Well, the Israelis called a cease fire with Lebanon on Monday, ending a month long conflict. Both sides quickly claimed victory. This reminded me of Desert Storm where Americans went into Iraq for a month and stopped just short of Baghdad and occupation. Although nothing was accomplished besides a little death & destruction, both sides claimed victory. This has led me to believe that brief wars allow for both sides to claim victory, making everyone is happy.

Now, let's look at Iraq, the sequel. Americans have occupied the country for four years now, they have installed a democratically elected government (a touch of irony in that phrase), & violence has escalated to over 100 IRAQIS DEAD PER DAY. This is not civil war. This is just unfortunate. America will not admit defeat. Think about the Vietnam War, where the United States occupied Southern Vietnam for about a decade. Despite support of the democratically elected side of Vietnam, hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese died. When we left, nothing of significance was accomplished, but America did not admit defeat.

So let me get this straight. Short wars allow both sides to claim victory. Long wars means no one will admit defeat. There it is. Victory vs. Not Defeat.

Has there ever been a war that solved problems? People like to say World War II. We got rid of Hitler & demilitarized Japan. Hooray! We also formed Israel, split up Germany & created the Cold War between the USA & the Soviet Union. I'm not saying the world have been better with Hitler in charge, but we didn't really fix anything. We just redrew the lines in the sand. By the way, we were fighting in Korea less than five years later.

I much prefer my wars to happen in the movies or the football field, where we know who the good guys are. Should we root for humans or orcs? Not a hard decision. Raiders or Chiefs? It doesn't matter, but you can only root for one of them. Should we root for Israelis or Lebanese? That one's not so easy. Given my attention to Mideast conflicts in the last decade, the one thing I can say with complete conviction is that Arabs are anti-Semites & Israelis are assholes.

The Israelis claim that they bombed Southern Lebanon because two of their soldiers were kidnapped by Hezbollah. It was such a serious reason that they called the cease fire without ever getting those two soldiers back. Does anyone remember the patrol boat in the Gulf of Tonkin? Maybe not, but it escalated the Vietnam Conflict in a massive way. Remember WMDs? Of course not, because they didn't exist (but they could have).

A side note: For a group of people who died by the millions in Germany, you'd think two soldiers kidnapped wouldn't incite such a violent response in Jews. When American soldiers died in Somalia, we didn't start a war in Africa.

Then, there's the Arabs. Not just Lebanese, not just Hezbollah, not just Iran. All of them. Are there any positive role models in the freaking Arab world? All I see are oil rich fat cats funding terrorists, Muslim fanatics blowing themselves up, and weeping hooded women screaming to god to both praise his name and smite those who just killed their relatives. Jesus came from that region, didn't he? Where's our Messiah now?

Guess what, everybody? We have officially kicked off the 21st Century with a modern version of the crusades. I have heard very little brought up in the massive amount of news coverage about any comparison to the conflict today & the conflict of centuries ago. Maybe it's because no one can get an exclusive interview with King Arthur, and the Knights of the Round Table still claim that all the documents are classified. The Middle East may be the Holy Land to a lot of people and religions, but I'll take the stunning landscape of New Mexico any day before defending, occupying or attacking the blood-stained desert land by the Sea of Galilee.

Here is my point. I'm not on anyone's side. America has no business occupying Iraq. Terrorists and insurgents and religious sects have no business killing Iraqi civilians. Israel needs to throw a few more olive branches to their enemies. Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Hezbollah, Iran and all you fanatical Arabs need to understand THOSE JEWS ARE THERE TO STAY.

But Americans will stay the course, insurgents will put a jihad on you, Israelis will go after radical Muslim gangs on their own turf, and Arabs will claim that the Israeli turf does not exist.

I root for no one in this crusade. Just like with football, when you don't root for anyone, the whole game just seems barbaric and cruel.

Chris Jungle owns the Holy Grail & will live forever.