn’t military strategy – the issue is moral."
Interesting point. "In any war, it is not unusual" to send thousands to die for no clear purpose whatsoever. Of course, when 3,000 Americans die in a terrorist attack, it is good reason to launch a perpetual war on "terrorism." When 1,000 Americans die in Iraq -- or, for that matter, 3,000 die in North Africa -- and we don't have any idea why, let's not get caught up on its virtues as "military strategy." It's an issue of "morality." Let the thousands continue to die, so long as we know that we're good, our enemy is evil, and what Americans are killing and dying for is a sense of moral clarity.
(Link courtesy of Strike the Root)
