I disagree strongly with your contention that i treat the consequences of war lightly, or concerning the motives for the war. I am opposed to retreating from Iraq because Americans have become war weary. Regardless of whether someone believes it was a bad idea to invade Iraq, in my opinion, it would be more irresponsible to just pull out than to stay and continue to work towards producing a stable nation. That also seems to be the position held by all of the major Democratic presidential candidates.
I am not blood thirsty, would prefer war to be the last resort. However, I do feel that 9/11 justified some stronger measure than had been adopted subsequent to the prior attacks by Al Qaeda. Most Americans supported the Afghanistan invasion, and we had more international support. With hindsight, perhaps we should have stopped there. Afghanistan showed that we would not just passively absorb terrorist attacks. Unfortunately, things seem to be going worse in Afghanistan, while they are improving in Iraq. At the end of the day, it is the local populaces that have to choose their sides. But we are no longer going to allow terrorists to hide among supportive populaces, and attack us, without reprisals.
