Why does the U.S. insist on trying to spread democracy to places that obviously do not want it? Some cultures are obviously just not suited for that particular type of government. Now, I understand the rationale of our government. I really do. It’s that democratic nations tend not to go to war with each other. We also have this belief that democracy is the best form of government, when we’ve never really tried any others. But at some point you have to say to yourself, what is the point of trying to end tyranny throughout the world, by going to war with the countries you’re trying to help? The best case would turn out like Afghanistan, where only 1,794 Americans have died. But, at what cost to the Afghani people, infrastructure, and culture? Some estimates put the number of deaths of Afghani civilians in the hundreds of thousands. The worst part of this tragedy is that nobody really has a clue how many Afghani civilians have been murdered.
The other much more staggering number is the amount of Iraqi civilians who have been killed, all in the name of spreading democracy there. A website I found (http://www.unknownnews.net/casualties.html) puts the number of civilians dead there upwards of 900,000! Can anyone even tell me why we invaded that country in the first place? I know, Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, and he gave no evidence that he destroyed them. But is that really worth the deaths of hundreds of thousands of its citizens? To say nothing of the American soldiers who have been sent to their deaths. Also, if Saddam had ever tried to attack us, he would have been obliterated. He knew that. We knew that. So why did we invade their country? If you guessed oil, I think you would be correct. Recent exploration has shown that Iraq has the world’s largest proven oil reserves. Now, maybe George W. Bush actually helped to prevent a worldwide depression that would have resulted from 6-7 dollar a gallon gasoline. We will never know. I just cannot wait for the day when we start to care less for material things, and more for each other. It may never happen, but a guy can dream, can’t he?
