My friends,

What follows below is a note from an Air Force reservist to the squadron
 mates he is leaving behind. His words are inspiring to the squadron, and
to stateside Americans who seek the unvarnished truth.

As I head out to wrap-up my five month active reserve tour, I am sad to
notice a certain questioning about the direction of the War on Terrorism.
 So I have something to say to my fellow military members as I walk out
 the door, and it�s something I feel must be voiced. Please bear with me,
as this has been on my mind often in the last few weeks.

Every day we hear on the news about another bombing in Baghdad, or
about unrest on the Pakistani border to Afghanistan. Recently, another five
 soldiers were killed in Iraq and sectarian violence is threatening to rip the
country apart. And the question that keeps being asked is, �Can we win this?
� A simple question, but one that is entirely misguided. We�ve already won
 our fight in Iraq and Afghanistan. The only question left is �How far can we
take our victory?�

Never again will Al-Queda use Afghanistan to train and send terrorists to
attack our homeland. Women now hold elected positions in the country and
are going to school, homosexuals aren�t being killed by having walls collapsed
upon them, children can fly kites with their fathers in fields without being
beaten, people may now listen to music, adults vote in a representative
government, and the soccer fields are now used for games instead of mass
 executions.

Never again will Saddam Hussein use his once-large army to invade his
neighbors. The Kurds will not be gassed with WMDs, and have turned their
portion of the country into the safest part of Iraq. The two sons of Saddam,
Uday and Qusay, will never again patrol the streets of Baghdad looking for
women to abduct. The Hussein�s will never again oversee the dropping of
their enemies into human-sized shredders, nor will they ever house
international terrorists in their country as guests. Terrorists such as Abu
Nidal, who killed over 900 people in 20 countries and who was a guest living
in Iraq for nearly a decade. And al-Zarqawi, the Iraqi al-Queda leader who
fled to Iraq after our invasion of Afghanistan, obtained medical treatment
under direction of Uday, and is now taking the eternal dirtnap.

Sometimes it doesn�t seem like a victory, especially since al-Queda
appointed a new leader in Iraq to continue the war. But we know his name
and we know his face, and his time will also come. And as tiring as the
violence in the Middle East may be, we must acknowledge that we�ve moved
the forward edge of the battlefield from the skyline of downtown New York
City to the territory of the enemy. This may be our greatest victory.

So where do we go from here? How do we capitalize on our achievement of
removing two despotic regimes placed on the opposite end of the globe in the
course of several years? By giving the Afghan and Iraqi people their shot at r
epublican democracy. Note that I did not say by creating democracy in Iraq
and Afghanistan, because that can only be done by the citizens, and can never
be imposed. That is the moral strength of what we are trying to accomplish;
to come as saviors and not as an empire. It took our country eight years to win
 our own Revolutionary War, and four years later we had to create a new
constitution before we could make it work. The French Revolution took longer
than two decades, and failed, returning the country back into a monarchy.
The Afghans have had five years to attempt the same; the Iraqis three.

I�m not a predictor of the future. I�m not a seer. Maybe the nascent Afghan
and Iraqi governments will fall into chaos. Maybe the will of the people will be
 to slaughter one another, neighbor against neighbor, cousin against cousin. But
 for now our fellow brothers and sisters in uniform are performing amazing
feats everyday to give those citizens their one shot at achieving a way of life that
those regions have never known in all their existence. And should it fail- should
 chaos tear their countries apart- there will be people who will dream of a time
 when their voices were represented by those who governed, and a time when a
statue of a tyrant was pulled down and people came from the voting booths
while raising purple-stained hands in pride. And maybe those memories will
 allow for the next generation to step forward when their forebears did not.

But if they do succeed now? Then the band of authoritarian countries that wrap
around the world from Morocco to Indonesia will have been sliced, and many of
the world�s tyrants will sleep uneasily in fear for the rights that their own people
will demand. For this I pray.

As for me, I have nothing but pride in what my country has done, and for what it
 is attempting to do during these chaotic times. Instead of sitting back, we are
 attempting to change the world for the better, and are making the conscious
 decision to try to actively engage the world instead of the passive, depressed
manner of other nations. Whether we succeed in establishing democracy in the
region or if we fail, we entered with the righteous intention of keeping our
civilians safe, and the enlightened hope of freeing people locked in servitude to
the vicious and brutal elements in their midst. When my daughter grows up,
in whatever uncertain state the world will be in, I know I can look her in the
 eyes and say that I was there during the initial chaotic years of the new
millennia, and that I fought to leave the world a better place than I had found
it. For this opportunity that my country has given me, and for the honor to
serve alongside the greatest military servicemen in the world, I will always be
 proud.

Related

Hamas’ Must-See TV By Cliff May

Hamas may not have funds to pay the salaries of civil servants and improve
 social services for Palestinians. But resources to fund its propaganda efforts?
That, evidently, is not a problem. This month, the terrorist organization that
governs Gaza and the West Bank launched a satellite television station.

The new station will be broadcast by Arabsat, majority-owned by the Saudi
government. Arabsat, along with Nilesat, owned by the Egyptian government,
 already distribute the programming of Al Manar, the television station of
Hezbollah.

Hamas, Hezbollah and Al Manar have all been officially designated by the U.S.
 government as terrorist entities. Meanwhile, the Saudi government runs
commercials in the U.S. claiming to be America’s �ally� in the War on
Terrorism. And the Egyptian government presents itself as our moderate
Arab friend � in exchange for billions of dollars in American aid.

FROM:  http://www.theabsurdreport.com/2006/the-unvarnished
-truth-from-the-mid-east/