Needlenose

The term “quagmire” was coined to describe the increasingly costly and unwinnable U.S. ‘intervention’ in Vietnam. Although the language used by Dubya and his Oily Men to describe the war on Iraq were borrowed straight from WWII (Saddam=Hitler, Anti-War=Appeasement, de-Nazification=de-Baathification), the conflict most closely resembles Vietnam.

Just as in that conflict (and unlike WWII), the U.S. never actually bothered to declare war. In both cases, Congress abnegated its constitutional rights to wage war (a point on which Senator Bryd droned on at great length, in a complete turnabout from his stand on the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution). Fabricated evidence embraced by the Administration provided the causus belli for each conflict (Vietnam had the Gulf of Tonkin incident). Now we’re engaged in the futile endeavor of ‘imposing democracy’ (nation building) on a country that’s preparing to split into at least 2 parts.

And now, in the most chilling development, we’re starting to hear that dripping sound of American blood spilling into the desert as those stubborn ”pockets of resistance’ change their fighting tactics. By the end of the conflict Vietnam had cost more that 50,000 American lives – but of course that didn’t happen all at once. The first troops started dying in dribbles and drabs, 2 in 1959, 8 in 1963 and so on, in a steady escalation. I just hope this time the war doesn’t take 30 years and 5+ million dead Iraqis to play itself out.

In a break with history, however, I’d like to introduce a better metaphor for our unwinnable conflict – let’s replace ‘quagmire’ with ‘quicksand.’ I realize that the Iraqi desert is not particularly sandy, but it seems more appropriate than invoking a jungle/bog metaphor, and given time, the conflict is likely to spill over to Iraq’s sandier neighbors.