Stardate 20020830.0837

(On Screen): Zach Barbera sends this link to an editorial presenting the argument against attacking Iraq. Is this really the best that those opposing the war can come up with? In particular, as with most of the arguments against the war I've seen so far, it argues about the potential negative consequences which could take place if we fight this war, without considering the negative consequences if we choose not to fight it.

In that sense, it takes a moralistic rather than a practical view of the situation. If we actively do something which leads to evil, then we are culpable. If we are passive and evil takes place, it is someone else's fault. QED.

I'm not really too concerned with issues like sin, and punishment, and guilt. My concerns are rather more prosaic: I don't want Baltimore to be nuked. But perhaps that's because if we get attacked again, it won't be any consolation to those who die, or those who have to live with their loss, that we were sinless and took the moral high road.

Rothschild presents the case as a choice of two alternatives: go to war in Iraq, or stay home and be at peace. I see it as these two alternatives: go to war in Iraq, or stay home and wait for the war to come to us. There will be war; it's only a question of where it will be fought, and who will do the dying. Innocents will die, if for no other reason than because our enemies do not care about killing innocents. Our choice is not whether to spare innocents; it is to choose whether it will be our innocents who do the dying. All other things being equal, I'd prefer it wasn't.

That, too, is a simplistic argument, but it is at least closer to the reality of the situation than the one Rothschild presents, though you have to search rather deeply to actually find it, since his presentation is rather heavily larded with total irrelevancies. To wit:

This invasion would be unconstitutional.

It would be against international law.

It would violate the Christian doctrine of "just war."

It would further damage U.S. relations with its allies, relations that are already frayed by Bush's mindless unilateralism.

It would wreak havoc in the Muslim world, where there's plenty of havoc already.

It could shake the U.S. economy, which is trembling right now.

And most importantly, it could result in the deaths of thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of innocent people.

Worst case: It could end with the United States dropping a nuclear bomb on Baghdad.

That's quite a laundry list. Where to begin? (Ah, yes, at the top.)

The issue of constitutionality is a favorite of those opposing the war, but Rothschild takes it further than most. He argues that because there has not yet been any Congressional approval for an attack that we should never attack. Which is all well and good, but it seems as if this entire issue is rather too timely, since the general argument of when and how this nation should go to war is an important one but not specifically about this particular war. Ultimately, Rothschild is making a case against the terms of the War Powers Act, and technically speaking, it's possible for the President to have us in combat for up to 60 days before formally requiring approval from Congress.

Nonetheless, I agree that there should be Congressional approval, though it doesn't have to actually be a Real Live Declaration Of War. (That's never actually been required, though such bills have occasionally been passed by Congress.) I've argued that such a thing should happen quietly, and in fact I suspect it already has happened quietly. From the point of view of maintaining Constitutional balance, that suffices.

He invokes International Law, another favorite.

International law is quite clear: Country A cannot attack Country B unless Country B has already attacked Country A or is about to attack Country A. Iraq has not attacked the United States. And it's not about to. Saddam, as brutal as he is, loves to cling to power. He knows that attacking the United States would be suicidal.

Actually, under international law, Saddam Hussein may have a better case for attacking the United States today than Bush has for attacking Iraq, since Bush is threatening an imminent war against Iraq. But no one wants to hear that!

Unfortunately, this argument is also totally wrong, because imminent military attack is far from the only reason that such wars, big or small, take place. I suspect Rothschild probably objects to all the cases where such wars have been fought for other reasons, but that's beside the point. Ignoring his sensibilities and looking at the actual practice of war, imminent attack on self is far from the only acceptable justification. There are several others.

First, it is considered acceptable to go to war to defend an ally or to satisfy a treaty obligation to an ally. Second, it is considered acceptable to go to war against a nation which consistently and unrepentantly refuses to carry out its obligations under treaties it has signed. All diplomacy is backed by the threat of force, but that requires the willingness to apply force when all other means of persuasion have failed. Finally, "self defense" covers far more territory than simply the issue of "imminent attack".

But all of that is moot, because there isn't any such beast as "international law", in the sense that he invokes it.

Furthermore, for the United States to take this aggressive action without the approval of the U.N. Security Council would be a violation of the U.N. charter, which the United States has ratified.

I think you'd be hard pressed to find any organization whose members give more lip service and less actual compliance with the terms of its charter. I don't consider the UN charter to be binding on the US any longer because few other nations on Earth bother obeying it, either. To play a game by the rules when nearly everyone else is cheating is idiocy.

Continuing on, Rothschild argues that it would violate the Christian doctrine of "just war".

What's that got to do with us? We're not a Christian nation, and Christian doctrine is uninteresting. Remember those fateful words, Congress shall pass no law regarding an establishment of religion... That means that this nation will not be ruled according to the dictates of Christianity, or Islam, or Judaism, or Buddhism, or any other such thing.

First, on the diplomatic front, a unilateral war against Iraq--or even one with our viceroy Tony Blair on board--would drive a wedge between the United States and many of its allies in Europe and around the world. The German government has already said it would not support such an adventure. The French are not enthusiastic. Nor are the Canadians, the Russians, and the Turks. And Saudi Arabia, whose kingdom--all right, whose oil--the United States fought to defend in the first Gulf War, won't even allow U.S. troops to use its land as a staging ground. Egypt and Jordan are also opposed to this war.

It takes two sides to make a disagreement. The fact that they disagree with us doesn't mean that we're automatically in the wrong, or that we have to be the ones to back down. The more detailed discussion of our relations with each of these nations, and the potential effect a war might have on our relationship with them, is something I've dealt with in very great depth other times. I'll only make one particular point here: Saudi Arabia and Jordan and Egypt are not the same as the others, because we fully expect that this war will alienate all three. More on that below.

This would be the second Muslim nation the United States has invaded in the last two years. Scenes of innocent Iraqis being killed on Al Jazeera will not, it is safe to say, enhance the image of the United States in the Muslim world, an image already badly, badly smeared by Ariel Sharon's offensive against the Palestinians and the 11-year embargo the U.S. insists that the U.N. impose on Iraq, an embargo that has killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqi kids.

Bush can prattle on as long as he wants about the United States not being at war with Islam or the Muslim world, but after a while, many in that world will find the argument harder and harder to swallow.

And rightly so, because this is a war on radical Islam. Iraq will be the second Islamic nation we'll have attacked, whose government we'll have removed, and it won't be the last. The Arab Muslim nations are nervous because they're right to be nervous. That's particularly true for the rulers of Saudi Arabia, because this war (the overall war) won't end until after the Sauds are deposed. They're the primary source of money for those who attacked us (and will continue to attack us) and they are also the primary source of funding for the deliberate spread of Islamic fundamentalist in the Arab world and elsewhere around the globe.

Well, for starters, the despotic rulers of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt, stooges of the United States, may lose their grip on power if the U.S. invasion galvanizes what Robert Fisk calls the sleeping Arab masses. Hard to see how that would be in the interests of the United States, as Bush defines them.

On the contrary, it's not hard at all, unless your eyes are closed. (He cited Robert Fisk! He actually used a reference-to-authority to Robert Fisk! Gaaah.) First of all, is he actually trying to argue that we should be maintaining the power of despotic rulers? But more important is that all three nations are havens and sources of funding and personnel for the primary groups which directly threaten us.

And finally, even if there were a value to be placed on maintaining them in power, it isn't infinite. If the benefit of fighting this war were sufficiently high, losing such "friends" may well be a price we'd be worth paying. I'm quite sure that they wouldn't want to pay the price; c'est la guerre.

And secondly, the more brutal the United States appears in the Muslim world, the more likely it is that suicide bombers will come to roost in the United States. It's a warning that we ignore at our peril.

This is wrong on several levels. For one thing, it misjudges the Arab (note: Arab, not Muslim) culture. They react to strength and weakness, not to honor and anger. They attack the weak and stay clear of the strong.

For another, those kinds of operations are more gated by money than by recruits. That's not the kind of thing that individuals are really capable of, operating alone, except at a very low level.

Third, proles aren't revolutionaries. Revolutionaries come from the educated middle class. Angering the "Arab street" won't result in more action against us.

Finally, suicide bombers have already come to roost in the US. (I suggest that Rothschild is long overdue for a trip to New York City. He may in particular enjoy the view from the top of the World Trade Centers; it's quite spectacular.)

On the economic front, another war against Iraq is sure, in the short term at least, to spike the cost of oil, since Iraq is a leading oil supplier, and since other big oil suppliers--Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Iran --are right next door. Now our economy is already in difficult straits. The invasion of Iraq could tip it back into recession.

This is an astonishingly weak argument. The only answer I can possibly come up with to this is, "So what?"

On the military front, and here's a sobering irony, Bush's invasion may actually increase the odds that Saddam Hussein would use chemical or biological weapons. Bear with me here. Back in 1991, he had chemical or biological weapons loaded onto missiles. Bush the Elder warned Saddam that if he used those weapons, he would face devastating retaliation. Everyone, including Saddam, understood that to mean the U.S. would drop a nuclear bomb on him. So what did he do? He backed down and didn't use those weapons. But today, Bush the Younger is making it quite clear that Saddam is going to be a goner, so Saddam has no incentive not to throw whatever vials of chemical or biological weapons he might have lying around at U.S. troops or at Israel.

Brent Scowcro