Re: A Tragedy - 2 more Soldiers Killed
One of the worst things a leader with such responsibility can do is to become too emotionally involved.<br />Great, now some of you may be pissed off, and think its cold.<br />It is. The world is. If you don't think you could ever understand, perhaps you should REALLY look at at the world a bit more, not through colored glasses.<br />Some of the worst decisions ever made by those with great responsibility were macro/large scale decisions influenced by the emotional effects of in the trench pictures, ceremonies, etc. How about you do a little reading on such events/people as Trieste, Chamberlain, Sun-Tzu, the Ssu-Ma, Battle of the Bulge, FDR/Manhattan Project, "Hamburger Hill", Normandy, and even Lebanon in the 1980s, just to name a few of many excellent examples. Many more HUMANS perished than necessary based on off-the-cuff decisions derived from emotional micro-effects in the above circumstances (and many more). Another very recent example of this was President Clinton's staff intentionally shielding the President from the details of atrocities in Rwanda, so we would not get involved in that morass on emotional grounds. His staff failed him in that regard in Somalia, where we got involved and you had the "Blackhawk Down" incident." President Clinton's emotional response (bodies dragged through the street in gruesome detail) from the "Blackhawk Down" incident subsequentally resulted in our immediate withdrawal from Somalia. Upon this, it can be construed, the terrorists (particularly UBL/AQ which was directly involved in Somalia) came to a reasonable conclusion that we did not have the "stomach" for a fight, and that the US could be brought down by terrorism....and 9/11. <br />The President knows damn well that people have and will continue to die, that he is directly responsible, and that their is a tough job that must be done. Though he cannot remain out of touch, he must not allow himself to make off-the-cuff decisions based on individual tragedy but rather keep focused on the big picture of what must be done to save many, many, many more lives from oppression, torture, mass murder, and loss of freedom.
