The Endless War

Via DJ Adequate at Kos, a fascinating exchange in Tuesday's Senate Foreign Relations Committee testimony from the Secretary of State:

CHAFEE: So would you agree that if anything were to occur on Syrian or Iranian soil, you would have to return to Congress to get that authorization?

RICE: Senator, I don't want to try and circumscribe presidential war powers. And I think you'll understand fully that the president retains those powers in the war on terrorism and in the war on Iraq. ...

CHAFEE: So that's a no.

RICE: Senator, I am not going to be in the position of circumscribing the president's powers.

These bastards still think they have a blank check to bloody the nose of anyone they see fit. We've already heard about infiltrations into Syria to stop the flow of foreign fighters into Iraq. Rice is suggesting something altogether different: that war with Syria could be embarked upon with no further action from the President consulting with Congress. She also said this to Christopher Dodd (D-CT):

RICE: Senator, our policy toward Syria is on the table. And that is, we want a change in Syrian behavior. We want a change in Syrian behavior on the Iraqi border…

This is very big and very quiet. The neocons are going on their merry way and expanding the combat zone to project American might with an even bigger footprint. Though this seems like a radical new strategy of endless war, those of us who remember our history classes know that we've seen this movie before:

On April 29, 1970, South Vietnamese and United States units unleashed a multi-pronged offensive into Cambodia to destroy the Central Office for South Vietnam (COSVN), the headquarters for North Vietnamese and Viet Cong combat operations in South Vietnam. Extensive logistical installations and large amounts of supplies were found and destroyed, but as reporting from the United States MACV subsequently disclosed, still larger amounts of material already had been moved deeper into Cambodia.

The North Vietnamese army turned on the republican government forces, and by June 1970, three months after the coup, they and the CPNLAF had swept FANK from the entire northeastern third of the country. After defeating the government forces, they turned newly won territories over to the local insurgents. The Khmer Rouge also established "liberated areas" in the south and the southwestern parts of the country, where they operated independently of the Vietnamese. The KCP's debt to the North Vietnamese after March 1970 was one that Pol Pot was loath to acknowledge; however, it is clear that without North Vietnamese and Viet Cong assistance, the revolutionary struggle would have dragged on much longer than it did.

United States bombing of enemy troop dispositions in Cambodia - particularly in the summer of 1973, when intense aerial bombardment (known as Arclight) was used to halt a Khmer Rouge assault on Phnom Penh - bought time for the Lon Nol government, but did not stem the momentum of the communist forces. United States official documents give a figure of 79,959 sorties by B-52 and F-111 aircraft over the country, during which a total of 539,129 tons of ordnance were dropped, about 350 percent of the tonnage (153,000 tons) dropped on Japan during World War II. Many of the bombs that fell in Cambodia struck relatively uninhabited mountain or forest regions; however, as declassified United States Air Force maps show, others fell over some of the most densely inhabited areas of the country, such as Siemreab Province, Kampong Chhnang Province, and the countryside around Phnom Penh. Deaths from the bombing are extremely difficult to estimate, and figures range from a low of 30,000 to a high of 500,000. Whatever the real extent of the casualties, the Arclight missions over Cambodia, which were halted in August 15, 1973, by the United States Congress, delivered shattering blows to the structure of life in many of the country's villages, and, according to some critics, drove the Cambodian people into the arms of the Khmer Rouge.

And we all know how well that turned out. Hey Syria, rent "The Killing Fields."

Many believe that the armed forces are simply stretched too thin to take on another war anywhere in the world. But a neighbor to Iraq means that the bases can stay put, no infrastructure need be built or moved, and the war simply widens. I'm sure we'll start to hear "We're fighting them over there in Syria so we don't have to fight them in Iraq," too. At any rate, get used to learning about Bashar Assad, Damascus, and the Baath Party (all over again).