Requiem

Christy has a powerful post at FDL precipitated by the deaths of the two kidnapped soldiers but it draws from a deeper pool outrage and sorrow. I encourage you to read it and some of the thoughtful comments. But I also want to make a point about the invasion of Iraq and the growing opposition to the continuing occupation. I think that some of this opposition is simply a reaction to the fact that more and more American soldiers are dying. But I don't think that the fact that people are dying (and too many are dying horribly) is what makes the invasion and occupation wrong and the withdrawal the right course of action.

The invasion was wrong to start with. It was morally, legally, technically wrong (as I've said before) and it's still wrong. The fact that "we're there now" doesn't change the fact that we shouldn't be. That's why I'm arguing for withdrawal -- because the U.S. shouldn't be there. They should leave and the reasons for leaving are the same as the reasons for not invading -- because it was wrong -- not because people are dying. I can imagine situations where soldiers are killing invaders and dying defending themselves, their families and their homeland and I would not think their actions were wrong (nor would I be advocating quitting). What makes this enterprise wrong is the U.S. being the aggressor, the invader, the side that started the fight.

One of the facts that compounds the "wrongness" of the invasion and occupation is that it inevitably caused people to suffer and die. Some of these people are dear to us but each victim of violent death is somebody's somebody and to have this death the result of doing something wrong is completely indefensible. If there was no good reason to invade, then there is no good reason to stay and to kill and be killed.