Comments on: Further confirmation?

By: msg

msg — Thu, 08 Apr 2004 05:41:19 +0000

The US invaded Iraq to liberate the Iraqi people from a brutal dictator. But that can’t be true, because nothing that’s happened since the invasion aligns with that statement of purpose. There has been no liberation, no relief from suffering, only more and more suffering, an almost official contempt, and less and less recognition of Iraqis as a people in need. They have become the enemy. The second-level, more cynical, reason given, was that the oil deposits that underly Iraq will become increasingly important as global supplies diminish and population and technological development both increase. So the US invaded to guarantee a stable supply of petroleum. But that can’t be true either, can it? Because nothing that’s happened so far, and nothing that’s been proposed, seems geared toward a stable local economy, which would seem necessary to guarantee access to those oil deposits. – So why are American young people dying in Iraq? Without seeing any hard data I’m confident the social strata represented in the death counts are virtually synonymous with big-box employee lists back home. So number one, American young people are dying because their lives don’t matter anyway. Their lives are as disposable in Iraq as they are in Wal-Mart. The next question would be – who benefits from things as they are, now, in Iraq? And there’s only one answer to that.

By: armando

armando — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 23:44:23 +0000

Thats a fairly chilling answer you got, Chris. The first part I can live with, if you are right you are right. But, as you say, risk is not a virtue when thousands of lives are at stake. I think that sums up one of the reasons why I never believed in the war as a humanitarian exercise. You have to actually care about the people you are saving in order to make the case that you are acting in order to save them.

By: Chris

Chris — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 21:22:48 +0000

As it happens, I asked Hitchens exactly this question when I got a chance to meet him. I wrote about it on my old site: http://www.seewhy.blogspot.com/2003_06_01_seewhy_archive.html#95296673

By: baa

baa — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 14:56:07 +0000

Go out for dinner and you miss a lot on this thread. John Quiggin: thanks for the response. I don’t know if you read the pieces by Michael Walzer on containing Iraq, but I think you’ll find a lot to like there. The suggestion you make is, I think, a reasonable option: military sanctions and an ongoing inspections regime. The concerns about this program are largely (but not entirely) practical: inspections were only seriously restarted when 150,000 US troops camped out on Saddam’s border. This led many to suspect that any effective sanctions/inspections regime could only exist while the threat of invasion was live. This requires a massive garrisoning of the Middle East, and one that isn’t obviously sustainable by the West. Frankly, I think many people concluded (but, you would be fair to criticize: did not say) that this approach replicated many of the costs of war with few of the benefits, and would collapse the moment political will wavered. Timothy Burke: Also, thanks for the response. You’re right, there’s a significant gap between the argument I outlined and the administration’s pre-war emphasis. I suspect that’s because barrels of sarin constituted an explicit violation of UN resolutions in a way the obvious intention to acquire nuclear weapons and high probability of succeeding did not. More’s the pity for the UN resolutions, in my view, because poison gas shells don’t really matter—they don’t augment the strategic menace posed by Iraq in the way nuclear weapons do. But the Administration went the UN route (partially) and thus needed to stress the factors that would convince that audience. I think the real debate on Iraq should have emphasized two questions. First, is a nuclear-armed Baathist Iraq an aceptable outcome? Second, if no, how do we prevent that from happening? If you answer yes to the first question, the answer to the second is either John Quiggin’s solution, or invasion. Is it fair to note at this point that one of these solutions is both more certain to remove the threat and is likely to have better humanitarian results? That is, to use humanitarian considerations as one among the tie-breaking factors in how to resolve a security threat?

By: Kimmitt

Kimmitt — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 09:39:38 +0000

For instance, if there is a functioning and independent Iraqi democracy within two years, which lasts for at least a further five, then I think that ought to shake the convictions of hardened opponents. If this takes place, I’m converting to Protestant Fundamentalism and joining the Cult of Bush. I’m not kidding.

By: Chris Bertram

Chris Bertram — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 09:36:11 +0000

Unfortunately, trackback only works with MT blogs, but contributors to this thread may be amused to read the response that has appeared at SIAW href=”http://marxist-org-uk.blogspot.com/2004_04_01_marxist-org-uk_archive.html#108118654864301653” rel=”nofollow”>http://marxist-org-uk.blogspot.com/2004_04_01_marxist-org-uk_archive.html#108118654864301653 .

By: liberal japonicus

liberal japonicus — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 09:03:44 +0000

John Quiggen wrote: I agreed with the policy that was publicly stated until late 2002 – threaten Saddam with war if he didn’t declare his (putative) weapons and admit inspectors. On the evidence we had then, there was good reason to suppose he had all sorts of weapons. But once the inspectors went in, it became apparent that this was (at least) far from certain. I would have continued as follows. Once Saddam admitted the inspectors, let them do their work. Once the inspectors found he was clean, drop all but purely military sanctions subject to a continuing inspections regime to prevent him restarting the programs he abandoned in the early 90s. This would have been great, but the problem was that the irrational actor seems to have been the US, refusing to believe Saddam. I realize that Saddam didn’t give anyone much cause to believe him, but, really, what could he have done to prove that he had no WMD other than go into exile? Or to lie and say ‘you got me, I’ll destroy them’ and then quickly create some to destroy. Short of that, there was nothing that Saddam could have done to prevent the US invasion. And I have to think that the fact that there have been no WMD discovered (I should add that I supported the invasion on the premise that there were WMD and my impression of the portrayal of Saddam’s brutality was to demonstrate that he was not a rational actor, not as a reason for war) must give the ‘arab street’ cause to think that all the talk of bringing democracy is so much hot air. And what, exactly, could the US point to that would have them change their minds?

By: Curtis Crawford

Curtis Crawford — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 06:07:29 +0000

Chris Bertram wrote: “. . . it seems appropriate to ask of everyone who seems certain of the rightness of their position on the war, whether there are any developments that would lead them to say, ‘OK, I was wrong.’ ” A splendid question, mostly unanswered in the discussion. Answers might come most easily from people who had some clear rules about making war. For example, an absolute pacifist would have no difficulty in explaining his opposition to the war, regardless of the benefits and harms as weighed after a year. But most of the discussants seemed to judge whether to make war based on weighing various plausible (largely unknowable) good vs bad consequences. I have never found an absolute pacifist position persuasive in international relations. But there are some moral principles that should govern whether making war is permissible. They are fundamental to the UN Charter, and as applicable to the mighty as to the weak. Making war may be justified as 1. Defense against armed attack. Or when 2. Authorized by the UN Security Council in response to a threat to international peace. Making war is not justified 1. To overthrow dictatorships or 2. To intervene in civil conflict.

By: Rajeev Advani

Rajeev Advani — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 05:25:49 +0000

Timothy: If I’m going to be asked to approve a costly new program, I want to first have a conversation about the entire universe of good things that that money might be spent on rather than presuming that the first one raised is the right one. I totally agree with you on this; my biggest problem with the Bush administration is their disrespect for the public. They act as though Americans would not be interested in such a campaign; I think they would be, and that it should be discussed. (Wolfowitz et al should keep blogs, in other words) From my perspective, even if you approve of humanitarian or liberal intervention, Iraq was exactly the wrong room to clean first. I would put it differently: Iraq was the most radical and revolutionary place to start. Domino democracy would not be out of the question if Iraq developed a thriving economy and open political system in the next decade, but it is far from certain that this will happen. Iraq carries the largest payoff for democracy along with the most ominous risks. In an earlier post (or the comments to it) John Quiggin noted that Kuwait would be a better starting place. As I said there it would certainly be the sounder option, but the effect would not have been as profound as the revolutionaries in the White House desire. As a side-note, it’s interesting to note that those who gravitate toward revolutionary ideology (read: ex-Trotskyist Hitchens) are often attracted to the neoconservative vision of full-fledged regime change in Iraq. Finally, to Jeremy regarding distasteful metaphors: I’m usually careful about being insensitive, and I think this one was ok. A repugnant analogy is one that trivializes the life and death of civilians and soldiers: for example, Kissinger calling his bombing operations in Cambodia “breakfast”, “lunch” and “dinner” because of their timing. If anything, I’d say my analogy was on the same moral level as metaphors employed by realist theorists; i.e. states are a bunch of pool balls that occasionally collide with one another. They’re just trying to abstract the logic away from the emotionally charged zone of international relations.

By: Jeremy Osner

Jeremy Osner — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 03:58:22 +0000

Timothy: even if you approve of humanitarian or liberal intervention, Iraq was exactly the wrong room to clean first. Thank you. I have not seen this more clearly stated and it is exactly right. (My problem with Rajeev’s entertaining analogy is basically that war is entirely unlike room-cleaning; you may have to break a few eggs to make an omelet but it struck me as entirely too breezy a way to think of war, which after all consists of destruction of cities and of people’s lives.)

By: Troy

Troy — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 03:11:41 +0000

My general answer to the pro-war people on this thread is that imperialism has its limits, and the Coalition of the Willing was not sufficient to materially (positively) affect the course of events in the mideast. if the intervention had been truly one of humanitarian purpose then everything in its lead up would have been different, and I would have had a different appreciation of these altered facts on the ground from a year ago. Recasting arguments to another time, not supporting US intervention for various authoritarian dictatorships in Saigon was not one of these “objectively pro-Ho Chi Minh” deals IMV.

By: Troy

Troy — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 02:59:13 +0000

anthony: The american colonists were free as of July 4, 1776. Though the ensuing civil war took 7 long years with numerous reverses (and critical help from the french monarchy). As for the request for a Plan B from this non-war supporter, leave the iraqis to sort their own problems out. The present argument is echoic of the samn damn argument of 35 years ago—was the destruction of the village necessary to save it?

By: james

james — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 02:57:22 +0000

I supported the war because Iraq had several violations of the 1991 cease-fire agreement. As a matter of policy, I believe the US should aggressively enforce cease-fire treaties. According to the Geneva Convention, any chemical or biological weapon is automatically classified as a WMD. Obviously, ricen wasn’t the threat people where sold on. Most people where envisioning nuclear weapons. The Middle East is important because of oil. Not for the reason the anti-war commentators frequently bring up. Right now, if the region collapses for any significant length of time, the world economy collapses. That is a fairly important national security issue. I too would be interested in active, pro-active alternatives to war in Iraq.

By: Timothy burke

Timothy burke — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 02:36:42 +0000

Rajeev: That’s a good metaphor for prioritizing humanitarian interventions, but I feel that the kind of logic it implies was entirely absent from the planning for this war, and largely remains absent when war proponents accuse critics of being “soft on Saddam”. I see almost nowhere before or after the war a logic that says, “We begin the process of humanitarian intervention in this place [Iraq] because it is the best possible place in which to begin the general project of humanitarian intervention”. It’s rather the problem I have now with a well-meaning campaign for a living wage at my own institution. I don’t disagree that a living wage is a good thing, but it’s going to be costly. If I’m going to be asked to approve a costly new program, I want to first have a conversation about the entire universe of good things that that money might be spent on rather than presuming that the first one raised is the right one. Certainly this argument means that no one has the right to accuse prudential detractors of the war with approving or tolerating Saddam Hussein’s rule. The first person who makes that accusation opens themselves wide to the counter-accusation of failing to clean the whole house all at once, because they offer no metric that tells us why they want to clean one room rather than another. From my perspective, even if you approve of humanitarian or liberal intervention, Iraq was exactly the wrong room to clean first.

By: roger

roger — Tue, 06 Apr 2004 01:46:25 +0000

This pro and anti war debate strikes me as so exactly wrong—both about the issues then and the issues now—that it has to typify some deep strain of wrong in the discourse of the “clercs.” I opposed the war not because I supported Saddam Hussein. Far from it. I didn’t believe war was necessary to effect regime change, but I thought the U.S should be trying to effect regime change. But war at that time seemed inappropriate; it seemed to be constructed by the administration in power out of fantasies and lies; and the administration’s purpose seemed to be less the creation of an independent Iraq than of a satellite of the U.S with all the rhetorical trappings of democracy, and none of the stuffing. Chalabi was to play the role of Somoza, or the Guatamalan general, or any number of U.S. puppet figures. This didn’t happen, partly because the defense department conned itself with its Con man, partly because of the resistance. Here we have a case where taking political sides using absolute good and evil as your guides would get you nowhere. Who could support a resistance that consists of thugs, torturers, and the power mad? Who could support an occupation that consists of exploiters, filibusterers, and the dregs of every rightwing lobbying group in D.C.? But their clash actually created a good thing—an opening for Iraq to be a sovereign nation—with an emerging civil society. This happened between the two hostile parties, and it is still a fragile structure. However, what is amazing is that people can cast their views in concrete at a certain instance and then throw mud at each other as the circumstances accumulate—without paying attention to the fact that these circumstances were predicted by neither side. It is as if, in the pro war/anti war fight, the Iraqis themselves don’t exist—they have merely a dramatic insistence, allegorical figures for the “true” battle between good and evil. Which, down deep, is one’s most persistant reason for skepticism about western interventions. They still happen within an overwhelmingly racist context; the real people over whom concern is shown exist as children or monsters, but never as adults with their own reasons or interests; and the appeals for ‘neutrality,’ for shaping the discourse in terms of scientific proof, unconsciously imports into history that most unhistorical idea, that a principle can exist there without circustances—emerging ex nihilo, and referenced as a sort of supernumerary thing henceforth. I can only shake my head, man. Wow.