So more than 60% of Americans favor going after ISIS – as long as we don’t send actual troops to do the ‘going after’. In the absence of troops – and if I hear one more person on TV say “boots on the ground” I’m going to throw the remote at the flat screen – that means other ways to attack. F-16’s are expensive to fly, and we know the military’s budget is being slashed. So what’s the obvious solution? Drones. Drones. The God-damned Drones. They’re baacckkk!

Those little white toy airplanes in the sky that deliver mayhem and death to the wicked as well as the innocent – the ‘collaterals’. We will be chasing down those little white Toyota trucks with 50 cal’s mounted in the bed with little white specs of aerial death – operated by small, either callow or callous men sitting in comfortable chairs in Virginia, playing what they have come to think of as a video game. There’s no death and destruction – just antiseptic puffs of smoke and flame when viewed at the altitudes at which they operate. And the victim on the ground never knows it’s coming until one second before it does. Hello. Goodbye.

What is it about this name-morphing group ISIS – ISIL – IS that has so attracts our attention? Beheadings of people who look like us – who are us. And don’t you think Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi nee Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri al-Samarra, roughly translated Ibrahim from Samarra is well aware of the impact of these actions? You betcha. Come on back – I can beat you now. You’re on my home turf, and I have money and plenty of nihilistic young men with suicide vests willing to kill themselves – and you.

But here’s the thing. The current Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi replaced a predecessor Abu, one Abu Abdullah al-Rashid al-Baghdadi. This character started out as a piece of creative fiction by Al Qaeda, designed to put a local ‘face’ on their activities. His lines were read by an actor. Then the fiction turned into a real guy – allegedly killed by a joint effort of Iraqi and American forces in 2010. But the details surrounding his identity and death are sort of murky. But that didn’t stop generals and politicians from applauding his alleged demise, and calling it a big step in the eradication of Al Qaeda. Right. Maybe not.

So the visual all this conjures up is from that movie Starship Troopers, the kids against the bugs. But the kids found that no matter how many bugs they killed, there were always more. The movie came from a sci-fi novel written by Robert Heinlein, a prolific writer in the 50’s and 60’s. Here’s a line from a synopsis of the book from Wikipedia:

There is an explicit contrast to the “democracies of the 20th century”, which according to the novel, collapsed because people had been led to believe that they could simply vote for whatever they wanted… and get it, without toil, without sweat, without tears.”

Sounds like Robert’s prediction was dead-on. Less than 2% of the population contributed to the combined wars in Afghanistan and Iraq for the last 12 years. The impact on the 2% was significant, as we’ve discussed before. When Barry O put the dual conditions of approval of immunity for American soldiers – signed off on by the Iraqi Congress – it was a sure way out. No more ‘boots on the ground’. Now Baghdadi wants us back. We’re the best recruiting tool he has, and the juiciest target that he’s confident he can defeat.

So essentially we’re in a no-win situation, spawned in large part from getting involved in Iraq and Afghanistan in the first place. I know – can’t change the past, only the future, but don’t we ever learn anything? Do we really believe we can defeat these bigger, stronger bugs with drones and airstrikes? We cannot, and will not. And – hey, take a step back here and think for a moment. Is it our job to do so? Why aren’t the folks that own the real estate stepping up? ISIS is a creation of Sunni Islam. They give blood and treasure to support this creature. Do you think there are any Christians, or even Shia Muslims amongst its ranks? Not a one. So to go after them is to go after Sunni Muslims. I can see the recruiting poster now.

Somerset Maugham retold an ancient story from that area – called it Appointment in Samarra. Here it is:

There was a merchant in Baghdad who sent his servant to market to buy provisions. In a little while the servant came back, white and trembling. He said, “Master, just now when I was in the marketplace, I was jostled by a woman in the crowd. When I turned I saw it was Death that jostled me. She looked at me and made a threatening gesture. Now lend me your horse, and I will ride away from this city and avoid my fate. I will go to Samarra and there Death will not find me.” The merchant lent him his horse, and the servant mounted it. He dug his spurs into its flanks and as fast as the horse could gallop he went. Then the merchant went down to the marketplace and he saw me standing in the crowd. He came to me and said, “Why did you make a threatening gesture to my servant when you saw him this morning?” “That was not a threatening gesture,” I said, “It was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.

So we leave Iraq in 2011, thinking we’re finished with this death thing in Baghdad. And where are we now? Trying to figure out whether to stay, or flee to Samarra. Or maybe we can send drones in our place so we don’t have to choose. But we’re postponing the inevitable. I’m resigned to the reality that war will be with all of us for decades to come. The build-up to the big one. Reminds one of the 1930’s.

Here’s a quote from this morning’s NY Times by Firmin DeBrabander on the topic of drones:

The United States is gradually becoming a warring nation with fewer and fewer warriors, and few who know the sacrifices of war. Drones represent the new normal, and are an easy invitation to enter into and wage war — indefinitely. This is a state of affairs Machiavelli could not abide by, and neither should we. It is antithetical to a democracy for its voting public to be so aloof from the wars it fights. It is a feature, I fear, of a democracy destined to lose that title.

I think that sums it up nicely. Do I have a better way? Not any more…there was a time, but now …yeah. No.