With the upcoming Presidential elections, Iraq is a hot topic. Sure, the war has had its ups and downs, and the loss of American lives keeps rising, but is Bush and his Administration really to blame for what happened in Iraq? Let’s take a closer look.
It appears that most Americans are against the war in Iraq. But let’s go back a few years before the war started. Americans seem to forget that the majority were FOR the war, and the reasons why we went to war in the first place.
For those that argue the U.S. did not exhaust peaceful alternatives to war, we must go back and follow the events that happened after the first Gulf War. No one will argue that the Persian Gulf War was a success since it essentially took a few days, with little loss of American life. Soon after the war, the United States left Saddam in power in hopes of resolving their differences peacefully. The United States had the power to “dethrone” Saddam at the time, but didn’t. Instead, the U.S. government tried to work with the United Nations to force Iraq to follow international laws and restrictions. Clearly, this was an attempt to maintain peace in the Middle East.
So what happened? Believe it or not, Saddam continued hostility for many years after the first war by shooting at U.S. F-14’s patrolling the No Fly Zone. The menacing gesture would only test the U.S.’s patience time after time. The main problem was the lack of authority and power portrayed by the United Nations. The U.N. was the governing authoring power to deal with Iraq after the first Gulf War. Their lack of dominance and failed diplomacy with Iraq forced Saddam to make a mockery of the international community.
Saddam enjoyed disobeying the U.N. resolutions. The U.N. was never able to successfully use its military power against Iraq when they were required to conduct their routine inspections of Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction. It’s obvious that the U.N. had enough reasonable suspicion that Iraq held questionable weapons that could threat world peace, or else they would not have tried to enforce resolution after resolution against the country.
The policies against Iraq would have been a continual failure had the U.N. remained in control. The United States was the determining power to enforce the international laws and make Iraq abide by them.
Shortly before the 2nd war, Bush followed peaceful negotiations with the U.N. to force the organization to follow up its resolutions with the country. After several resolutions, and yet more failed attempts to get Iraq to agree with terms, the road to war would be inevitable.
The night before the initial invasion, Bush even gave Saddam the option to leave the country and seek political asylum in Jordan, but yet his stubborn nature convinced him that he would be able to protect his country from a super power.
Let us not forget how swift and successful the initial invasion was, despite the low support of international armies. The lack of support from the international community is partly to blame for the conditions that resulted after the invasion. Had the United Nations done their job, the United States would have never invaded Iraq, and Saddam would more than likely be in power right now.
So you may ask,”What about lying about weapons of mass destruction?” Well, it wasn’t really a lie. It was known that Saddam was attempting to foster weapons. Why then would he give the U.N. such a hard time about inspections if he hadn’t any weapons of mass destruction? The United States had a reasonable suspicion that Saddam was hiding weapons, which would give the U.S. jurisdiction for its forceful search. Theoretically, had Saddam abided by the resolutions and inspections, set by the U.N., the United States would have no reason to invade Iraq, unless Iraq was the aggressor.
Another reason for invading Iraq was that there was proof that Al Qeada did have training camps within the country.
So today, it is easy to point the finger, and blame Bush. Bush only did what he had to do, to enforce international law and ensure the safety of his allies and the United States. Let’s not forget the many Americans and coalition forces who have died protecting world freedom and our way of life.
Let us not compare the war in Iraq with Vietnam. Vietnam suffered the loss of over 60,000 American lives, and currently 3,800 Americans have died in Iraq since 2003. THIS DOES NOT COMPARE. Comparing to Vietnam is just another way to point the finger and put blame.
Let’s not blame our leaders, or our country, but let’s blame the world. The United Nations is to blame.
By - RST
11/29/07
http://www.iguanawin.com/
http://www.iguanawin.com/
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