Against All Enemies
I finished Richard Clarke's book Against All Enemies today and am glad I read it. Maybe it is because I thought a year ago when the war in Iraq started that we should have been going after Bin Laden with the ferocity we attacked Saddam Hussein. No one doubts the world is better off with Saddam deposed, but that is not the issue. If knocking off despots was the issue why not do the same in North Korea, Sudan, and Zimbabwe, to mention a few candidates. We blew the chance we had to get Bin Laden when the world would have cared less, and would certainly have understood and might even have applauded. Clarke's book is critical of the Clinton and Bush administrations, but it is not an anti-Bush polemic purely for political reasons. I accept Clarke's argument that when the new administration arrived at the White House in January 2001 they wanted nothing to do with any ideas or programs left on the table by the Clinton administration. Every administration wants to invent a new wheel. We can only speculate whether things might have been different.
#170 (04-19)
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