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Chris Matthews Urges President Not To Attack Iraq
Jews In Media, Government, Are Getting Ready To Roast Him
12/4/2001 1:23:12 PM
Chris Matthews / Jewish World Review
Commentary -- [Bill's note: This article was published in Jewish World
Review today with the
comment, "(HE'S LOST IT, FOLKS!)". I am hearing that we should see an all
out
attack on Mr Matthews by the Israeli Lobby soon. Personally, I was amazed
to
see this. I know he lives in Bethesda, and I have run across him once or
twice
at Barnes and Nobles (though I doubt he remembers me.) Next time, I'll
have to
compliment him.]
Chris Matthews
If it were in my power to stop Dubya, I would
http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- LIKE other victors before him,
President
Bush is being tempted with greater glories. He should follow his triumph
in
Afghanistan, the trumpet sounds, with a more magnificent destruction of
Saddam
Hussein.
If it were in my power to stop him, I would.
To attack Iraq now would forfeit all that the American president has won
since
Sept. 11:
-- the backing of the United Nations;
-- the resurrection of the Big Three alliance of America, Britain and
Russia,
which won World War II;
-- the support of the Arab League; and
-- a 90-percent job approval from the American people.
It short, it would be nothing like the recent successes in Afghanistan.
To topple Saddam would take a half million to a million U.S. troops. It
would
require an occupying force capable of policing a civilian population that
would
be embittered by enormous casualties and a brutal bombing campaign.
Throughout
much of the world, and not just in the Middle East, it would cast our side
in
the role of the aggressor. Once again, it would recall Pearl Harbor, but
this
time with us in the role of the imperial Japanese.
I have given up trying to understand the thinking of those who agitate for
such
a wrong and tragic course against Saddam. They try and fail to blame him
for
Sept. 11. They try and fail to blame him for the anthrax letters. Yet,
their
inability to nail him only adds to their resolve. They want nothing less
than
an all-out war with Iraq. They want American troops to march into Baghdad,
take
control of the country, "take out" Saddam, and create a post-Saddam
government
favorable to the United States.
I can't tell where President Bush stands, whether with his Secretary of
State
Colin Powell or with the neo-conservatives inside and outside of his
administration who have long led their global wish-list with Saddam's
destruction. He called this week for Saddam to let U.N. Inspectors search
his
country for weapons of mass destruction. While Hussein defied him, this is
the
sort of posturing that's been going on for years.
Bush must certainly know the risks and costs of the all-out invasion the
anti-
Hussein hawks are demanding. It would put the United States on one side,
Iraq
and the rest of the world on the other. I doubt that even Tony Blair would
back
an attack on Baghdad.
What a calamitous end this would bring to the current anti-terrorist
campaign.
Instead of leading the world in a war of justice, we would be undoubtedly
scorned as an aggressor.
Here at home, the country would suffer a hard division.
The hunt for Osama bin Laden was, let's face it, an easy sell. His crowd
killed
our people. For that, he's going to die.
A war with Iraq would enjoy none of this same authenticity. We would be
attacking another country based on what it might do: use biological or
nuclear
weapons against another country.
That might work with a small group of us. It will not sell to the
majority.
I liked the way Harry Truman talked about us. He called us "this country."
He
didn't mean the government in Washington, but the American people in those
splendid moments when we feel and act as one.
Right now is one of those moments. The Taliban is finished. Forces allied
with
the United States have grabbed Kabul and other major cities, while the
Marines
hunt cave-to-cave for Osama bin Laden.
Here at home, the country stands united. The terrorist network that
attacked us
on Sept. 11 is being decapitated.
Best of all, we can see a feasible future line of attack. To wipe out bin
Laden's Al-Qaeda network, America will now attack its other training
grounds in
Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and the Philippines. And along every step of the
way,
President Bush will retain the emphatic loyalty of the American people.
That 90-
percent job approval rating will stay at 90 percent.
This isn't complicated. Bush is doing what any red-blooded American leader
would do. He is bringing justice to those who killed our people in cold
blood.
That's something Americans have been ready to do since those early
Revolutionary days, when our flag showed a coiled snake and the words
"Don't
Tread on Me."
What we shouldn't be ready to do is attack another country before it
attacks
us.
Libertarian Socialist News
Post Office Box 12244
Silver Spring, MD 20908
http://www.overthrow.com
(check out our messageboards -- discuss this story on-line!)
(Formerly http://www.libertariansocialist.com)
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