"We're going to bomb you back into the stone age"

A couple days after September 11th, 2001 the United States was gearing up to retaliate against someone; they just weren't sure what country would bear the brunt of our anger. Covering all their bases the then Assistant Secretary of State Richard Armitage sent a message to the intelligence director of Pakistan and said "Be prepared to be bombed. Be prepared to go back to the Stone Age."

The CBS news magazine "60 Minutes" is going to air an interview with Gen. Musharraf on Sunday that will give an inside look at the scare tactics that the US uses against heads of state to get them to cooperate on the War on Terror.

The idea that you could bomb someone back to the stone age first came up during the Vietnam war when American forces dropped more explosives on the North Vietnamese than were used in all of World War II. After a decade of combat and over 50,000 US dead, Vietnam remained firmly in the modern age and American forces pulled out.

While the very few if any bombs have fallen on Pakistan since September 11th, the United States has expended record amounts of precision armament on Iraq and Afghanistan. To date no one has stopped Bin Laden and Iraq is looking more like Vietnam every day. Maybe the United States should change its tactics.

(Photo: Scott Carney, minutes after the 2nd tower fell)