Letters

Is Iraq a Futile Fight?
The report on the U.S. military's frustrating struggle in Iraq sparked comment from some readers who oppose the war, while others felt that questioning U.S. actions only gives comfort to the enemy

I was delighted to see a major American magazine giving readers the truth about the war in Iraq [Sept. 26]. You labeled Joe Klein's report as the "secret history" of U.S. mistakes and misjudgments in failing to thwart the Iraqi insurgency at its start. I contend that the situation was in no way secret. Non-Americans knew even before the war began that if the U.N. didn't run the postwar occupation, a disaster was inevitable. The U.S. is the dinosaur of modern conflict—all brute force with a peanut-size brain, completely outdated in a world where credibility comes first.
Sam Smith
Oxford, England

It is too late to win the war in Iraq only if you believe it is already lost or you want the U.S. to lose. People have failed to learn the lesson the insurgents grasped early on: It ain't over till it's over.
Douglas Young
Los Angeles

War is a tragic part of the human condition but is sometimes necessary to combat such evils as slavery, fascism and, yes, terrorism. The Iraq war, however, will achieve no noble purpose. There were no weapons of mass destruction, and democracy will exist in Iraq for about as long as U.S. troops are there. Many more Saddams are waiting to rise to the top in Iraq. We were naive to think we could easily paste a veneer of Jeffersonian democracy on a land where tribal allegiances date back centuries. By almost any measure, this war is unnecessary and a tragic blunder. Yet to withdraw our troops now would compound the mistake we made in deciding to invade and would leave an unstable and volatile nation to fend for itself. So what should Americans do? We should support our troops until some sort of muddled conclusion allows at least a partial withdrawal.
Ken Reich
San Rafael, California, U.S.

Over the years, hundreds of thousands of Americans have given their lives defending freedom. The relative sacrifice in Iraq is insignificant compared with what inaction would cost us. I do not like war and wish the need for it would end, but headlines like "Is It Too Late to Win This War?" illustrate that TIME has no idea what this enemy is like. Nor do you understand that the insurgents will not negotiate or play by the rules. They will not give up until they are defeated. I hope the President will use his bully pulpit to put that in perspective for the uninformed who think that the U.S. has made a mistake and that the war against terrorism is a video game you can wind up before dinner.
William H. Files
Evansville, Indiana, U.S.

The U.S.'s difficulties in Iraq were entirely predictable and show that military forces are ill suited for social work or political projects. An army is a blunt instrument. Its function is to destroy an enemy. Unless the U.S. intends to do just that, we should keep our soldiers at home.
Michael Smith
Cynthiana, Kentucky, U.S.

We lost the Iraq war long ago. George W. Bush had no idea what he was getting us into. Now we all know that bluster and posturing don't win a conflict. If we can't stabilize Iraq, how can that country's ragtag police ever do so? Maybe peace would come if our occupation forces left.
Gary Wilson
North East, Maryland, U.S.

I was opposed to the war in the beginning, but now I feel we must play this hand out to an acceptable end.
Steve Cosner
Troy, Ohio, U.S.

The financial cost of the Iraq war is driving the U.S. ever further into debt. The war looks as if it can't be won. The only course is to get out. If you can't finance a war, then you shouldn't be fighting one.
Marvin Shane
Winnipeg, Canada

You asked whether the U.S. can win the war in Iraq, but a more apt question would be, "Since the U.S. is losing the war, what can it do?" The White House naively assumes that all countries are fertile ground for democracy. The layers of tribal fabric that make up Iraq are too complex for Western leaders to handle. Once American troops leave—as they eventually must—the only alternative to a tribal war in Iraq would be the installation of a strongman, a surrogate for Saddam Hussein on a short leash. With an autocratic leader in place, in six months there would be social order in Iraq good enough to protect U.S. oil interests, which is what the war is all about.
Chris Keating
Quebec City, Canada

The debacle in Iraq was wholly predictable, given the history of the British occupation there in the 1920s and the U.S. disaster in Vietnam. Moreover, it is bad military doctrine to fight the inevitable guerrilla war without an integrated hearts-and-minds operation. What I'm saying isn't hindsight; many of us have known from the start that the Iraq war was insane.
J. Stephen Cridland
Cape Town

I am amazed that Americans don't seem to realize the gravity of the situation in Iraq. Why is the U.S. sacrificing its soldiers? The oil in Iraq is not worth it. There is no easy outcome to this war. U.S. opponents from around the world have a golden opportunity to challenge America in Iraq. U.S. troops must contend with combat conditions, unfamiliar terrain and hot weather, along with hatred from all corners of the Middle East. The sooner the war comes to an end, the better it will be for U.S. prestige. The Iraqi opposition forces are willing to sacrifice themselves to defend their country. But what are American soldiers sacrificing themselves for?
Zeeshan Ahmad Lahore, Pakistan

A Flood of Money
TIME's reporting on President Bush's slow and clumsy response to the Hurricane Katrina disaster stated that part of Bush's strategy for regaining the American public's confidence is to "Spend freely, and worry about the tab and the consequences later" [Sept. 19]. Average Americans, even though they are suffering enough with rising energy and food costs, loss of jobs and lack of affordable health care, have rallied to help those who are recovering from the hurricane crisis. I am curious to know what our President, representatives and wealthier citizens have personally contributed. Recovery should not be paid for by cutting funds for health care and other vital federal programs, as some have proposed. While helping the hurricane victims, we still need to maintain spending on research, education, environment, medical care and energy alternatives.
Alison Ozer
Amherst, Massachusetts, U.S.

Make no mistake about it: Hurricane Katrina didn't destroy New Orleans; the breaches in the levees did. Maybe it's time the U.S. government spent its money on what is broken in our country rather than trying to fix things in other nations.
Nancy H. Babendir
Skokie, Illinois, U.S.

The federal government cannot afford to foot the entire bill for reconstruction and relocation projects related to disaster relief. I propose that all federal funding for the war in Iraq be diverted to the hurricane-recovery effort. Then the money needed to pay for the war would come from members of the Bush Administration, Congress, private citizens and corporations who supported (and in many cases profited from) the invasion of Iraq. Paying for the continuing occupation of Iraq with private funds would allow the hawks to support a cause they believe in and at the same time free up more federal money for the victims of natural disasters—a cause that many more Americans support.
David W. McCreery
Salem, Oregon, U.S.

Perhaps Americans are by now waking up to the humbling fact that the world has only one superpower: the climate.
Barry Weightman
Port Vila, Vanuatu

Building homes in an area below sea level, on a floodplain, near an earthquake zone or in a mudslide area is stupid. Billions of taxpayer dollars should not be spent to rebuild New Orleans in its present location. Disasters like hurricanes Katrina and Rita will happen again and again!
Jerry Mazenko
Garden Grove, California, U.S.

Your Katrina photo-essay "Ghost Town" [Sept. 19] featured a reprehensible picture of a lifeless body floating facedown in the contaminated muck of New Orleans. That was disrespectful to the dead and their families. You may have intended to show readers the horrors of the aftermath of Katrina, but it was shock journalism.
Michael Yonker
Portland, Oregon, U.S.

Vulnerable Borders
In "Syria Gets the Cold Shoulder" [Sept. 26], TIME reported that most world leaders were unwilling to meet with Syrian President Bashar Assad at the U.N. World Summit and that President Bush blames Syria for not doing enough to stop terrorists from entering Iraq. Does no one in the Bush Administration find it ironic that it is criticizing a developing country for its inability to guard its border with Iraq while the U.S. has been unable to secure its own border with Mexico? Why should Syria, which opposed the war, put all its efforts toward securing a border that is being used as a passageway into Iraq for insurgents? We should strengthen our own borders before we bully other nations.
Gabriel E. Sarah
Tucson, Arizona, U.S.

Germany's Opportunity
Surely the outcome of the elections in Germany provides a golden opportunity for the two largest parties to form a grand coalition [Oct. 3]. They can work to institute urgently needed economic reforms without taking exclusive blame for the temporary pain they will cause. The two parties could each appoint an equal number of experts to an economic panel that decides what the most suitable reforms are.
Tony Pupkewitz
Johannesburg

A Big, Warm Blob
Our Appreciation of film director Robert Wise [MILESTONES, Sept. 26] referred in a rather disparaging manner to The Sound of Music, for which Wise won an Oscar for best direction. TIME's somewhat negative cinematic view was first voiced 40 years ago when the movie version of the 1959 Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein Broadway musical comedy opened. Here is an excerpt from that critique [March 5, 1965]:

"Though Director Robert Wise (West Side Story) has made capital of the show's virtues, he can do little to disguise its faults. In dialogue, song and story, Music still contains too much sugar, too little spice ... [The film's] gemütlich heart tugs make a Lehar operetta seem grimly realistic by comparison. Viewers who want a movie to swell around them in big, warm blobs will find Sound of Music easy to take. Sterner types may resist at the outset but are apt to loosen up after a buoyant, heels-in-the-air song or two by Julie Andrews. Seconding her perky triumph as Mary Poppins, Julie turns every number into a bell ringer and gives the comedy its zestiest scene when she punctures her employer's vincible mettle with a few white-hot verbal thrusts."