Eagles we were, eagles we will be again

Editor’s note: The following article is a response to Thomas Qualtere of The Heritage Foundation’s recent article “Hawks we are, hawks we must remain,” published on this site.

I rarely become truly angry when reading the opinion of a fellow human being. As should be obvious from my libertarian associations, I understand that free speech is inextricably linked with freedom. However, while I would never advocate for the silencing of one whose opinion I find little to no common ground with, I can still say that Thomas Qualtere of the Heritage Foundation’s recent article concerning the future of both foreign policy and conservatism in our nation deeply saddens me, and reinforces in my mind the importance of helping my fellow Americans gain an accurate understanding of the misguided foreign policy that has led our country into a cycle of perpetual war and violence from which it often seems there is no escape.

Qualtere attempts to address the question of where the youth of today should commit themselves in terms of creating the American foreign policy of tomorrow.  “We are the 9/11 generation,” he writes.  Qualtere states that we are a generation that should understand the cost of not confronting our enemies overseas, and that the lessons of 9/11 should be our call to fight for an American foreign policy that deals with our enemies where they live, rather than lets them come to strike us at home.

According to Qualtere, we are children of the ’80s and ’90s, the ’80s being “harmonious, optimistic, and thriving,” and the ’90s being “a time of peace and prosperity that neither our parents nor grandparents ever knew.”  It seems that Qualtere believes that the most important things to remember about the ’80s and ’90s are that “the music was great, the movies were fun, the new cellular telephones were neat and the World Wide Web was even cooler.”  Then, 9/11 came, ending America’s party.

I at least give Qualtere credit for admitting his own ignorance.  Indeed, one would have to selectively remember only certain aspects of ’80s and ’90s to have as flawed an understanding of the modern Middle East as he does.

Let’s not remember the fact that the CIA in the 1980s taught the fighters who would one day be the Taliban how to build and employ suicide bombs.  Let’s not remember that during the Iraq-Iran war, the United States supplied Saddam Hussein with many of the weapons that he would use to kill American soldiers just a few years later.  Let’s not remember that it was the official policy of both Presidents Carter and Reagan to give the Afghani freedom fighters who were attempting to keep the USSR at bay just enough aid to perpetuate the Russian invasion for the sake of draining the Soviets, but not nearly enough to aid to bring an end to the conflict in order to give the Soviets “their Vietnam War,” resulting in massive Afghani casualties.

Let’s certainly not remember that during the ’80s and much of the ’90s, Osama bin Laden was receiving a nice fat paycheck from Uncle Sam.  Let’s not remember that during the ’80s, the CIA provided the most extremist Muslim groups with weapons, support, training and thousands of Korans as methods of support and recruitment.  Let’s not remember that the majority of the Islamic extremists we are fighting today are the result of a network of recruitment that was conceptualized, financed, and maintained with American taxpayer money.