Much of the justification for the preemptive invasion of Iraq hinged on the argument that the United States had reason to believe that the country had illegally produced weapons of mass destruction (or more familiarly, WMD's). At the time, there was really no way to tell whether Iraq did possess these instruments of apocalypse, let alone what their intentions might be if they did. Ultimately the Wolfowitz Doctrine prevailed, and troops swept through Iraq in a matter of months. Unfortunately for the current administration, the military was unsuccessful in producing any Iraqi WMD's. Given only this evidence, it is impossible for us to tell whether there ever were any such weapons or not, though many have speculated wildly on either side of the debate. We can only know that the administration isn't lying about having found them. As far as I'm concerned, it is an irrelevant matter of fact, a historic antiquity of certain irrelevance, whether Hussein's Baathist government really did have these weapons. What concerns me is whether, given the evidence that the US government had on this crucial issue, such action was justified. More plainly, if presented with the same scenario again, better aware of the woes that come with occupying an unstable, Middle Eastern country, would we recommend the same action once more?
A similar situation is developing in one of Iraq's bordering countries, Iran. Ignoring the situation regarding North Korea for the time being, the international community (primarily the US and her European allies) has considered Iran's atomic energy program to be little more than a facade before its impending nuclear arsenal. According to (http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/iran/nuke-fac.htm), Iran's nuclear program has been public since 2003, but amidst a flurry of anti-Israel comments from their president, new concern has arisen about their real intentions.
It seems that there are many relevant parallels between the situations with Iran and pre-invasion Iraq. One might even go so far as to say that the United States has more reason to suspect Iran of WMD's than it did Iraq, and that Iran is more vocally hostile towards the United States' ally, Israel. After all, the US put Hussein into power so that he could oppose the more extremist Iran. Here, we have returned to the questions of early 2003 regarding the proper course of American foreign policy.
Just like Iraq, it is impossible to tell (at least for the average American) whether Iran does, in fact, have WMD's, let alone what it plans to do with them. Hopefully the Pentagon can be more certain than we armchair patriots, but as we must decide on a course of action regarding Iran, we demonstrate our reactions to the outcome in Iraq. Do we prescribe the same remedy to fight Islamic Extremism anew? Do we alter our policy slightly in response to a country where 40% of the population is below the poverty line? Or is it that we've learned our lesson about getting involved in the region? Whatever the administration does decide, it will be a sincere evaluation of the war in Iraq, and set a precedent that will define US policy in the region for years to come.
Here are some links that I found interesting if you care to research the issue a bit:
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ir.html
- Facts on Iran
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmhansrd/cm051013/text/51013w07.htm
- List of nuclear capable (in terms of power) countries according to the British Parliament.
http://www.iaea.org
- International Atomic Energy Agency Homepage
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/12/14/iran.israel/
- Statements by Iranian President
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/27/world/middleeast/27iran.html
- Iranian response to threat of US action
Branden Stein is an undergraduate in Philosophy and German Literature at The Ohio State University. He can be contacted at: stein.179@osu.edu
7 Comments:
What can I say besides, nice post. I couldn't agree more. Well done Stein.
Shatnermosism - You may be guilty of using loaded language against the concept of pre-emptive strike. I am not certain, but I believe that the standards for pre-emptive strike are a little more than just "feel threatened by".
I'd be uncomfortable taking the ability to strike first off the table, especially in today's world. Militant Islam has seemingly run the gambit and taken a strong hold in almost every middle east country. An important concept to remember... although its s bit... "un-academic" is that "all's fair in love and war". I wouldn't extend that to apply to torture or anything, but if we strive to be too noble, we could find ourselves as part of the ashes of history in a world covered with mosques.
Well supossedly the reason for going into Iraq was about WMD's. If that was the case, it was Saddam's fault that we ended up going in, because he definitely wanted to create the perception that Iraq had such weapons.
(the endless shell games and badgering of inspectors)
What the world should be most uncomfortable with, is Militant Islam having Nuclear capabilities. Militant Islam has shown a history (and until they reform, their religion supports it) of invading and converting.
I do think that there is a definite issue in Iraq, over what to do next there, but the UN's own standards set up for military intervention far earlier than the U.S. ever got involved... how many resolutions again did Iraq ignore?
I think a big piece of the puzzle is corruption and ineptitude in the United Nations, and the concept that diplomacy can solve everything.
The Butler report in the UK and even the UN's intelligence all believed that Iraq had WMD, by the way. Never rule out the possibility that they got them out of the country/sold them before we invaded.
Worst decision of the Bush administration? Telling Saddam the day we'd attack. Way to give the enemy a time frame in which to ship out WMD's (if he had them) as well as set up a defensive strategy for iminent danger. I still cannot fathom us informing a country that we're going to invade. What... "strategery".
Yeah, there are a lot of questions about why we went into Iraq, not least of which is our very close partnership with Israel. Likewise, there are a lot of concerns about the utter failure of the UN to enforce its own legislation, and the fact that corruption in the UN is continually denied in order to try to maintain some sort of legitimacy.
Of course, unipolar, bipolar, tripolar and multipolar theories come into play as concepts for world influence... I tend to subscribe to bipolar with the potential for tripolar...
Unipolar - The United States completely dominates policy decisions.
Bipolar - The United States and China dominate policy decisions
Tripolar - Add Russia to the mix.
Multipolar - (more of a hope for western democrats, not the political party democrat, mind the reader) The concept that many nations would play strongly in international policy decisions.
Eric, the decision to let them know when we were going to attack was a horrible blunder. Thus:
"A former general and friend of Saddam Hussein who defected but maintains close contact with Iraq claims the regime supported al-Qaida with intelligence, finances and munitions and believes weapons of mass destruction are hidden in Syria.
Ali Ibrahim al-Tikriti, southern regional commander for Saddam Hussein's Fedayeen militia in the late 1980s, spoke with Ryan Mauro of WorldThreats.com.
Known as the "Butcher of Basra," al-Tikriti commanded units that dealt with chemical and biological weapons. He defected shortly before the Gulf War in 1991.
Last month, Saddam Hussein's No. 2 Air Force officer, Georges Sada, told the New York Sun Iraq's weapons of mass destruction were moved to Syria six weeks before the war started. Sada claimed two Iraqi Airways Boeing jets converted to cargo planes moved the weapons in a total of 56 flights. They attracted little attention, he said, because they were thought to be civilian flights providing relief from Iraq to Syria, which had suffered a flood after a dam collapse in 2002.
Discussing Saddam's support of terrorism, al-Tikriti said the dictator's regime sponsored Palestinian groups with logistical and material support. "
I wish I would have been able to join this conversation earlier.
Doesn't anyone remember the post 9/11, pre-iraqi war threat to any nation harboring Osama? We traced him from Afganistan to Iraq and Iraq refused to help.
Interesting points on future policy. Eventually many nations will be achieving nuclear status, so how can we regulate or keep an eye on every nation? With all these nations having many allies, how will one nation battle just one other without triggering retaliations from everyone? Should we swiftly crush anyone who doesn't comply or let everyone have the big guns? I don't think there can be a middle ground on policy for an extended period of time with this. It'll be interesting to see where the decisions go. I know many people don't want to see fighting of any kind and would prefer the latter choice, but in some situations (I'm not saying this is one of them yet) there has to be. I would hate to see it come down to another Hiroshima where many must die to save even more, but it might come to that.
It's all speculation until we see what our leaders do.
On a side note, knowing the intelligence field, they are ver specific in what they say and probably every piece of information given was assumed to mean something whether true or not. Many of those put together mean a lot of bigger truths or fictions. I wouldn't blame the actual intelligence guys, but the information path. Just like when you play the game telephone and the original phrase gets distorted all the way to the last person.
Well just in case there was any confusion, I DON'T want to see nukes flying all over. I'm pretty sure everyone would be dead if one went off nowdays cause it'd trigger everyone else to use them.
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