"We're fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them over here."
Insanity. Absolute insanity--on multiple levels. But they keep using it. Right wing pundits keep throwing that crap out there and it filters down to the average, unthinking GOP supporter, who then offers it into regular conversation. Last week on C-Span I heard a Republican caller offer his version of the "flypaper theory" as the reason we need to stay in Iraq. Here then is my attempt to hopefully end this talking point once and for all. Here are the responses that we need to get out into the mainstream so everyone knows how lame and immoral this whole idea is.
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I. There is no finite number of terrorists
The idea that "fighting them over there" will result in victory over terrorists presupposes that they exist in limited numbers that can be completely eradicated. This is a ridiculous argument for two reasons.
First, "terrorists" can never be described as a limited number. Because a terrorist is defined simply as someone who will engage in acts of terrorism as a combat tactic, as long as people are desperate enough to try to make their point through random acts of violence, there will be terrorist acts and those who carry them out. Remember, Timothy McVeigh was a terrorist; the IRA employed terrorist tactics. Just because these people weren't brown and Muslim, doesn't mean they weren't terrorists. People who engage in random acts of violence or destruction of property are terrorists by definition. Therefore, eliminating terrorism is a fools errand that can never be completed.
Second, even if we limit the definition of terrorist in this circumstance to the enemy we are currently fighting in Iraq, we still can't count on a limited number of enemy combatants (if you'll pardon the use of this term) because, as the recent NIE on Iraq just informed us (as if we didn't already know), the conflict in Iraq is causing an increase in the number of recruits to the insurgency and/or al Qaeda.
II. Who says they can't fight us over here, too
The "flypaper theory" also presupposes that al Qaeda lacks the ability to carry out attacks on multiple targets all around the world at the same time. This assumption was proven incorrect by the London subway attacks and by this report which shows that the number of terrorist attacks worldwide has spiked since the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
III. Even if it's correct, the flypaper theory is immoral
The analogy I heard the Republican-robot caller on C-Span use is that when he has a rat in his house, he sets a trap for the rat and then he captures and/or kills it. Lets correct his analogy for him. I have a rat in my house. Rather than set a trap for the rat, I throw a whole bunch of garbage into my neighbor's yard and house (or better yet, I pick a random house a few blocks away). Then, instead of setting traps, I take my cat and I throw him into the other yard with what should soon be dozens of rats scurrying around the house and in and among the garbage. That's not exactly a friendly thing to do to my neighbor, or to my cat. Not to mention the fact that it doesn't get the rat out of my house. But this is what our government has done to Iraq and our military.
Can we please stop this nonsense now?