The American Spectator

Reader Mail

(Page 7 of 14)

But such grace, such self-restraint, can evaporate overnight and turn into uncontrolled wrath once a certain threshold has been crossed. Where is the that line? Nobody can say for sure, but I can tell you this: It does exist, and if it is crossed -- which hopefully it will not be -- the Islamofascists will have entered a new dimension -- a dimension beyond their imagination.

p>Now some might say that "overreacting" is exactly what Al Qaeda wants, that this will enflame the Muslim world against the West. Although this is true, it is also irrelevant. For the fact of the matter is that the military and economic power of the West is such that no force on the planet -- let alone backward Arab and Islamic societies -- can withstand it if it is focused on an enemy. How long could Saudi Arabia keep its oil if we really wanted it? br> -- Peter Skurkiss br> Stow, Ohio /p>

If you asked Joe Sixpack in 1940 what is the most fearsome weapon of war, he wouldn't have said atomic or biological weapons, he would have said the airplane, more specifically the bomber. Americans, then, had a mass phobia about terror bombing of American cities. The idea that an enemy would deliberately bomb a man's family and intentionally kill innocent women and children was horrifying. So naturally, the Americans, along with our British cousins, couldn't wait to inflict it on the Germans and Japanese.

In our Western psychology, revenge and spreading terror for terror's sake can't be justified; these visceral feelings need to be suppressed and a rational reason substituted. The myth of precision bombing of specific military and industrial targets was developed to justify dumping hundreds of bombs all over cities, countryside and oceans. Military proponents of air power claimed bombing alone would win the war. And it wouldn't hurt their careers either.

The British and Americans bombed their own troops by accident on several occasions. After the battle of Midway in 1942, the Army Air Corps erroneously claimed to have sunk most of the Japanese ships with B-17's. Hitting a warship twisting and turning at high speed from 20,000 feet was considered possible with precision bombing. It was more like trying to catch a greased pig with both arms tied behind your back.

This author doesn't mention how many munitions factories were destroyed by the British/American Dresden bombing, probably because Dresden didn't have much war industry and what little it did have survived most of the bombing. An American expression best describes our joint efforts: "Dang, we missed." The real purpose of Operation Thunderclap was to help the Red Army by driving refugees from the cities and on to the roads. The German army was retreating from the Russians and refugees clogging the roads and requiring food and shelter hindered the movement of German forces. Churchill personally ordered the bombing, although he later repudiated it.

p>"Bomber" Harris, the American generals Hap Arnold and Carl Spaatz were convinced that terror bombing was completely justified and helped the war effort. Whether it did or not has been much debated, but the debate is healthy if it makes us closely examine our motives and how we want to wage war in the future. br> -- Patrick Skurka

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Trade, Bill Clinton, Religion, Islam, Constitution, Law, Military, Iraq, Iran, Russia, Israel, United Nations, NATO, Communism, Energy, Oil