Editor,

This is an open letter to President Obama. Thank you for bringing to an end to a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan, but please do not repeat the errors of the past by once again bombing Iraq or committing the United States militarily in Iraq. To do so would involve our country in what is a sectarian civil war. Dropping bombs in Iraq will inevitably result in civilian casualties and hatred directed toward the United States, making us less secure, not more secure.

This situation is similar to Vietnam. In that conflict, as you are well aware, the U.S. interjected itself militarily into an anti-colonial civil war. In Vietnam, the U.S. was temporarily able help keep in power a corrupt military dictatorship that had failed to connect with the people. Soon after our military intervention ended, the South fell to the North with the Army of Vietnam unwilling to fight. Sound familiar?

To again intervene in Iraq fits a definition of insanity. “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” (Albert Einstein)

Top-down military action does not remove injustices and lead to an open pluralistic society or create a working democracy.

Successful democratic changes in recent history have come from faith-based nonviolent uprisings: Indian Independence (Gandhi), Southern Black Freedom Movement, Solidarity Movement in Poland, destruction of apartheid in South Africa, removal of the Marcos dictatorship in the Philippines, South Korean Democracy Movement and the list goes on.

We have the largest hammer, but please resist the temptation to look for nails to pound. Please stand up to the military, media and those members of Congress who can only think of pounding nails. When will they ever learn?

DICK HALL

St. Augustine’s Episcopal Peace Fellowship