Iraq and Ike

The Washington Post has a great article discussing whether Defense Department officials ignored the lessons learned about counterinsurgency in Vietnam concerning counterinsurgency in Iraq. It is certainly an interesting article and does seem to show that those involved with the planning and executing of the Iraq war missed valuable advice that could have spared us all of the carnage currently being experienced in Iraq.

I also read Dwight Eisenhower's fairwell speech and it stirred me! This is his famous military-industrial complex speech. There's so much in there for we as Americans to think about.

On the military-industrial complex:
This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
--Notice how Ike places the burden of defending against this increase in power by the military-industrial complex squarely on the shoulders of the citizenry. Every American has a duty to be alert and knowledgeable when it comes to security and liberty. This is a particularly important message for we Americans to hear today in our age of national security and the war on terror.

On scientific advancement:
Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientifictechnological elite.
It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system -- ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.
--A great caution in the light of stem-cell research so hotly argued for my nearly everyone today.

On stewardship:
Another factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society's future, we -- you and I, and our government -- must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.
--We all need to hear this again especially when it comes to our ballooning and scandalous federal budget deficit and our environment. We need more fiscal conservatives like Tom Coburn and John McCain in government to protect government coffers. We also need conservatives with the environmental philosophy of Theodore Roosevelt who recognised the importance of preserving our land and so established our national parks system.

On pipe-dreams:
Down the long lane of the history yet to be written America knows that this world of ours, ever growing smaller, must avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate, and be instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect.