I'm biased, I'll admit it. My dad's side of the family is all Jewish, whether it's liberal, reformed, conservative, or orthodox Judaism. Tons of my family lives in the Middle East, esp. Israel, but also some Palestine. And most of my family on both sides is military. The other side of my family? Mostly Irish and English. Northern Ireland, to be more specific. And they have had to deal with terrorism since the 12th century with the fight of giving Northern Ireland back to the rest of Ireland.
So, I've got a family with tons of military action and terrorist action on both sides. Them being the victims of terrorism, mind you, since Jewish people don't believe in blowing themselves up to hurt the enemy.
But, I've also had the opportunity to know about the Middle East situation long before September 11, 2001, and this has given me the opportunity to know what's going on without all the pro-Iraqi action or anti-Iraqi action propoganda that's been created in the meantime.
And what do I think? I think it's important that we are there. For once. In the past, the United States has gone into various Middle Eastern countries, blowing a few things up, and then left. Last time, they left the Taliban in charge of Afganistan, and didn't keep an eye on it to see it turn out right.
The United States has made an action. They have gotten rid of a dictatorship where people were killed if they did not vote for Saddam Hussein. People say that Saddam Hussein was not part of the war on terrorism, and remembering President Bush's speeches at 9/11/01, I disagree. Bush never said that the war on terrorism was Al Quaeda specific, not even once. He said we were going to crash down on terrorism. Saddam Hussein may have hated Al Quaeda because they were a threat to him. But he did support other forms of terrorism. His own country was a great example of the terrorism he pulled off.
If we leave in the middle of what we've done, again, in the Middle East, we are responsible again for anything bad that happens. We were responsible for the Taliban, I'm sorry, we were. Do we want to also be responsible for just setting up the next 9/11/01? Or something worse? I think not. I think two things: 1) we need to be there now and working really hard to getting things stabilized and sturdy for the people over there, we need to be helping them and showing them that yeah, we can be dicks, but we are capable of working to make things better. 2) it is HIGHLY important that we know when it is time to leave. We do NOT want to be more imposing than UTTERLY NECESSARY. Right timing is crucial to not create more tension than necessary.
But we're there, and if we left now in the midst of all their chaos we'll be in a huge pile of shit later on. That's something I KNOW from the history of how people behave over there, government and military wise. But I wish the United States people had a more educated idea of WHEN would be a good time to leave. Exactly WHEN is everything set up enough for us to leave without it tumbling down and becoming as bad as Al Quaeda having control or worse? Making sure we make their lives better in the long run is the main key. If we leave and it tumbles, who do you think the next generation of terrorists are going to blow up? Yeah, that's right, us, because above all, people tend to hate the United States.