There are lots of reasons to hope that this war is nearly over, not the least being that if it does end soon, the civilised world will be able to switch its attention to other bad things now being done by other bad people.
You get the feeling that Fidel Castro, for example, was hoping that this thing would last a lot longer than now seems likely. He’s been rounding up dissidents, and he surely guessed that he’d have two or three months free of major western media interference. But what if Gulf War II fizzles out quickly, and what if the Media then takes a closer look at what he is now doing, say in about a fortnight’s time? Well, we can hope.
The news I’m watching on the TV right now (Sunday breakfast time) is that the British are moving fast into the centre of Basra, days sooner than the media people I’m listening to had been expecting. If they, and the Americans in Baghdad, can make these incursions stick and if there are no big and nasty surprises yet to come, and if they can reduce the whole thing to a few dozen boring little sieges of nutters, the media may soon be toning down its fascination with Gulf War II and be looking for other morsels to feed on. If so, look out Fidel.
How delightful it would be if this opportunistic calculation were to turn Castro into one of the bigger casualties of Gulf War II.
And what’s Mugabe been up to during the last fortnight?
Is anyone planning a TV show to question the opponents of the war on their predictions of mass civilian dead and military disaster?
Absolutely! There’s a considerable number of idiots who should be called to account for their hectoring scare-tactics – not least because they always say the same things whenever the West is forced to take military action, always receive huge amounts of opinion-forming publicity and always melt into the background when (inevitably) they are proved wrong.
I would pay good money to watch Tony Benn, Charles Kennedy, Robert Fisk, Billy Bragg, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, John Simpson and so many others forced to explain themselves.
I would pay even more money if, the next time they were up on their hind legs spouting, they were confronted by their previous dopey predictions and laughed to scorn.
Should we propose such a show then? Question to pro-war “How badly does a conflict have to go before you agree it was a mistake?” Question to anti-war “Is there any situation when you would agree a war like this is justified?”
I think senior military officers would field their question much better. After all, they study military disasters of the past. I suspect anti-war people would be much worse answering their question.
Hm. We probably won’t be hearing any apologies from John Simpson any time soon. We apparantly opened a bit of friendly fire on him Sunday, wounding him slightly and taking out a dozen of our special forces guys.
-koff-
Sorry.
With regard to your observation that the war is providing a distraction that enables other bad things to go on unnoticed, you might find this of interest:
Beyond The Lens.
Mark, With the broadcast media in Britain dominated by lefty nihilists, I think your question was a wee bit optimistic. All records of opposition to the war are now in the process of being disappeared.
I suppose I am a tad hopeful, Liberty Belle, yes!
Argentinian-style disappearing of video tapes etc? I suppose articles in print are harder to hide later, though!