Nothing but bravado
Re “Iran attack very necessary. This wasn’t ‘bravado,'” Feb. 28: It is clear that retired newspaperman, Ray Watford, should stay retired. The Iran attacks were not necessary and are most certainly “bravado.”
Dozens of casualties in multiple countries later, including six U.S. service members, we can assuredly say that those who were “understandably uneasy” were correct to be so.
War does always carry risk, particularly one that is recognizably illegal under the United States Constitution and the United Nations Charter.
Past failures in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, the African Sahel, Syria, Lebanon, the Balkans and other sites of military intervention in the last 50 years should have been the pattern that Watford acknowledged.
His fear should not be confused with wisdom, and destruction and death should not be confused with “liberation” or any other moralistic slogan deployed to justify the latest Middle Eastern catastrophe.
If anyone wants a lesson from history, heed the words of John Quincy Adams speaking of America in 1821: “Wherever the standard of freedom and Independence, has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.”
David C. Lane, Washington Court House
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Iran attacks were most certainly ‘bravado’ | Letters
Reporting by Letters to the Editor, Columbus Dispatch / The Columbus Dispatch
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