Much As I Hate To Say "I Told You So..."

While archiving files, I ran across this letter I wrote nearly 5 years ago. Although much of what I assert would be commonly accepted in hindsight, at the time it seemed a minority view.

The Journal-Gazette
100 Broadway
Mattoon, Illinois 61938

2 October 2002

To The Editor:

I saw a cartoon recently which depicted people seated around a boardroom table. The caption read "If we're going to prioritize, we're going to need some priorities." It seems that the Bush Administration and Congress could take a lesson from the funnies.

In the year since Al Qaeda terrorists took thousands of innocent lives within these very shores, our government has lost sight of what must be its most important objective -- namely, that of hunting down the Qaeda al-Jihad leadership, every cell, and every member, and dispatching them quickly to hell.

It's not that we haven't had opportunities. On several occasions (most notably at Tora Bora and again in the Shah-e-kot Valley) coalition forces should have captured or destroyed most of the high-ranking Al Qaeda members. According to a report by Nicholas Lehmann in the September 16th issue of The New Yorker magazine, 17 of the top 25 Al Qaeda leaders are still running around loose in the world, ready, willing and able to kill Americans and our allies, both civilian and military (as is their stated purpose). Some analysts believe that despite assembling the largest military coalition in the history of the planet we have thus far been unwilling to commit U.S. ground forces in Afghanistan in large enough numbers to get the job done.

Osama bin Laden and his mentor Ayman al Zawahiri remain uncaptured. It is likely that they are both still alive and still have in their possession chemical and biological weapons, along with a nasty little suitcase nuclear device which they reportedly purchased in Chechnya.

So, why anyone in their right mind would be considering a war with Iraq at this time is beyond me. We haven't finished the job at hand. War with Iraq would be a distraction from our first priority and duty. In addition, displacing Saddam Hussein at this point -- evil as he certainly is -- would likely create yet another vast region where ethnic battles escalate, local warlords rule and terrorists are free to roam as they please.

Yet, the Democratic leadership (if one can call them that with a straight face) in Congress is lockstep with the President, marching happily along toward this insanity.

Bin Laden, Zawahiri and their kind will not stop short of the obliteration of human life on this planet if left unfettered. If we care about our children, if we care about their safety and their future, it is critical that we prevail upon our elected representatives to focus every resource on the destruction of Al Qaeda. They are the ones responsible for the attacks of September 11th, and they are the ones who pose the most serious and immediate threat to Americans today.

The sideshows can wait.

Sincerely,

Brian K. Noe
Mattoon, IL

3:33:15 PM      comment []