�War is a matter of vital importance to the State; the province of life or death; the road to survival or ruin��
SunTzu, The Art of War
It all comes down to this: do you pull the trigger or not? When everything has been said, when all the arguments made, one must sit down and actively reason whether the US should wage war with the nation of Iraq.
It�s beyond Saddam Hussein. It�s beyond UN Resolution 1441. It�s beyond any allies the US may or may not have. The point that General Sun Tzu made all those centuries ago still resonates: war is serious and should not be conducted frivolously.
There are those amongst the body politic who demand increased arm inspections as a means to prevent war. There are those amongst the body politic who state that President Bush has not made the case for war, ergo it should not be waged. There are some in the body politic that claim that this is all about oil, and that President Bush, being a former oil executive, is only concerned about looting Iraq�s natural resources. Some of his more vociferous domestic opponents state that this is just a distraction for the administration�s failed attempts to get Osama Bin Ladin (OBL) and his executive henchmen. Some overseas claim that we are either being manipulated by Israel and the �Zionist lobby�, or engaged in the colonial aggregation often associated with the European empires of two centuries ago. Some even claim that this is all personal, just a blood feud between the Arab Saddam and WASP-y, patrician Bushes of Kennebunkeport.
To that I say: �hogwash.�
Saddam Hussein is a dangerous hoodlum who has fashioned Stalinist dictatorship that has its boot on the neck of the Iraqi people. He has started wars that killed millions. He has used poison gas on his own citizens. He actively subsidizes terrorism around the world.
No serious person can deny any of that. Indeed, that�s been the case for years. So why now? Why should America risk blood and treasure to dispose of a tin pot dictator?
It all comes back to Gen. Tzu: survival or ruin.
This war is really is about survival. Not oil. Not Israel. Not distraction. Not empire.
To understand why it�s not about those things, one simply has to look at arguments.
It�s about oil
Let�s say, for the sake of argument, that President Bush decreed tomorrow that all vehicles in the US must run on ethanol or bio-diesel. That we were never going to import any oil ever again. That we were going to start a crash course designed to end petroleum use in the US forever. Where would that leave us?
Saddam would still have lots of money. He would still have weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). He would still have a proclivity to use them. And he would still hate the US.
Even if we didn�t need the oil ever again, he would still want to kill every American reading this sentence. His motive or means will not go away even if we ran our economy on hay.
It�s about Israel
Israel has won every conventional war it has ever fought and can take care of itself. Everybody thinks they have their own nukes and would use them if they were ever attacked by anybody with a WMD. The Palestinian issue is resolving itself, with the Israeli Army attacking terrorist networks with tanks and midnight raids. Indeed, I have contended for years that if the Palestinians would simply change tactics � embrace Gandhi or Martin Luther King instead of Fidel Castro or Yassir Arafat � they would already have their state.
Israel is indeed an ally in the region. No one can deny that. However, they can account for themselves quite well on any field of battle. They don�t need us to fight their battles for them.
It�s just a distraction
The capture of Khalid Sheik Mohammed in Pakistan � Al Qaeda�s operations chief� utterly refutes this argument that President Bush is simply using Iraq to distract the American people for the incompetent job his administration is doing in capturing OBL and destroying his terrorist network. Having been on the FBI�s most wanted list for a decade, he has sponsored, organized and planned terrorist activity all over the world.
We got him. He�s squealing. His rank and file will be vacationing in Cuba at Guantanimo Bay soon enough.
Sorry. President Bush can walk and chew gum at the same time.
It�s about empire
Arguments can be made that American became an Imperial Power in the latter days of the 19th Century with the annexation of The Philippines and Cuba. Okay, fair enough. But they�re both independent now. The same is true for the territories we conquered in Europe and Asia during the World War (parts 1 and 2). Afghanistan is free. Kuwait is free. Panama is free. Kosovo is free. I contend that the Europeans who carp that our war with Iraq is about empire are simply projecting their sorry histories onto us.
No, Iraq will be a free and democratic state before you know it. And will have a destabilizing effect on all those mullahs and sheiks living within broadcast range.
After 9/11, the President�s critics � made up almost entirely of those who thought Al Gore should really be the president � wondered how the attack could have occurred. �How come nobody could connect the dots?�, so many passionately intoned. Hearings were demanded and held. Bureaucracies were dis- and re- assembled. The Taliban were overthrown. Al Qaeda was pursued. Things were going along swimmingly.
Then, President Bush started talking about the �axis of evil�. He mentioned Iraq by name. The critics pounced. The usual suspects chanted the usual homilies. The subject was changed at every opportunity.
They didn�t connect the dots.
They argued for more inspections. They argued that Bush was stupid. They banged their spoon on their high chairs when people criticized their criticisms. They charged �McCarthy-ism�.
But Sen. Joe McCarthy was right. There were Soviet spies in the State Department. Stalin's lackeys were in Hollywood. Sure, McCarthy's tactics were evil, falsely accusing some and insidiously implying guilt by association. But the core of his arguments were correct. The Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were guilty. So was Alger Hiss. The Soviets got the H-bomb given to them. All this has been verified through disclassified Soviet intelligence made public 10 years ago.
The usual suspects didn�t connect the dots then, either.
What 9/11 did for the Bush Administration is connect the dots. The policy of containing Saddam actually worked as long as he didn�t have a delivery vehicle for all those terrible weapons we know he has. He literally didn�t have a missile that could reach the US. That was his problem.
On 9/11, we realized that he didn�t have to develop a missile program. He could have all the missiles he wanted and book tickets for them online with a credit card.
That�s when the Bush Administration connected the last dot. His critics still have not.
This is serious. And it is about survival.
05 Mar 03 dpny
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