On Wed, 12 Mar 2003, John D. Giorgis wrote: > At 01:00 AM 3/5/2003 -0600 Marvin Long, Jr. wrote: > >Saddam is as guilty as sin but if containment can keep him as > >relatively weak as he is now, then perpetuating that state of affairs is > >the lesser evil > > Two questions for you Marvin: > > 1) Do you consider the ability to use massive amounts of anthrax and nerve > agent in chemical and biological attacks upon the US to be "relatively weak?"
First of all, I'm not convinced that Hussein has the ability to use massive amounts of anything against the US. I don't doubt that he has stockpiles of the stuff, but that's not the same as being able to deploy them in any significant way against the US. It seems to me that in order to be able to "use massive amounts of anthrax and nerve agent" against the US, Hussein would have to be able to fly planes over the US or else to target us with ICBMs or maybe warships or something else comparable. He can't do that right now. It seems to me that Hussein's strength lies not in his ability to threaten the US directly, but in his ability to threaten those of his neighbors in whom the US has a vested interest. But this ability is itself highly curtailed by sanctions and no-fly zones. So, yes, he does seem to me to be "relatively weak" (relative to what, is the question perhaps) at this time. Weak enough so that we could have spent another year on diplomacy to try to build support instead of announcing ahead of time that war is what will happen no matter what anybody else says and then reluctantly going through the motions of negotiating with the UNSC. Secondly, please note that you quoted me out of context above. The quoted statement was originally part of a hypothetical designed to explain why some people might think Hussein in his current state is less dangerous than a United States, power unchecked by any rival, armed with the precedent that preemptive warfare is a legitimate principle whenever our interests are at stake. I believe Erik described this perspective as a selfish ivory tower paranoid fantasy. :-) Personally, I think it's just the historical cliche that power corrupts applied what appears to be the current trend: that the United States seeks to be the unrivaled economic, military, and political force on earth. The fantasy - that is, the yet-to-be-tested article of faith - is that America's values and political institutions will prevent power from corrupting the exercise of its unchecked hegemony. That theory will only start to be tested now that the Soviet Union has fallen and we have a motivation for being militarily aggressive on the world stage in the war on terror. I think it's perfectly natural for someone trying to think about the "big picture" to be more concerned with containing America - the larger long-term issue - than with Hussein, the smaller short-to-medium term issue. We can't assume that everyone - especially citizens of other nations, even the ones that generally like the US - will assume by default that a unipolar global American hegemony will be the best of all possible worlds. However...having said that, I want to say this: I've been silent in this thread since the post quoted above because I found Erik's response to be very powerful, powerful enough to make me decide to shut up and sit and listen and read what others have to say and think for a while. That's still pretty much how I feel. I think the US has handled this issue about as badly as possible on the diplomatic front - by our bluntness placing at needlessly increased risk the very leaders, like Tony Blair, by whose support we hope to gain international legitimacy. On the other hand, I see no moral credibility in the mechanations of nations like France, say; and the hope for a Mid-East region genuinely improved by an American presence in Iraq is very compelling. It still feels totally like a roll of the dice to me, though. And we've reached a point where the US's search for UN approval has become sort of pathetic; Powell's announcement today that we would continue to seek UNSC approval bordered on self-humiliation for the administration in its search for international support, given Bush's press conference several days ago. Which, in an odd way, I find heartening...it suggests to me that these men really are sincere in their stated goals even if they do a lousy job of selling the plan. Meanwhile, it tends to expose the unprincipled intransigence of the opposition, as when France announces that no resolution that includes the use of force will ever pass muster. Why have any resolution ever, then? So at this point I'm thinking that if war comes to pass, as it almost certainly will, I'm going to bite my tongue and hope and pray, in my strange and godless way, that everything works out for the best. I can't honestly say that I believe in this war. But my fondest hope may be to be proven wrong. > 2) Did you consider the DPRK in 1994, when it was accepting US bribes and > UN inspections, and when it was only a few years away from assembling a few > nuclear bombs without us knowing or able to stop them, to be "relatively > weak" at that time? Yes and no. Compared to the US, in general terms, yes. Even today. But it seems to me that DPRK, backed to some degree by China, constitutes a much greater threat to US allies than Iraq, even before our latest massive troop buildup in the Middle East. In other words, even though the US is vastly more powerful than the DPRK, the DPRK can hurt too many of our allies too quickly for us to take them lightly, and they are in a much better position to do such a thing than Iraq is in its current state, even without nukes. Also, back in 1994 I basically saw the DPRK as a nation run by such crazy MFs that they might actually be willing to stupidly destroy themselves in a war with the US just to save face over some stupid thing or other, so I was immensely heartened by their willingness to take our bribe like sane people: maybe they were slowly coming around. Now I think that the DPRK is neither insane nor coming around, and I still think they could hurt a lot more of our allies than Iraq ever could to date. Marvin Long Austin, Texas Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Poindexter & Ashcroft, LLP (Formerly the USA) http://www.breakyourchains.org/john_poindexter.htm _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
