Yikes

As tempting as it is as Americans to ball up and try to play a lesser role in world events, and especially the middle east because, well Iraq is messy...it worth thinking about what the region is like with or without us.

When we left Beirut in 1983 in response to the Marine barracks being suicide bombed, the reason given was that it was too messy. Sectarian violence in Lebannon made us appear to be on one side, and hence the enemies of other sects in the region. This logic was correct. (And kinda, sorta applies to Iraq today) But there was a long term downside to this choice. It emboldened Hezbollah and other, like minded terrorist organizations who hypothesized that if hit, the US won't hit back, and will curl up into isolation, because well, Americans don't like dying. And they ARE right. We don't like dying. And they've used this fear of death against us, as a tactic to get our of "their" region. Which actually means, allowing them terrorize small segments of the region into backwards, militaristic war zones. See Southern Lebanon, Gaza, Afghanistan.

In hindsight, what if we massively retaliated against Hezbollah? Would Al Queda have ever developed? Would any organization dared attack us, knowing full well that if they did, we would do everything in our power to completely dismantle it. In the cold war, this deterence theory worked - Russia would never attack us knowing that we would annihilate them in response. And vice versa. Would an organization, even one who feels as if they are on a noble mission from god, attack the US knowing that in doing so, their organization would be eliminated? I don't think so.

I mean, what if we went all out against Al Queda after the 1998 Embassy bombings? I'm talking troops and everything? Would that have prevented 9/11 and hence Iraq?

And so the question is, is our response both to 9/11 and Iraq preventing larger attacks to come, attacks that would really disrupt our way of life?