Thoughts of a Political Turncoat
I never said I knew everything. I don't. I don't know if Iraq has WOMD. I don't know if Bush is really only doing this for oil. But for weeks before the war, I was against it, and now I'm pro. I guess its because I was never really against war in the first place.
Initially, I was in the third of the country that supported war if the UN agreed. This is because I don't know all the info, and I assume that the people in charge up at the UN Security Council do. Thanks to France, however, the US never got permission to go to war, but it never really got denyed permission to strike. Bush is right: The UN in its current form is useless because it can't do anything that one of the permament members of the Security Council is against. A change up there needs to happen for the UN to be at all relevant. A new way for the veto to work, so that one country can't hold the rest of the world at bay.
Anyway, because of the veto, the third of the US in the middle now have to change their position. There is no real middle ground. And I chose Pro-war.
First off, this is not about oil. There is oil in Texas, there's oil off the coast of California, there's oil in a lot of places. Iraq just happens to have a lot of oil that is currently accessable. Oil may be a ulterior motive, but not the only, and certaintly not the main, reason.
Also, the whole "Like father, like son" argument is pure BS. Clinton also fired a few hundred missiles at Iraq a few years ago, remember? This is not a Father/Son thing, or a Republican thing. Sadaam is just PO'ing the US a lot.
And why? Because Sadaam has violated the UN many times. In the weeks prior to the war, Iraq magically found these new weapons that were not there a few months ago. In the first few hours of the war, SCUD missiles that exceeded the range set forth by the UN were fired at Kuwait. Fortunately, almost all of them were shot down by patriot missiles, and the only one that wasn't KO'ed by the patriots went into the ocean.
I would rather have UN support instead of going in to this with only the UK and Spain backing us, but I'll support the US because we do have the right to protect ourselves. And the last person of the face of the Earth that I would want to have a nuke would be Sadaam.
I don't like war. I like war games, true. I like how you can fight battles with SIMULATED people to kill other SIMULATED people in a Fantasy or Sci-Fi enviornment. However, having taken US History last year, I realize that sometimes war is the only option. There has to be a point when war must happen. When Great Britain and France were willing to sign off on Austria and Czecheslovakia, Germany merely gained territory it would have trouble aquiring in a war. The same thing could be said for the UN allowing Iraq to keep stalling inspectors for a decade.
Basically, I blame France for this. By acting in the interests of peace, they caused war. Had France not vetoed the request for permission to go to war against Iraq, then the UN would have said something. If the security council had voted "no" on war, then the US would not have any support except for the hard-line chickenhawks, and Bush would have had to think twice about going ahead with the fight. However, if the Security Council had voted "yes" to war, then the protests/riots would be much smaller.
Of course, Sadaam and Bush are also to blame, but France also played a part in this :).
I never said I knew everything. I don't. I don't know if Iraq has WOMD. I don't know if Bush is really only doing this for oil. But for weeks before the war, I was against it, and now I'm pro. I guess its because I was never really against war in the first place.
Initially, I was in the third of the country that supported war if the UN agreed. This is because I don't know all the info, and I assume that the people in charge up at the UN Security Council do. Thanks to France, however, the US never got permission to go to war, but it never really got denyed permission to strike. Bush is right: The UN in its current form is useless because it can't do anything that one of the permament members of the Security Council is against. A change up there needs to happen for the UN to be at all relevant. A new way for the veto to work, so that one country can't hold the rest of the world at bay.
Anyway, because of the veto, the third of the US in the middle now have to change their position. There is no real middle ground. And I chose Pro-war.
First off, this is not about oil. There is oil in Texas, there's oil off the coast of California, there's oil in a lot of places. Iraq just happens to have a lot of oil that is currently accessable. Oil may be a ulterior motive, but not the only, and certaintly not the main, reason.
Also, the whole "Like father, like son" argument is pure BS. Clinton also fired a few hundred missiles at Iraq a few years ago, remember? This is not a Father/Son thing, or a Republican thing. Sadaam is just PO'ing the US a lot.
And why? Because Sadaam has violated the UN many times. In the weeks prior to the war, Iraq magically found these new weapons that were not there a few months ago. In the first few hours of the war, SCUD missiles that exceeded the range set forth by the UN were fired at Kuwait. Fortunately, almost all of them were shot down by patriot missiles, and the only one that wasn't KO'ed by the patriots went into the ocean.
I would rather have UN support instead of going in to this with only the UK and Spain backing us, but I'll support the US because we do have the right to protect ourselves. And the last person of the face of the Earth that I would want to have a nuke would be Sadaam.
I don't like war. I like war games, true. I like how you can fight battles with SIMULATED people to kill other SIMULATED people in a Fantasy or Sci-Fi enviornment. However, having taken US History last year, I realize that sometimes war is the only option. There has to be a point when war must happen. When Great Britain and France were willing to sign off on Austria and Czecheslovakia, Germany merely gained territory it would have trouble aquiring in a war. The same thing could be said for the UN allowing Iraq to keep stalling inspectors for a decade.
Basically, I blame France for this. By acting in the interests of peace, they caused war. Had France not vetoed the request for permission to go to war against Iraq, then the UN would have said something. If the security council had voted "no" on war, then the US would not have any support except for the hard-line chickenhawks, and Bush would have had to think twice about going ahead with the fight. However, if the Security Council had voted "yes" to war, then the protests/riots would be much smaller.
Of course, Sadaam and Bush are also to blame, but France also played a part in this :).
posted by Wraithy at 3/30/2003 04:19:00 PM
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