The morality of starting a frivolous war

Submitted by Michael (United States), Jul 11, 2008 at 20:49

It's apparent I won't be changing your mind. America always being in the right seems to be a gut issue with you. But it would have been more fun as well as more enlightening had you been able to offer up some specifics, instead of just saying "You are wrong. And you are wrong about much of the other stuff you wrote." I take it you aren't referring to any actual facts here, but rather the idea that I'm existentially, ideologically wrong. Even though the facts available to the interested researcher following 9/11 lead to the conclusion that Saddam had no role to play in 9/11, and had no serious offensive capability. No one could guarantee, for example, that he had NO stockpiles of WMDs left in some hole in the desert. We could only guarantee that he couldn't deploy them without coming to everyone's attention and bringing about his own downfall.

For what it's worth, I feel strongly that we should have taken his government down back in 1991, when it was the proper thing to do. Instead, we got out and ensured the deaths of thousands of Shiites who were counting on us to back them up. Had we stayed they could have taken him down with our assistance, and the USA could have been the biggest heros of the entire Arab world-- even despite our stance on Israel. But we didn't. I wish I could explain to you how removing him would have been the moral step back in 1991, when he was doing terrible things, and not in 2003, when he wasn't.

But I guess we just think differently. War is a huge step to take, involving as it does countless innocent lives at risk. We should only take it when we are under the direst of threats, or when there is some great humanitarian crisis. The post-9/11 threat from Saddam was, IMO at the time, trifling and of no consequence. And events since have borne out my take on it, not that of the Bush White House or of the author of your book.

Then you offer the knockout punch: "I will ask what the others asked you-are you an Amercian?" Apparently not in the sense you intend it: a blind obedience to "my country right or wrong". In my version of patriotism, it is my duty to fight so my country always stays in the right... and to fight against those who would corrupt its values by concocting a needless war. So in the last seven years I've had quite a lot of work to do!

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