If you’re like me, and haven’t managed to arrive at a definitive stance on the rush to invade Iraq, Jeanne d’Arc offers some solace – she hasn’t been too fired up on joining the debate, either. Well, I’m glad to hear someone else say it: there are questions & doubts & any number of head-spinning rebuttals to ponder.
Jeanne ultimately comes out in the ‘Anti’ camp, but explains well why some of us might not choose to jump right into that debate, at least not publicly: the tenor of the debate is rarely helpful in getting to the heart of the matter.
I particularly like this passage:
That’s the nature of debate, I suppose. My evidence against your evidence. My ad hominem beats your post hoc. And yet somehow, at the moment, all that flying, banging, whizzing evidence (and lack of it) feels oddly irrelevant.
Well said, Jeanne.
As for me, I am still on the fence. I try to look at it all with an eye to history, if I can (a week or so ago I was pondering whether this situation was more similar to ‘pre-WW2′ or ‘pre-Vietnam’), and keep clear of knee-jerk reactions.
I also look at it all with a general tendency towards pacifism – a bit of the Buddhist notion of non-violence, non-aggression, but with an understanding that self-defense is morally right. As that applies to recent history & war: I would have supported military action in WW2, but not Viet Nam.
As that applies to the ‘personal’: I couldn’t kill anyone with my bare hands, but should the need arise I would knee a rapist in the balls with nary a blink. I don’t think I could gouge his eyes out – but I’d kick him in the back of the head a few times once he’s down from the hit to the groin. Then I’d run for help. I don’t want to kill him or cause brain damage – but I want him down, so I can get away; ideally, I’d want him to stay down until the cops arrive. See? Self-defense.
And, yes, I’m rambling again – be nice. I use this blog to think out loud – if you want an organized essay, visit one of the fine bloggers on the right. [Like skippy the bush kangaroo, Armed Liberal, Jeff Cooper, or Ann Salisbury (hee! free plugs for everyone!).]
So I end up going back and forth on Iraq – I can’t quite bring myself to support military action, but I don’t count it out, if there’s a justifiable reason for it. Particularly with my current readings on the rise of Hitler and Nazi Germany.
I do not like the approach the Bush Administration has taken in trying to convince us (and the rest of the world) of the need to attack Iraq. They haven’t given sufficient proof of an urgent threat to us that requires immediate military action – which allows a so-called ‘preemptive’ action to be interpreted, instead, as American Aggression against a weaker nation. ‘Preemptive’ implies a viable, imminent threat on the horizon – imminent being the operative word; so far, the ‘threat’ Bush warns us of is too vague to make an all-out land war reasonable. The ‘threat’ from Iraq seems no worse than the threat from Pakistan or India (both of which actually have The Bomb).
But the comparisons of Saddam to Hitler pre-WW2 are not lost on me – reading up on the Nazi Regime recently, I realize they are more apt than I ever imagined back during the Gulf War. However, those (Saddam-Hitler, Iraq-Germany) parallels, though more convincing to me now than they were a decade ago, are not in the forefront of the Administration’s argument, which reduces them merely to interesting observations, not considerations for invasion of Iraq. As it is, I get the impression the administration is aware of a threat they aren’t sharing with the rest of us – but if they want the people’s full support, they must disclose any real & viable threats to us. If the Pro-War crowd wants to use the Hitler analogy (and many do), use the lessons of history to tell us just how it is that Saddam is a threat to our future security (and the security of our allies) – that would also be a very effective way to put the UN’s responses (and lack thereof) in context. Remember, the League of Nations also sanctioned Hitler – to no avail.
Why do it now? That’s another question that’s eating at me. Short of an imminent threat to our security, the only other morally justified reason to take military action is humanitarian one. Action in Bosnia & Afghanistan both had the sheen of moral rightness to them. Where is the humanitarian argument for Iraq? ‘He gassed his own people’, we say. Well, yes – but we knew that 10 years ago. We didn’t play the humanitarian card in ‘91 – why is the need so urgent now? Well, if it was urgent then, it’s SUPER-URGENT now, right? Right?
Well, maybe not – as far as I can see, the call for ‘liberating the Iraqi people’ (as an argument in favor of war) is still at a low volume among the Administration. It’s something that’s thrown out, reservedly, in a long list of arguments that don’t seem to have the full support of the people offering them. By that, I mean the list of Iraqi atrocities that seems to be the basis of the ‘moral imperative’ to topple Saddam have been floating around for over a decade, with no one in much of a rush to deal with them. Why now? The sudden urge, so long on the back burner, is suspect.
So, again, I’m left with the impression that there’s a ‘real reason’ out there driving the push to war in Iraq (I am not so conspiracy-minded as some – I won’t scream about ‘blood for oil’, as I don’t think Iraq’s oilfields are a primary motivator), because our security does not truly appear to be threatened by Iraq, and the Administration doesn’t seem to consider the liberation of the Iraqi people to be a prime motivator for military action.
So, is there a justifiable, moral reason for attacking Iraq … right now? Right now, as opposed to 5 years ago, 2 years ago, or next year? What does Bush know that you and I don’t?
UPDATE: The charming and talented Martin Devon comments: If Saddam with an atomic bomb doesn’t seem like reason enough to take action, I don’t think I’ll be able to “talk you off the fence.” To which I say: Saddam with the bomb IS enough to take action. That’s one of the things weighing on my mind. But he doesn’t have it … or does he? See, that’s the crux of it – no data.
Which leads me to this question: Is that the bottom line? No nukes … for certain dictators, that is? Nerve gas is okay. Mustard gas is okay. But nukes, uh-uh. But in Pakistan, we’ll let it slide? We, as a nation, need to be clear on what the standard is for making war.
Personally, I’m not comfortable with anyone having The Bomb, but we’ve got it, our allies have got it, and nations in some of the most unstable areas of the world have it. What’s the rule on this? We can have it, Britain can have it, France can have it, Israel can have it, India can have it, Pakistan can have it … but Iraq better not even think about it. OK, fine (hey, I know Saddam can’t have The Bomb, sheesh) – but an arbitrary standard gets to be rather difficult to enforce over the long-term … no one knows what the standard actually is.
