We (well, certain “progressives” among us, anyway) seem to forget how war was waged before we got sensitive about things like casualty counts. Reading Doonesbury this morning really infuriated me — “Sometimes our guys get hurt.” Well, no shit, Garry “Stupid Hat” Trudeau. In war, you either kick ass, or get your ass kicked. Middle grounds and indecision lead to Vietnam (oh, and you didn’t serve, did you?) and Mogadishu.
Another quote from Uncle Billy Sherman. This one is from a letter to Grant, trying to get permission to march through Georgia:
I propose that we break up the railroad from Chattanooga forward, and that we strike out with our wagons for Milledgeville, Millen, and Savannah. Until we can repopulate Georgia, it is useless for us to occupy it; but the utter destruction of its roads, houses, and people will cripple their military resources. . . . I can make this march, and make Georgia howl!
And later, after he had taken Savannah and was on the march north to Columbia, SC:
[W]hen he received a truce note from Wheeler, offering to quit burning cotton in the path of the invaders if they in turn would “discontinue burning houses,” he kept his answer brief and to the point. He was unwilling to waste time now in an argument over the propriety of gratuitous destruction. . . . In short, he declined to enter into any discussion of the matter, except to tell the rebel cavalryman: “I hope you will burn all cotton and save us the trouble. All you don’t burn I will.”
Shelby Foote, The Civil War: Vol. III, Red River to Appomattox, p. 789-790
This is what we do to our own people, Saddam. Just imagine what we might do to you.