“America Wages War Like the World’s Biggest NGO” | TIME.com
Nov. 16, 2012
You don’t want your military described as an “NGO” — that stands for non-governmental organization, like the Red Cross or Doctors Without Borders. It’s just one of the criticisms lobbed by Mark Steyn about how the nation is fighting, or not, in Afghanistan, in the latest issue of the conservativeNational Review. He argues that while the U.S. tends to be forward-leaning when it comes to getting into wars, it’s also forward-leaning when it comes to getting out. We simply don’t have the will to win, he says.
That’s true, as far as it goes, of course. Democratic governments who ask their civilians to sacrifice their offspring for never-ending wars – ...
Steyn, author of America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It, takes a pretty apocalyptic view of the global scene. He fears Islamic fundamentalism could be coming soon to the United States. One place to turn back that tide, he believes, is Afghanistan. But he doesn’t like the apparent return-on-investment:
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America wages war like the world’s biggest NGO – a do-gooding non-profit for which armed conflict is not the sharp end of a nation-state’s interest but an act of global stewardship. It’s war as the ultimate NPR fund drive: For a pledge of $12 billion, we’ll open a schoolhouse in Kandahar and a women’s-health clinic in Shah Joy and give everyone a copy of Three Cups of Tea. Six months after the last NATO soldier leaves, there will be no women at the women’s-health clinic and no schoolgirls at the schoolhouse. We came, we spent, we left no trace.
Read more: http://nation.time.com/2012/11/16/america-wages-war-like-the-worlds-biggest-ngo/#ixzz2CxI5fKrF
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