The Dangers of Triumphalism
The Battle for Baghdad is hardly over, but it’s pretty clear that the regime of Saddam Hussein is finished. That’s a welcome thing in itself, at least for those Iraqis who have suffered so much under the cruelty of a totalitarian socialist state, but the danger for Americans is that a wave of triumphalism will sweep the United States and feed the neoconservative agenda of building a world spanning empire through the expenditure of American blood and treasure. My friend Brian Doherty has penned a short plea against taking up the burden of empire.