In the March/April 2007 Issue of Mother Jones, Peter Bergen and Paul Cruickshank referenced the then most recent State Department report on global terrorism, stating that the goal of the United States is to identify, target, and prevent the spread of "jihadist groups focused on attacking the United States or its allies [and those groups that] view governments and leaders in the Muslim world as their primary targets."
"Yet, since the invasion of Iraq, attacks by such groups have risen more than sevenfold around the world. And though few Americans have been killed by jihadist terrorists in the past three years it is wishful thinking to believe that this will continue to be the case, given the continued determination of militant jihadists to target the country they see as their main enemy. We will be living with the consequences of the Iraq debacle for more than a decade."
In the nine years since that article/report, has dangerous crazed terrorism lessen, hardened, or spread?
If you live in a nation where civil war has been implanted, it is bloody clear terrorism has worsened. If you reside in a civil nation with a decent economy the numbers are less bloody, as this Atlantic story reminds.
So why did George W. Bush & Cheney scare and lie the nation into sending armies to war in the wrong country?
Albert Einstein hinted at an answer when he defined one of our public policies saying, "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." We have been repeating a war based economy over and over again and expecting...
Do we need different armies?
From 1950 -- 2000, 198.8 million Americans have served in our our nation's military corps.
During the recent Iraq debacle over 2.5 million have served. Of those, more than a third were deployed more than once, so you may need to multiply that by about 3 to get a more accurate body count of those who have served (7.5 million).
"When I say 2.5 million people have served in Iraq and Afghanistan, jaws drop," said Paul Rieckhoff, the chief executive officer of the advocacy group Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. "I know which lines are going to get gasps, and that's one of them. I don't think they appreciate how many people have served, and particularly the number who have had repeated deployments. You've had an unprecedented demand on a small population. The general public has been incredibly isolated from those who served."
In fact, as of last year nearly 37,000 Americans had been deployed more than five times, among them 10,000 members of guard or Reserve units. Records also show that 400,000 service members have done three or more deployments.
This is what happens when your commander-in-chief is born with several sets of silver spoons, has skirted his military service, and has personally tasted few of the difficulties the masses and governments in the world face daily.
That is why we need to voluntarily field 21 million over 27 years via People's Lobby's American World Service Corps National Service (AWSCNS) Congressional Proposal through service organizations that have already proven themselves such as:
That is why we should ask (and test) the super-rich to voluntarily fund the ASWCNS by annually donating less than .006% of their wealth to build, do good, and spread good will at home and abroad.
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