Posted on 06/10/2003 10:15:37 AM PDT by NYC Republican
NATION BUILDING AND WMD'S: You'll want to read this story from the Christian Science Monitor, but the title pretty much says it all: "Building Three Nations at Once." If you include all of the domestic work the Bush administration is trying to accomplish the title could easily read "Building Four Nations at Once."
The piece offers an important sense of perspective and outlines the enormity of the tasks we now face in Afghanistan, Palestine, and Iraq. The scope of what we are trying to do in these three places is massive - not to mention massively complicated - and trying to erect multiple Democracies from scratch around the world isn't something we can (or should want to try to do) by ourselves.
We had no choice with Afghanistan. Toppling the Taliban and routing al-Qaeda was absolutely imperative and completely justifiable. Putting the country back together again is also imperative from a US national security (as well as a moral) standpoint.
Palestine is a different story. Americans generally accept the fact that the US should devote a considerable amount of time and energy to being an honest broker in the conflict. Our willingness to work in the Middle East is based upon two optimistic assumptions: 1) we believe the problem is solvable and we can help bring about a solution and 2) our participation in the process will generate goodwill for the US among the Arab world. Despite the vast amounts of time and resources we've devoted to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict over the last three decades neither of these things has happened. In other words, our current participation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a voluntary good-faith effort that carries with it some symbolic value inside and outside of the Muslim world, but won't result in irreparable harm to the President or the country in the event we fail to achieve a lasting peace.
Iraq falls into yet another category. It was a war of choice justified almost completely by the following assumption: Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and also was known to have links to terrorist groups including al-Qaeda and al-Qaeda affiliates. Together this constituted a direct threat to our national security gave the United States the right to take preemptive action.
Yes, Iraq was in violation of twelve years of UN resolutions and therefore international law, but no one in their right mind can say that without the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001 the Bush administration would have been lining up to invade Iraq. It simply wouldn't have happened.
Nor can any objective person say the would the war have happened if Saddam didn't possess WMD's. This is why the WMD question is so important: it's the irrefutable cornerstone of the "Bush doctrine" and is now linked directly to the future credibility of the United States in the world. To turn around now and say that the WMD issue doesn't matter is intellectually dishonest and - to be even more frank - a bit cowardly.
Equally dishonest and cowardly are those who say Bush and Blair fabricated the entire WMD issue. There is evidence. We have found two mobile weapons labs. We know that numerous sources including former presidents, former Iraqi officials, and foreign intelligence services agreed with the assessment that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. President Bush continues to insist that Saddam had WMD's and I believe him. But we need to find them and we need to prove that they did, in fact, represent a significant threat to the region and to the security of the United States. It's just that simple.
In the meantime, the mess in Iraq is ours to clean up. We chose to go and win the war but we don't have a choice now about winning the peace. We're going to have to stay as long, and spend as much as it takes to build a modestly functioning society there
Hard hitting commentary from one of the best blog/news sites on the web, IMO. While I don't agree with everything said above, most of it is spot on.
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