So having to deal with two superpower invasions and 30 years of civil war makes people into savages, does it? It seems a dubious barometer, if we were being honest about the situation. But of course that line of argument would imply that anyone who suffers being on the receiving end of someone else's never-ending war would be a savage by default. I'm not so sure white people would like where that argument could go in a hurry.

My argument is also not so much 'let them live in savagery and medieval backwardness' as 'Well, if there is a cure to this, we can't it, so let's cut our losses and let things go to Hell. We did it once, we can do it again. And next time they bushwhack us, we just assassinate people with Hellfire missiles instead of repeating the cycle a third time.'