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Have you seen the bumper
sticker that reads, "War Is Not the Answer?". I saw one the other day
and thought to myself, "That's a nice sentiment but it is a simplistic,
ill-informed slogan". In truth, war sometimes is the answer. There are
many anti-war protest groups, many of them formed on American university
campuses, which continue to believe that war never changes anything and should
never be considered, regardless of the consequences of not waging war. There
are few people who are pro-war but, when used as a last resort, war can often
be the answer. To believe that if we laid down our arms, all of our enemies
would reciprocate, is naïve and explains why most anti-war groups come from the
Left of the political spectrum. Most of those who hold these beliefs are
idealists who continue to advance the theory that man is intrinsically good by
nature despite historical evidence to the contrary. Would pacifism have
defeated the evil of Nazi Germany or imperialist Japan?
Would the communist "Evil Empire" of the Soviet Union
have collapsed without the threat of missiles deployed on the European
continent and the buildup of the American nuclear arsenal? Would Hitler, Tojo
or Stalin have abandoned their militaristic actions if the rest of the world
had simply laid down their arms? Of course not. Our enemies, you see,
understand that war can change things. This is the reason that Osama bin Laden
and al-Qaeda have declared war on America
and the Western world. They realize that war is the answer for them to achieve
their goals of conquest. They will not capitulate to pacifism and bumper
stickers.

Democrat presidential
candidate Barack Obama has stated that he would meet unconditionally with representatives
of all the world's regimes, including Cuba's
Castro, Iran's
Ahmadinejad, and North Korea's
Kim Jong-Il. He believes that all problems can be resolved through dialogue and
negotiations. Once again, this is a naïve point of view. Former US
president Jimmy Carter recently traveled to the Middle East
to meet with the leaders of the terrorist group Hamas in order to engage in
"negotiations". The only thing he accomplished, as Hamas readily
proclaimed, was to give credibility to an organization which has the stated
goal to eliminate the state of Israel.
Neville Chamberlain, the Prime Minister of Great Britain during the 1930's,
believed that he could negotiate with Hitler and keep his country out of war
with Germany.
Joseph Stalin signed a non-aggression pact with Hitler believing that he could
spare Russia
from the militaristic ambitions of Nazi Germany. Both men came to realize,
almost to the point of the ruin of their respective countries, that negotiation
was not the answer it appeared to be. Those who hold ambitions of conquest,
whether they be Julius Caesar, Adolph Hitler, Mao Tse-Tung, or Osama bin Laden,
have no interest in a negotiated settlement. In most cases, negotiations solve
nothing until a military victory has been achieved.

Another characteristic of the
anti-war Left is that they tend to believe that the aggressor is the victim.
Many believe that America's
foreign policies brought on the attacks of 9/11 and that the problems in the Middle
East are all the fault of America
or their ally, Israel.
Islamic extremists also want the world to believe this lie. The decline of the
Islamic civilization in the Middle East has been
advancing for many years and the region's only economic development was due to
the birth of the oil industry thanks to the investment by American and other
Western companies. Without this economic intervention, the region would be
nothing but a poor, undeveloped, uneducated Third-World ghetto. Al-Qaeda has
taken advantage of this state of affairs to wage a war of terrorism against the
democratic non-Islamic governments of the world. Unfortunately, the "War
is not the Answer" crowd has bought into the myth of American repression
of the Middle East. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Nancy
Pelosi, Harry Reid, and most of the Democrat party leadership have all declared
that America
should withdraw from Iraq
and then the Iraqis will solve all their problems created by our invasion on
their own. Never mind that history has shown that precipitous retreat from a
battle usually results in catastrophic consequences. Those who want to compare
the war in Iraq
to the war in Vietnam
refuse to recognize the horrendous results from the American military
withdrawal in the previous war which resulted in the slaughter of millions in South
Vietnam and its neighbor Cambodia.

America
and her allies cannot simply unconditionally withdraw from Iraq,
return all of the troops home, and hope to peacefully negotiate a settlement
with Iran, Syria,
Al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups. America's
military has suffered more than 4,000 deaths during the war in Iraq
and, as terrible as that may be, a greater tragedy would be for us to lose the
war. We must do whatever it takes to win. Bumper stickers and slogans will
never lead to peace. Sometimes war is
the answer. War is the answer when it results in defeating an enemy which murders
innocents with suicide bombings, beheadings, and other acts of terrorism. War
is the answer when people can freely elect their representatives, live in
peace, and strive to achieve their dreams of happiness.

In
1968, while serving as an interrogator with the USMC, I was assigned to
the 11th ITT (Interrogation/Translation Team), 3rd Marine Division at
the prisoner-of-war (PW) compound in DaNang, Republic of Vietnam. One
of dozens of interrogations I conducted during my 13-month tour of duty
was with a rather interesting NVA (North Vietnamese Army)
prisoner-of-war who provided some unusual information. As part of our
procedures, our interrogation team members routinely asked PW's if they
had ever seen an American held prisoner anywhere. Occasionally, they
would answer they had seen Americans, sometimes in captivity, and once,
one was seen fighting alongside the enemy Viet Cong. We kept an album
with photographs of all our military personnel who were missing in
action and asked those who said they had seen an American to go through
the album. Only once, in all my interrogations, was a PW able to
identify a person from the photos. He said that he had witnessed an
American pilot who had been shot down over Hanoi being manhandled by
his captors while a crowd was cursing and spitting at him. He told me
that the pilot was held with others who had been captured and gave me a
description of the prison compound and its approximate location. The
American he identified from the photo was a US Navy Lt. Commander named
John McCain. For me, at that time, John McCain was just another Navy
pilot missing in action who had his photo in the album. I had never
heard of the man. I submitted my interrogation report and thought
little more about it. However, a year or two later, after I had
returned home to the States, I heard a radio news story about an
attempted rescue of American prisoners-of-war from a compound in
Vietnam. The location of the compound was not identified.
Unfortunately, everyone had been moved so there was no one at the site.
The news story reminded me of the interrogation I had conducted in
DaNang concerning the captured Navy pilot, Lt. Cmdr. McCain.

It
was 1973 when I first saw John McCain on television as one of the
returning prisoners-of-war from Vietnam. There he was - the American
from the photo that had been picked out by the PW I had interrogated
several years earlier. For those who may not know, John McCain was held
as a prisoner-of-war for five and a half years (1967-1973), much of the
time in solitary confinement. He retired from the Navy as a Captain in
1981. His naval honors include the Distinguished Flying Cross, Silver
Star, Bronze Star, Legion of Merit, and Purple Heart. John McCain's
first person account of his time in captivity can be found here: John McCain, Prisoner of War.
Since that time, I have recounted this story to very few people,
however, a short time ago, I decided to send an email message to now
Senator McCain briefly telling him about my interrogation report of
1968. I have never received a response but I suspect his email is
screened and he has possibly never seen the message I sent.

John
McCain is now a candidate for President of the United States. The
senator is an honorable and patriotic man who has sacrificed much for
his country. I respect him greatly for his military service. As a
former trained military interrogator, I disagree with his views on
passive interrogation techniques for enemy combatants. I also disagree
with his positions regarding illegal aliens, President Bush's tax cuts,
oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, climate change
regulation, drug re-importation from Canada, and campaign-finance
legislation. But I agree with him on doing whatever it takes to win the
fight in Iraq, on finding and eliminating Islamic militants and
eradicating al-Qaeda and other terrorist factions. These are the most
dangerous threats to our country today. I will vote for Senator McCain
because we cannot elect someone as the next President of the United
States who will retreat in the face of evil. I know that John McCain
loves his country and I trust that he will never retreat. He will be an
outstanding Commander-in-Chief of our military.

I PICK ‘EM, YOU CLICK ‘EM

From The Trail:

* Romney stresses need to assist military families – Yahoo News

* Romney calls Hillary’s Illegal aliens beliefs “big mistake” – Agape Press

* NH Independents stirred by GOP Primary – Boston Globe

* Absense in SC to hurt Hillary? - CNN.com

News:

* Spitzer abandoning illegals’ licensing plan – MSNBC.com

* Weather Channel Founder calls global warming, “manufactured crisis” – Agape Press

* Panel finds Medicaid recipients living in luxury – FoxNews.com

* Conservative congressional influence surging – Politico.com

Opinion:

* Laurie David cries: Tim Russert won’t mention global warming – News Busters

* The insanity of Bush Hatred – Peter Berkowski