Pre-Emption

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We've all heard the arguements against the war in Iraq. Most members of the anti-war camp site the fact that the war was a pre-emptive attack to prevent Saddam from using WMD. When no WMD were found, it removed the reason for a pre-emptive attack. My question is quite simple: Bush's popularity even BEFORE the war was questionable. In some cases, do you think the WMD arguement is merely an arguement of convenience? In other words, were there enough anti-Bush people in the populace that disapproved of his policies to begin with, and the war only represented the most egregious example?

If that is the case, then we have two other questions that need to be answered:

If, in fact, WMD were found in Iraq, would the war have been justified?

Directly following that question is: If it was justified, then is there a place in today's world for additional pre-emptive wars? Or, to paraphrase, are there certain sets of circumstances where a pre-emptive war can be justified?

I know the middle of the last century was a different time and place, but has any country provoked a war more than Germany in the years prior to WWII? Probably not. Yet, no pre-emption was taken there. In fact, the exact opposite strategy - one of concession - was adopted.

So can a pre-emptive war ever be justified as an acceptable stategy, or in some cases as an alternative to diplomacy? And if so, what parameters would we have had to meet for the war in Iraq to be justified?

 

Even if Iraq had had WMDs it wouldnt have been a pre-emptive war. Not even the Bush regime believed or even claimed outright that Saddam had the means to deliver any kind of WMD to US soil even if it was heavily hinted at.

Otherwise I do not think it can ever really be justified with a pre-emptive war. Even in the classical sense of troops be amassed on your border by a neighbouring country and hate speech filling the air waves it should be more than enough to start amassing your own troops to counter any possible invasion and send a clear message that you are prepared and ready if they want mischief and perhaps to ask them nicely to stand down. By striking first you only give motivation to enemy troops and make the world question who the bad guy is.

For me pre-emptive war is like you see someone who looks suspicious on a street corner and you go up to him start beating him to a bloody pulp just for looking suspicous. If you did that in a society there is no question who the cops would book even if the shady character would have jumped an old lady and stolen her purse two minutes later.

 

My objections to the war are not so much based on whether WMD’s were a legitimate reason for the invasion in the first place. Rather, I have a problem with two things:

1. In retrospect, it appears to me that the Bush administration was just using WMD’s as an excuse to invade, and therefore essentially lied to Americans and the world (but I realise there is disagreement over whether that is truly the case).
2. More importantly, there was little international support for the invasion, which raises the question of whether the U.S. thinks it’s OK to unilaterally take out any country it doesn’t like.

So on the question of whether a pre-emptive strike is justified, I would say yes, provided that there is sufficient evidence to justify it, and there is substantial international support for the action. However, whether that support would have to come through the U.N., or whether it could come from elsewhere, is another matter.

 

Weapons of mass destruction or no, the war was justified in my opinion. Saddam already proved in the past what his true intentions are, which were to dominate the whole middle east region, and completely annihilate a few groups of people in the process, such as the Arabs living in the swamps in Iraq, and the Kurds in southern Iraq. he also made a vow to erase Israel of the map of the world, sooner or later. Plenty of reasons to take action i'd say.

One Chamberlain was enough.

 

Not exactly. Pre-emptive war, in the specific Iraq-US instance, is more like gun control. Cops are allowed to carry weapons because they have special training, social responsibilities, and a history of using their deadly power judiciously, if imperfectly. But societies are free to pass regulations such that those without the social responsibility to "kill to protect" aren't permitted to own killing tools. If the common citizen decides to acquire an illegal gun anyway, it doesn't matter if he never actually uses it criminally - the well-armed cops have a (non-hypocritical) responsibility to deal with the problem. Especially if the gun-sneaking citizen has a criminal record, and even more so if that criminal record involves gun violence.

With Iraq, the stated objective - over TWELVE YEARS - was that Iraq demonstrate it had completely, verifiably, and permanently disarmed of a particular kind of weaponry that it had used in the past on its neighbors and people. (It was still free to keep its conventional military - look at the anger heaped on the US for graciously permitting Iraq to keep its helicopters.) Iraq not only failed to make clear a permanent disarmament, it did so with contempt, unlike oh-so-humble Iran.

So yeah, joacqin, as you put it, the US beat Iraq to "a bloody pulp just for looking suspicious". But it was a particular kind of suspicion, and perfectly justifiable.

 

Before I start I hope everyone understands that justification is objective. Yes? Good.

I think the war was justified simply because Iraq has been known to be a bunch of bastards anyway.

If they found the weapons then it was definatly justified. However people must remember the amount of time Iraq was warned about America invading and why. For at least a month Iraq was pretty certain the US would invade. They knew there was no way in hell they could resist such an invasion. The only victory they could aquire would be a moral victory and the best way to do that is show that they don't have any WMDs. To say just because no WMDs have been found in Iraq doesn't mean there weren't any. If they weren't destroyed they were relocated. How? Smuggled. Where? Who knows? I'm not saying there 'were' WMDs but there still could have been.

The invasion of Iraq to simply press the 'reset' button on the government was justified. Nobody can deny that Saddam was a horrible leader. The intention was good but with mad clerics and extremist groups I don't think there'll be a government that values equality in Iraq for a long time.

 

The notion of a pre-emptive war has no precedent in American tradition nor in any past policy. This regime has entered a new policy area, which is "shoot first and ask questions later." In the opinion of many Americans it is poor policy, motivated by what appears to be dreams of an imperial American empire. The neocons are dreaming of a "little America" in the midst of a completely different set of cultural and political group of nations, hoping that little America will spread to the rest of the neighbors.

But it is highly unlikely that the nations in the Middle East will quickly embrace democratic institutions. They have their own set of political values that they wish to preserve, whether or not we agree with them. Of course, the Bush regime would have us believe that they are interested in "speading democracy" to the region, while at the same time they attack America's own democratic institutions (unPatriotic Acts). Thus, one possible conclusion is that this war is really about the exercise of American power, and not much else.

[ May 28, 2004, 05:32: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

 

I see. And next week, we'll be attacking China because we all know they're "a bunch of bastards", too.

 

No. Not good. An objective is what you hope to achieve. Justification is the reason you wish to acheive it. If you want to equate the two, you are really going to have to explain to me how they are the same thing, because by their standard English definitions, they are clearly not.

To put it in common terms, say you have a job that you really don't like, but you need that job to earn money. Your OBJECTIVE is to earn money. But you JUSTIFY spending your time at work (instead of doing something you'd enjoy much more) because you are being compensated for it. By your rationale, it would mean the definitions of work and money were equivalent.

But that doesn't mean they were actually going to use them, and that's the point joacqin was making. You don't get imprisoned or attacked in the U.S. just for "looking suspicious" even if it is a "particular kind of suspicion". (Well, actually, given the Patriot Act, I guess you can.) The point is if you go to arrest someone for illegal gun charges, go to their home, and don't find any, and can't prove that they ever had any, then that person goes free, and isn't sitting in a prison cell somewhere.

 

Preemptive wars are never justified IMHO because if everyone started to play this game then Earth could very easily and very fast turn into a giant battlefield with an even greater graveyard coming to take place. More than that there are peaceful ways to hold down an aggressive head of state and as an extreme measure i can offer murder of the specific persons. I can't understand why we should punish severely a whole nation because its President is an idiot.

Noone appointed USA as the world cop first of all. Secondly if such a title existed then USA would be IMO among the last who should receive such a title because of the short history of the nation, and for that history which shows that arranging other states internal affairs is, to put it mildly poor.
I won't go to back in the history. Just see what USA administration has accomplished the last ten years. In Yugoslavia the Kossovo issue, which was partially constructed and exaggerated, turned now to an annihiliation of the Serbs who decided to stay in their homes. Right now they either lying dead in them or have been forced to leave and seek selter in the camps of KFOR.
In Afganistan things outside Kambul are worse than before with drug/warlords ruling the country. The current administration is trying to build a steady and thriving situation but the last attacks in Kambul are showing that these efforts are in vain.
Furthermore

{This is from a newspaper here in Greece which is in fact an article of Reuters. I haven't managed to find the original article but i am sorry i forgot to put this information right from the beginning i forgot.}
Which is something we clearly can see from the fact that the anti-western movement in Muslim countries is growing. Not to mention that at least here in Greece and i am sure that everywhere in the world the main sentiment is fear not security. We feel less secure than ever before.

Well i remember that every time the inspectors were chosen by the US and everytime there were US citizens inside. Amazingly every time they were thrown out of Iraq with the accusation of spying or undermining the current regime.
Well i won't say that these guys belonged definetely to a secret service and Shaddam was not a crazy guy feeling threated by everyone. But to me this scenario is possible too. After all the overthrow of Shaddams regime was the main goal for about a decade. And when USA inspectors did not participate in the inspections (because of the imminent war) everything went smoothly and the chief inspector said that given more time they would finish their job.
If you ask me i would prefer to have seen this happen and i would not care less for Shaddam as a President or as a prisoner.
That is enough for now

[ May 30, 2004, 00:22: Message edited by: Mithrantir ]

 

Well, I do really do not thing that the Germans prior to WW2 where more war-like then the British or the Dutch or the French or the Spanish. Just your average European colonizing country. Then getting back to the old point, implied here. Churchill was a looser, Chamberlain ruled. If it wasn't for the wisdom of Chamberlain, the UK would have fallen 1939, conquered by the Germans.

Then, any comparision between Germany and Japan and a freaking M.E. country is just ridiculous. The Germans and the Japanes where the height of their time. Equipped with the most modern equipment, the best trained soldiers and an awful lot of them. There are still world economy number 2 and number 3. Comparision with world economy number 123 or something like that doesn't really make sense.

The euphemism "pre-emptive" belongs into the trash bin. Aggressive war is what we are talking about here. Assault on another nation to conquer them was legal prior to WW1 as far as I know. Today not so, or yet again. At least, it's highly doubtful, if it is the Americans that will profit in the end from the return of the legallity of aggressive wars. That is, if one even can say that anyone will profit from it. Particularly, the irony that is was Bush the elder that went under the banner of the illegality of aggressive wars into the Second Persian Gulf war, a justified war by the way. Yes, yes, the times are changing.

As for the WMD. It was ridiculous in the first place, the whole thing so weak. It served to make Powell look like a fool. The stain on a career, poor dude. As for the reasons of the war, they still remain to be discovered.... er, no, I know it, it's making pornos in prisons.. that's it, yes! And I don't like the incompetence-apology: Bush is so incompetent, that he just doesn't know how to lie on purpose. BS, he's a liying liar with his pants on fire.

I think first, there has to be an army that is dangerous and on its way. And of course, any leader of any army will take care of the first military rule:" Don't start a war that you know you can't win". Ironically, I think if there is a reason for an attack on a country to keep them from attacking another country, there will be no country being able to accomplish such an attack... ooops, someone should pre-empt you.