\"A War like no other\"; by Victor Davis Hanson

[PMBardunias]

I'm afraid it is possible to put forward a point of view that "Isolationism" has only ever been a sop to those in the U.S. opposed to aggressive expansionism

The "isolation" was from the european powers and their many entanglements. Isolationism is not anti-war, in fact the whole point was to isolate us from the europeans in order to facilitate our "manifest destiny" to conquer and rule our side of the globe. In this we were much like the faction of Spartans that wished to be left alone to govern the Lakonia and Messenia and be the "first state" to the rest of Greece.

These operations were planned to secure valuable petroleum resources by establishng military dominance in the region while at the same time aiding key regional ally Israel.

I'm less jaded, or more naive, than Fred, but I believe the situation was a bit more subtle. It was not on Israel's behalf that we went to war, though they surely might have had a goal of ousting Saddam, but in support of the Saudi Royals. Those who attacked us clearly stated their primary grievance was with our military acting as "mercenary" guards for the Saudis since the first Gulf War. In fact so many of the terrorists were themselves Saudis that there is a character of civil war to the strike. Securing oil was of course the ultimate goal, places, like Ruwanda, that don't have needed oil, don't warrant our attention it seems. It is the Saudi-Iranian struggle that we are in the middle of.

In this I am reminded of the struggle between Corcyra and Corinth and how Sparta became embroiled in what was a colony/parent struggle. But the true conflict was between Corinth and Athens who like the Saudis and Iran battled for control of resources. Sparta in order to keep her position as number one Greek polis had to intervene on behalf of it ally.