‘Going Roman’ the American Way…

Re(1): “You've got money. But what do you want to buy?”, The Belmont Club, Wretchard TC
Re(2): “Things are coming to a head”, Works and Days, VDH
Re(3): “Yeah, We Can Win - If We Decide We Want To”, Daily Pundit, Bill Quick
Re(4): “The Three Conjectures”, The Belmont Club, Wretchard TC

Wow, a confluence of articles on really one topic. The topic is summarized best by the following:

In order to win a war, you first have to have the will and intention to wage a war. Nobody, Hanson included, has demonstrated anything like the will needed to defeat our Islamist enemies. Instead, to a lesser or greater degree, none of these people - from the Hansons to the Bushes - are talking about actually waging a war.

I have nothing against Mr. Quick but, and this is a big but, he apparently hasn’t read VDH’s authored works. VDH does, in fact, know what a ‘total war’ is. He does know, and in his referenced article demonstrates that fact, that there is a requirement of civil willpower and drive required for a Democracy to fight. These are things he knows and understands.

If Total War is initiated than it will look like:

At this point, a United States choked with corpses could still not negotiate an end to hostilities or deter further attacks. There would be no one to call on the Red Telephone, even to surrender to. In fact, there exists no competent Islamic authority, no supreme imam who could stop a jihad on behalf of the whole Muslim world. Even if the terror chiefs could somehow be contacted in this apocalyptic scenario and persuaded to bury the hatchet, the lack of command and control imposed by the cell structure would prevent them from reining in their
minions. Due to the fixity of intent, attacks would continue for as long as capability remained. Under these circumstances, any American government would eventually be compelled by public desperation to finish the exchange by entering -1 x 10^9 in the final right hand column: total retaliatory extermination.

Once started, there is no solution other than the final solution. That is why we stay our hand. Our civilization, our culture, our people will change in ways we cannot comprehend if we destroy their civilization, their culture, and their people. As Wretchard notes:

The attempt to establish a democratic Iraq, however disappointing the experience has been so far, is unlikely to be abandoned very easily in the near future -- and perhaps not for as long as a the ghost of a shadow of a chance remains that it may be attained -- not only because the current administration is so invested in it, but because the alternatives of divide and rule and naked power politics, which would have been adopted without a second thought by Empires in the early 20th century, are too cold-blooded and heartless to be easily embraced by an American public which genuinely wishes the Iraqi people well.

‘Going Roman’ is no longer sowing a city with salt. It is obliterating a language, a belief structure, a culture, and killing tens of millions or hundreds of millions.

It may come to pass, but I want history to write

‘It was necessary, and it was just'

on both the first and final lines of any discussion regarding our era.

This is not something to be taken lightly.

It is now discussed openly...