''In search of the moral war''
Printed on Tuesday, March 18, 2003 {at} 01:51:24 EST

By Raff Ellis

YellowTimes.org Columnist (United States) 

(YellowTimes.org) u On the eve of war with Iraq, many still scramble for 
moral justification of what will amount to the slaughter of a civilian 
population. The most disingenuous claim is that it's the moral thing to 
do. Columns have been written, speeches given and, along with the 
rants of TV and talk radio hosts, a litany of specious justifications has 
been paraded before a gullible, if not cowed, public. Even the president 
deigns to speak of Providence's guiding hand leading us to this just war. 
 Simply put, the arguments in favor of war fall into the following 
categories:  

We are already at war because al-Qaeda declared war on us. 
(Somehow we make the transference from al-Qaeda to Iraq in this 
statement.) There are moral wars, such as WWII that the U.S. was 
justified entering. (No preemptive wars are mentioned in this argument.) 
Iraq is a compliant safe haven for the very same immoral terrorists with 
whom we are at war. (Note that Afghanistan was not in the original Axis 
of Evil but was the primary safe haven of the al- Qaeda terrorists.) North 
Korea is not a threat because diplomacy is a viable option. (Even 
though they have nuclear capabilities and missile delivery systems.) 
Saddam Hussein is a brutal tyrant who has crushed his opposition in 
spite of the U.N. imposed no-fly zones. Diplomacy is not an option for 
dealing with a country that trains and harbors terrorists (which ones are 
never mentioned). He is stalling for time and has defied U.N. 
Resolutions for 12 years and is a threat to peace in the region. (Iraq is 
the only country being threatened with invasion for ignoring U.N. 
Resolutions, even though Israel has defied U.N. Resolution 242 and 
many others for 36 years.)  

Most of these arguments have implicit moral underpinnings, for if you 
make the case that Iraq is an immoral, "rogue" regime, attacking it 
becomes by default the "moral" thing to do. We are continually 
cautioned not to fall into the trap of appeasing Saddam as Europe 
appeased Hitler. This emotionally powerful analogy brings a disturbing 
element to the table that would smother most peace promoters lest 
they be put on the side of the dreaded immoral "appeasers."  

This rather transparent debate tactic is calculated to arouse emotion 
and tar the "enemy" with a hated icon that everyone recognizes. 
Comparing Saddam to Hitler, however, does serious injustice to Hitler's 
villainy. Hyperbole is an important element in this specious argument 
because no one in the region, including the insincere Israel, believes 
Saddam is a threat. Bush's claim that Saddam is a threat to the U.S. 
and world peace is a canard that even he doesn't believe.  

Another raison d'etre for going after Saddam is: "Iraq has tried to kill 
British and American aviators" [who were bombing and killing Iraqis, by 
the way]. The U.N. did not institute the no-fly zones over Iraq even 
though this lie has been perpetuated by the Bush administration. The 
zones were imposed by the U.S. and Britain after the U.N. cease-fire 
was accepted by Iraq, ostensibly to protect the Kurds in the north and 
the Shiites in the south. Simply put, it is an attempt by those two allies 
to harass and vex the Iraqi regime by encouraging insurrection from 
within and to prepare the ground for the ultimate invasion. Of course, 
the insurrection idea didn't work.  

Another common falsehood is: "Iraq had prevented UNSCOM from fully 
carrying out its mission and kicked out the inspectors in 1998." The 
truth is that the U.N. withdrew its inspectors to get them out of harm's 
way because it was told that Britain and the U.S. intended to conduct a 
bombing campaign, which also was not sanctioned by the U.N.  

The argument that Iraq is a safe haven for terrorists is not supported by 
one shred of evidence. None of the terrorists identified in attacks on the 
U.S., here or abroad, were Iraqi, were trained by Iraq or financed by Iraq. 
The sheikhdoms in the Gulf, all of whom are temporarily our best friends 
these days, supplied the vast majority of funding and personnel for 
those operations. Iraq is the only secular Arab Muslim state in the 
Middle East and it is interesting that we simultaneously rail against the 
"fanatic Islamic terrorists" and promote war against the secular 
Islamists, who in turn are despised by the self-same fundamentalists we 
have come to fear and hate.  

We must make "war against terrorism" to prevent any more horrific 
attacks, and we must "smoke out" the enemy wherever they are. Look, 
we can't find Eric Robert Rudolph, an American terrorist on the most 
wanted list for the past five years, and he's here in the U.S.! Even so, 
we were going to "smoke out" bin Laden and he was hiding in a foreign 
country that has enough caves to house all the troglodytes in 
Washington and then some.  

The administration realized from the start they might not succeed in 
finding bin Laden and became panicked at the thought that the success 
of their campaign for revenge would be judged on that objective alone. 
Memories of our inability to conquer a virtually unidentifiable enemy 
in Vietnam were still remembered so the neocons had to find an 
identifiable substitute. The smoke from the WTC hadn't even diminished 
before the Iraqi blip appeared on their radar screen.  

If you follow the genesis of the "war on terrorism" from its onset in 
Afghanistan to the imminent target, Iraq, you will see a gradually 
changing story that defies any semblance of logic. No matter where the 
bar was placed, if it looked as though Iraq was going to make a 
successful leap, Bush raised the bar. He undermined the U.N. from the 
beginning, posturing that we'd go it alone if we had to so they had 
better vote our way; it's the moral thing to do. 

Logically, how can you, on the one hand, say that Iraq has disobeyed 
U.N. Resolutions and then say you will defy the U.N. if it doesn't 
sanction war to enforce them? The U.N. was founded on the notion that 
the combined efforts of the world's nations could avert war! How far 
we have come from that ideal. The voices of peace are now denigrated 
when they should be revered. Calling Kofi Annan the Neville 
Chamberlain of the 21st century is but one of the more immoral, 
derogatory attacks made against those would opt for peace. France and 
Germany have been vilified and characterized in the mainstream (i.e., 
administration mouthpiece) media as irrelevant, ungrateful and gutless.  

So, we are going to war to kill untold numbers of people because of a 
"potential threat" posed by their country. How many nations could fall 
under such a definition? Bush, seeking the high ground of morality 
says, "Saddam killed his own people!" He will soon teach Saddam a 
lesson by killing more Iraqis than the dictator ever could.  

So, off to war we go. Sounds like the moral thing to me! 

[Raff Ellis lives in the United States and is a retired former strategic 
planner and computer industry executive. He has had an abiding and 
active interest in the Middle East since early adulthood and has traveled 
to the region many times over the last 30 years.]  

Raff Ellis encourages your comments: rellis{at}YellowTimes.org

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Source: YellowTimes ....
http://www.yellowtimes.org/article.php?sid=1168&mode=thread&order=0

Cheers, Steve..

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