To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, "It's our way or the highway."
Isn't that really why we're in Iraq? We wanted Saddam and his people to be more like us - benevolent. And when they didn't change, we went over there to save them from themselves.
We're going to help them make $87 billion worth of economic and social changes - all for their own good - which, of course, will benefit us, too.
But how will history view our actions 400 years from now? Like we were the big bully who got a little too cocky in the end?
Remember the relationship between Spain and England in the 17th century?
Spain was the world's wealthiest country during that time, with an empire reaching from Germany to the Philippines. Spaniards thought it was their duty to Christianize, civilize and educate the rest of the world, especially England, which was full of infidels at the time. OK, they were really Protestants, but to Spain, they were infidels nonetheless.
England was a much poorer country than Spain and was ruled by a girl, Queen Elizabeth I. Spain's Phillip II felt threatened by the Protestants and their female leader. So he sought to change it all.
To Spain, England was a rogue state; to England, Spain personified the anti-Christ. Does any of this sound familiar?
In the largest naval and beach invasion of its time, Phillip II intended to occupy England and overthrow the queen. This should have proved easy since England practically had no military.
England had managed to anger Spain because Sir Francis Drake, a favorite of Queen Elizabeth's, was pirating gold and other riches from Spanish ships brought back from the New World. To Elizabeth and much of England, Drake embodied the true (Protestant) God's hand of vengeance against the bullying Spanish empire.
But in spite of all Spain's military might and economic muscle, the Spanish armada was destroyed by a combination of bad weather and English ships that proved to be the cruise missiles of their day.
So Phillip II's attempt to rid the world of English terrorists failed, and they eventually created their own empire.
England began dominating the seas, and the Spanish had to be content with dominating the flamenco market.
I'm just wondering how successful we'll be at ridding the world of terrorists. What will our descendants think when they look back on our actions in Iraq? Will we face a similar fate as the Spanish? We've proved we can bomb the heck out of cities and towns, but our death toll is rising in Iraq after another helicopter was shot down near Tikrit last week.
Time will be the ultimate judge of our actions.
Catherine Portillo is a journalism senior. Reach her at catherine.portillo@asu.edu.
