Winning World Wars

I will give credit to the president’s speech-writers for comparing the current global war on terrorists to the great sacrifice of historical meaning in World War II.  Our struggle against those who wish to change the face of Islam, harm countries that are dependent on Middle East Oil, and try to demonstrate to the world that the United States is a paper tiger must be similar in scope to the herculean conflict waged against the Fascism and Militarism that threatened the world more than half a century ago.  We are in a war of ideas, a war of sacrifice, and a war not of our choosing.  How we fight this war will determine whether or not future generations will look back and realize we were just in our cause, right in our means, and honorable in our victory. 

What draws the most distinct contrast between our current war and the one referenced by our leadership is the lack of four key components that, if incorporated into the conflict, will lead us to victory.  First, we must know what we are fighting for.  Second, we must have a strategy to achieve our war aims.  Third, every citizen must be a part of this war effort.  And, finally, we have to know what our measures of success will be.  Without these four key criteria our battles will expend untold resources, cost the lives of countless American and foreign citizens, and yet we will never prevail.

We must know what we are fighting for.  Since the attacks on September 11, 2001 we have been in a war of ideas.  The world woke up that day to the ongoing conflict in the Middle East to realize that as a community we cannot allow this region to continue to feed hatred, intolerance, and injustice to the rest of the world, while holding it hostage to energy resources.  What this means for our goals in the war effort are difficult to distill from these vague notions of regional animosity, energy dependency, and religious fervor.    As a first step in flushing out our objectives, the leaders of countries willing to participate and sacrifice in this struggle should come together and sign a charter outlining our war aims.  Much like the Atlantic Charter signed between President Roosevelt and Prime-Minister Churchill in 1942, an international charter that outlines what we intend to achieve from our actions would be a significant first step towards realizing victory.

We need a strategy.  Since this is a World War, those countries fighting it must agree on how it will be conducted.  So far there has been little coordination of effort between the Columbian army fighting narco-terrorists in the jungles of Latin America, the Philippine army countering religious and political rebels on the southern islands of that nation,  US forces straining to hold the status quo in Afghanistan and bring some sense of normalcy to Iraq, and Israeli military units hunting suicide bombers in Palestine.  These are all areas where the international community has invested militarily and monetarily in operations it claims to be part of the Global War on Terror.  Setting aside the particularities of each of these smaller conflicts and whether they actually qualify as counter-terrorism operations, what we can all see that is missing is a strategy that pulls our military, diplomatic, economic, and cultural efforts abroad into a coherent whole to achieve our political aims.  Once our goals for this war are chartered, it behooves all the nations participating to set a broad strategic outline of how to achieve those goals.  Again, until this is done our military actions will continue flailing against what our political leaders point out is an organized worldwide terrorist campaign.  We have to be at least as organized as the terrorist in order to defeat them.  As of yet, we are not.

Every citizen must be a part of this war.  Since we are indeed in a World War, we must act as if we are in a World War.  As one of the primary driving forces behind the animosity felt toward the US in the Middle East, our dependency on oil has to be reduced and eventually eliminated.  If we can overcome what is so clearly a drug addiction for our nation then we will have come a long way toward ending our reliance on other countries for our economic future.  An imperative of every American, starting with our leadership, should be to advocate, institute, and abide by oil reduction policies immediately.  Our nation must realize that as long as we drive our SUV’s, commute vast distances to and from work, spend unrealistic amounts heating our oversized homes, and gorge ourselves on our addiction to oil, we will continue to be beholden to those who hate us.  The extra size of our cars, houses, and waistlines are not worth the cost of American civilians killed in terrorist attacks or American soldiers who die to defend our right to have these things. 

We need measures of success.  During World War II we knew we won when the countries against whom we were fighting signed surrender agreements that then led to peace treaties.  We can never hope to see a surrender agreement with Al-Queda, nor should we ever be willing to sign one.  What we can use to decide that our war is over really depends on our war goals set out in a charter of all nations who will actively contribute to the war effort.  Our measures of success should be written into every document and incorporated into our overarching strategy of how we will conduct this war.  We must have measurable markers by which we can determine we have achieved our mission.  Only at that point, when we really know that our war is won, can our leadership, whoever it may be, unequivocally stand in front of a banner declaring “Mission Accomplished.”  Until that time, our mission will continue to be ongoing and perilous. 

World War II was fought by a generation of Americans we can honor not just by providing them with memorials or inspiring speeches on national holidays, but by continuing their struggle for the four freedoms so eloquently spelled out by Franklin Roosevelt and drawn up by Norman Rockwell:  Freedom from Fear, Freedom from Want, Freedom of Religion, and Freedom of Speech.  These should be the guiding principles behind which we endeavor to create a charter for our current war.  As we honor those who sacrificed for us in the past and prepare to fight our battles in the future, we must hold ourselves true to what it means to be American and honor everyone who has paid the ultimate price to bring us to where we are today.  Yes, this war is much like World War II, so let us treat it as such.