Today's Rant:
"Smell My Armpit", or "Karl Attacks Bush/Saddam/War Thingy"
Think on this:
Dad always said that opinions are like armpits: everybody's got one, but no one wants yours. Everybody is in the habit of sharing their opinions and views (which is a terrific thing... I'm not decrying it at all)
on the War in Iraq. So while everybody's flapping their elbows, I thought i'd take my turn flapping too.
Here's my stink:
War is bad. It's a failure of democracy, communication; and human trust morals, and dignity. War sucks. That said, there are situations where war is the only way out of a problem. Between different groups, war can be justified if one society no longer respects the human dignity of the other, and communication and agreement between them has failed so badly as to be practically impossible. The Revolutionary War of the United States, The War of 1812, and World War II, and (perhaps) the First Gulf War are examples of this.
Wars that were needlessly fought were the American Civil War, World War I, the Korean War, and the Vietnam Police Action (although i think the jury is still out on that one). These wars were fought for unclear unreal or stupid goals and over issues that should have been handled diplomatically.
The Second Gulf War Clearly Falls into the 'Needless' category. The list of the "Coalition of the Willing" is very thin in terms of states that have much mass in world affairs. Of those, only a few (America, United Kingdom, Spain, and Belgium) have militaries or economies capable of providing economic help to those who are fighting. Furthermore, there is a certain amount of evidence that they do not fully believe in the war, and were 'bullied' into the coalition. Another way to look at this is to say that while ~42 nations support war, there is another ~130 (depending on the definition of nation applied) or so that don't support it. That mean that less that 33% of the world supports the war, and is possibly strongly against it. This is not a democratic way of solving problems.
On the other hand, you have to look very hard to find someone who would call Saddam Hussein and his cronies "Good" or "Friendly" or "Servants of the People". The Iraqi regime clearly exists as the result of the blood of the Iraqi people. We have countless eyewitness reports of abduction, torture, and rape. Saddam's regime is composed of an evil substance: Fear. The regime has no respect for the natural rights of those and rules, and only understands actions that lengthen it lifetime. The people of Iraq need freedom, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which, in their current situation, they would be unable to wrench from Saddam's hands. Those conditions should justify a forceful outside intervention in Iraq by a coalition of free nations.... but it hasn't.
Instead, the justification for the war is a knee-jerk response to the backlash of 100 years of denial of areas of the world claimed by imperialism, then abandoned with little aid in terms of technology, money, food, and education. 9/11 was a sign that something is deeply wrong in the world. That sign was not, as our good president would have you believe, that evil men were conspiring to kill 'innocent' Americans, but that conditions in the world were so bad as to inspire others to such great jealousy of first world countries as to want to destroy them.
The fundamentalist terrorism we see is has it's roots in areas with appalling human conditions, where food is scarce, education low, and freedom nonexistent. The fundamentalists paint themselves and their followers much like a cult leader does: as humble people working for the good of God. However, for their followers life is probably not of humility, but of the best that can be attained with the resources available, which is very scant compared to that available in first world nations. These conditions also tend to attract corrupt governments that are easily payed off. This, in turn, caters well to people trying to hide and/or organize terror activities, as they can exist without worry or punishment.... just slip the local cop a few bucks and they're good for the next month.
The cure for terrorism should have been to instill a Democratic government in every nation of the world, a massive movement to cure basic disease and malnutrition, and create free and equal education for all. But, instead of sending the people with terrorist among them food and money with an "I love you" note attached, we sent them bombs with cute little messages like "If you can read this, you're one lucky Afgan" scrawled on bombs. This is not the way to make friends and win over enemies. The Bush doctrine, which seems to consist of destroying a countries government and then leaving without leaving another in place, and without aid to those you freed, is only asking for trouble. Furthermore, justifying killing lots of poor foreign people (even if they are Taliban/Al Queda) deemed evil just to save a few of your own people seems a little selfish.
Aside from doing a poor job of justifying their war, the coalition of the willing were also to quick to drop diplomacy. They argued that they had given the Iraqi regime 12 years to change. They failed to mention that they hadn't been bugging them about over the past 12 years as hard as they might. Through the Clinton Administration "Containment" seems to have been the name of the game. Only since JWB came into office, and had something relatively surprising and tragic happen (that he could use to try to win over a country that only 48% wanted him anyway) that anyone considered that containing problems only made the ferment. So, we had only been in a position to bug Iraq for about 18 months (ok, plus, say 3 years after the Gulf War before the inspectors left), and for a good portion of that, we were busy dealing with the Afghans.
With 9 months between first movement at the UN and A-day, I think it is safe to say that Bush did not give diplomacy a chance. The UN was making positive movement in removing things from iraq. Also, over time, as inspections went on (under pressure of a war for not cooperating, of course), hints and clues of activities would be stumbled upon, and the extent of the regimes violations would be exposed. This would have accomplished the United States proposed goals in the end.
There is also a small issue of what some of the coalition members stand to gain: more oil will lower prices and help a suffering US economy. At 1 million government dollars flowing into the US per Tomahawk missile, this will also help the economy. Both President Bush and Dick Cheney have stock in companies attached to weapons construction. If the situation caves in, and we have the entire middle east (save, perhaps, the smaller oil countries) we will have to fight in order to keep our SUVs moving. A draft generally does terrific things to unemployment numbers.... also, having a US friendly nation that's a democracy, with a powerful army (read: NOT Saudi Arabia... that's another problem) would be nice to have to help us throw our weight around as oil becomes more scarce over the next 20-50 years or so.
To Summarize:
Saddam is a bad man. He does not lead his people in a moral way, and thus should be gotten rid of. Bush is a bad man, and should not receive votes during the next election or receive complimentary snacks on Air Force One.
Bush could have been a good guy and been the savior of the enslaved nations. This war is wrong because it is being fought for the wrong reasons. Close, GW, but no cigar.
3/24/03