Assessing

I recently sent an email to a group of my high school classmates asking them what they think now about our invasion of Iraq. We email about all sorts of things, have members who were UN weapons inspectors in Iraq (who believe they did their job well) and at least one who was high up in the CIA. Two years after our invasion it is worth stopping, taking a step back and assessing whether the high cost, thousands of American and hundreds of thousand Iraqi casualties, huge expenditures of money, a realignment of international relations, was worth what has been accomplished.

Mostly, if anyone tries to ask this question, the response is, "Support our troops." The refuge of scoundrels.

So what do you think? I have had a knee jerk opposition to the use of force to gain national goals. No doubt there are times when it is the only course possible. Was this one of them?

Probably the first question is whether we can have a debate about this without wanting to annihilate each other. Could be that the answer to that question has everything to do with what we claim we invaded Iraq to protect.