Memories

I had no idea Jay Reding was still alive, but here's what he wrote in my comments in Oct '02:

There's no reason why this isn't doable. Deposing Hussein will the easy part. Remember that people were saying that Afghanistan would be "the graveyard of empires" and that we'd have no better luck than the Russians? It turned out that Afghanistan can be won... and since we didn't come to colonize or conquer, we proved those predictions to be wrong. Iraq will be little different.

If anything, Iraq will be easier than Afghanistan. Iraq hasn't been in continuous warfare for years. Iraq has oil reserves that can fuel reconstruction, and many Iraqi people secretly harbor the dream of a free and democratic Iraq. No, we won't see democracy spring up in a few months or perhaps not in a few years, but it will come.

There's nothing wrong with worrying about our troops... in fact, I'd say that it's natural and understandable to do so. But we should all take comfort in the fact that they are part of the best fighting force that has ever walked this Earth, and the most elite of the Iraqi military don't hold a candle to them. This is what they were trained to do, and they will see this through.

And so will we...