September 12, 2004
Preventive War: A Failed Doctrine
If facts mattered in American politics, the Bush-Cheney ticket would not be basing its re-election campaign on the fear-mongering contention that the surest defense against future terrorist attacks lies in the badly discredited doctrine of preventive war. Vice President Cheney took this argument to a disgraceful low last week when he implied that electing John Kerry and returning to traditional American foreign policy values would invite a devastating new strike.
So far, the preventive war doctrine has had one real test: the invasion of Iraq. Mr. Bush terrified millions of Americans into believing that forcibly changing the regime in Baghdad was the only way to keep Iraq's supposed stockpiles of unconventional weapons out of the hands of Al Qaeda. Then it turned out that there were no stockpiles and no operational links between Saddam Hussein's regime and Al Qaeda's anti-American terrorism. Meanwhile, America's longstanding defensive alliances were weakened and the bulk of America's ground combat troops tied down in Iraq for what now appears to be many years to come. If that is making this country safer, it is hard to see how. The real lesson is that America dangerously erodes its military and diplomatic defenses when it charges off unwisely after hypothetical enemies.
Before the Iraq fiasco, American leaders rightly viewed war as a last resort, appropriate only when the nation's vital interests were actively threatened and reasonable diplomatic efforts had been exhausted. That view always left room for pre-emptive attacks; America is under no obligation to sit and wait, if it is clear that some enemy is actually preparing to strike first. But it correctly drew the line at preventive wars against potential foes who might, or might not, be thinking about doing something dangerous. As the administration's disastrous experience in Iraq amply demonstrates, that is still the wisest course and the one that keeps America most secure in an increasingly dangerous era.
The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, plainly ushered in a new era of catastrophic threats to the American homeland. If these are to be met effectively, major changes in national security policy will be required. But a shift toward preventive wars is not one of them. As the 9/11 commission report clearly established, international terrorist groups like Al Qaeda are highly mobile, self-financing and largely independent of traditional states. Governments that grant them sanctuary and facilities, like Afghanistan under the Taliban or Sudan, must face strong international pressure, including American military attack. Any attempt by the president and his surrogates to lump the invasion of Afghanistan into the category of preventive wars is plain wrong. In fact, the war in Iraq has undermined the important work that American forces are doing in Afghanistan by diverting soldiers, supplies and money.
Al Qaeda has already declared war on the United States, and America needs to fight back relentlessly - in Afghanistan and through international efforts to capture terrorist leaders who function with forged passports and visas, safe houses and sleeper cells. That is why Mr. Cheney is also wrong to disparage law-enforcement cooperation with allies as an important weapon in this war.
Instead, he promises more preventive, offensive wars against hypothetical dangers like Iraq. Besides estranging America from its main European and Asian allies, and leaving Washington looking like an aggressor to much of the Arab and Muslim world, these policies kill American soldiers and civilians in the countries attacked, and they threaten to tie down the Army and Marine divisions America needs to have available for responding to real threats in the dangerous decades ahead.
Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
They must have been too busy forging do ents with Rather to notice that both Russia and Britain came out embracing Bush's doctrine of preemption this week.Instead, he promises more preventive, offensive wars against hypothetical dangers like Iraq. Besides estranging America from its main European and Asian allies, and leaving Washington looking like an aggressor to much of the Arab and Muslim world,
Britian will take whatever action we take, regardless. Using them to argue your case it's pointless.
Russian adopts the same stategy simply because of their sitaution with chechnea (sp?), while the bush administratino fails to do that torwards the very same conflict.
It it is becoming more and more apparent that Iraq has not advanced the war on terror at all. It is still up for debate, but the longer the drags out, the more it seems to fit the definetino of being a BAD decision.
Exactly what was preempted when we invaded Iraq? North Korea is merrily building nuclear weapons and Iran is being cagey until they can get one together. Iraq had nothing, Nothing, NOTHING. This war is one horrible joke.
What about Libya? Was that a "joke"?
We did not know what Iraq had in the way of WMDs due to Hussein's lack of cooperation for well over a decade. Every major intel agency in the world believed he had them, as well as the current US administration and its predecessor.
We did know that Hussein was starting to support fundamentalist Islamic terrorism. We did know that he was skimming hundreds of millions from the UN Oil for Food program.
**** it. I guess we need to go back to the good old days when America did not address potential threats and instead waited for them to come to our shores and leave 3,000 dead, if not perhaps more.
The choice was not one between one of Hussein removed or Hussein left in a box. The sanctions scheme was starting to break down (Russia and France were dealing with the er) and as mentioned above he was already finding ways to get around those.
He had WMDs in the past. He used those before. Everyone ing believed that he had a desire to procure them and use them again.
What is a horrible joke is the dream that we can close our eyes and make these threats go away.
We did address the threat. We went into Afghanistan, destroyed the al-Queda bases, and beat up on the Taliban. Iraq had nothing or very little to do with 9/11, especially in comparison to our good oil-rich friend Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Getting rid of Hussein was nice, but I bet that Iraq will go right back to developing weapons very soon after we leave. Pakistan and Israel have the bomb, Iran is close, and no Iraqi ruler will want to be second-place behind them. The advantage of Hussein-in-a-box is that we had a world-supported box. Once we leave Iraq, we won't have that box anymore.
That's assuming we leave Iraq instead of becoming a semi-permanent occupier. I have read up to10 years of occupation from some pundits.
Leaving Hussein in power was not an option.
We can kid ourselves all we want. The Iraq war wasn't about terrorism but oil. Hussein and his sons were monsters, of that there is no doubt, but he was sitting on top of the second largest known reserve in the world that on a good day could kick out 2.5 million of barrels per day under the food for oil program, and because of a collapsing oil infrastructure due to sanctions and embargo. Compare that to the nearly 25 million barrels per day American companies draw from a bit larger field in Saudi Arabia. We are living in a world where the disruption of even 1 million barrels per day could send oil future prices ing.
If countries were selling weapons to Saddam, they sure didn't make much difference in the war and the administration would have already paraded them around going "see we told ya so".
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