The day of green is one more upon us. I can’t say that I have much planned for it other than wearing a shirt of the proper color. Its a bloody Monday, which puts a damper on any big celebration. Well, at least I can give a big shout out to Lea and Shane and let them know I’ll be thinking about them over one of that awful green beers.
Ok, the War
I remember vividly the last gulf war. I was working the night shift as an intern at radio station FM99 down in Norfolk when Liz Gillet (the DJ for the evening) came in with an AP wire report that Iraqi tanks had rolled into Kuwait. From that point on it was rhetoric, coalition building, deployment, and all the usual hand-wringing that proceeds such a conflict. When the war finally came, it was a bizarre televised affair that had all of us glued to CNN for days on end.
So here we are again.
Let me start by saying that I support this war. Its not a decision I make lightly, nor one without reservations. I’m keenly aware that my Nation’s poor foreign policy decisions in the past may well have paved the way to this conflict. I dislike “nation building”, and I dislike the lives and expense it will cost, but still, I support this war.
So why? Well, there are innumerable issues on the periphery: “freeing” the Iraqi people, protecting American interests, bringing stability to the region, etc., etc. All of these are good and well, but none of them justifies in my mind a war against Iraq. There is only one issue that is really salient here:
Preemption – Does Iraq pose a credible and present threat to our nation, either directly or thru assistance it might provide to our enemies?
That’s it. That’s the only issue that’s really important me, and I believe the answer to that question is yes. Don’t ask me to prove my case because I really can’t. I don’t have a vast network of spies in Iraq reporting on hidden weapons, nor am I possessed of mystic mental powers enabling me to read the intentions of Saddam Hussein. But I am bright enough to know that burden of proof and level of threat MUST be balanced. If the danger was only from conventional weapons or traditional nation-to-nation conflict, I would want our nation to grudgingly wait for Iraq to strike first and provoke us with some clearly defined cause for war. However, the threat of nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons combined with a terrorist-style delivery changes this equation dramatically. The danger becomes nothing short of apocalyptic and I’m simply not willing to wait for an American city to be reduced to a glowing cinder before we have enough “proof” to act.
So I’m willing to trust our leaders when they assure me that Saddam does posses such weapons, and is planning to use them on us. And if Mr. Bush and his associates turn out to be wrong? Well, then a little “Regime Change” here at home seems more than warranted (via the polls, of course)…