IRAQ’S LIBERATION STARTED JULY 4, 1776
William Rees-Mogg makes that argument in the London Times:
The United States usually intervenes with reluctance — it took 13 years to get from the original invasion of Kuwait to the removal of the Saddam Hussein regime. The US has even tried to avoid intervention by propping up authoritarian regimes, as in modern Saudi Arabia. Yet the underlying American idea is the most revolutionary idea in the world. It is the idea of liberty, of human freedom, of self-government and of democracy. Without American, and often British, intervention, most of the present-day democracies would never come in to existence, or would not have survived, particularly the European democracies.
Why is this so?
American forces have twice been able to win in the Gulf, with light casualties, in Kosovo, and in Afghanistan, because the United States, with about a 20th of the world̢۪s population, has the most advanced science, the best technology, the highest productivity, the best electronic communications, the most advanced weapons, the greatest logistical capacity. US power is the result of a free economy in a free society.
In Iraq, the overwhelming victory was won in three weeks by no more than one sixth of the potential defence forces of America. No such result could have been achieved, or even contemplated, by the armed forces of any other nation. The US model has repeatedly proved to be uniquely powerful, not just in defence, but in broader economic political and international terms.
Terrific perspective piece. Read the whole thing.
(Hat tip: RealClear Politics)
