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A Fork In the Road to Hell There seems to be a misunderstanding about the aims of the United States in a war with Iraq. In these post September 11th days, a number of Americans -- many of them in the news media -- are caught up in the Popularity Contest, worrying about why the United States isn't trusted in various parts of the world. There are questions popping up all over about why the US is no longer thought of as "the good guys;" protests that a war with Iraq would be "another war for oil," conspiracy theories that the US was planning a war with Afghanistan long before September 11th, 2001, in order to build an oil pipeline. Suspicions worldwide that a war with Iraq is simply to take that nation's oil reserves for the US. Much of this is ill-informed and ill-timed. The US isn't trusted in some parts of the world because the US is the only remaining superpower, with an economy, an army and weapons that cannot be matched. That alone is reason to distrust us, especially if you're French, power-hungry or Nelson Mandela. The US has become the world's policeman, for better or worse. That happened during the Carter years (1977-80) if not earlier, as many columnists have noted. We're committed to world markets and ending hunger worldwide and have been for decades, and in cooperation with many other nations the fight against hunger and poverty is making inroads. United Nations poverty figures support this conclusion. And the US has worked and does work hard for cooperation between nations, both in markets and in political matters. But we can't be all things to all people, so many will distrust us and many others will attempt to subvert even our best intentions. This is all part of human nature -- it's politics 101. But some in the news media and many on the Internet seem to have forgotten this. America has a conscience. Americans were wracked with guilt about the bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima and worked to clear those cities and fund a huge rebuilding effort. The horror of Dresden during World War II was not lost on the American public. Even today, there is much sympathy among Americans for the starving people of Iraq, who've been subject to UN sanctions since the Gulf War more than a decade ago. But a war for oil? Our oil supplies are currently safe and plentiful. We have friends in Mexico, Argentina, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, even Russia -- well, the list goes on. The US is running out of oil? Quite the contrary, oil is plentiful even in our offshore drills. Going to war with Iraq is not just about oil. It's much, much more complicated than that, and those who think it's "for oil" are being simplistic at best. It's about politics and weapons and Israel. It's about Saddam Hussein, an avowed enemy of the United States and its power, a sharp leader who wants to prove to the world that he can take on the US and humiliate it while systematically destroyed his people. He who defeats the king is then king, or so he thinks. Consequently, Saddam stockpiled weapons, lied to the world about it, rubbed the nose of the United Nations in his slick manipulations then undoubtedly went about the sordid business of stockpiling even more and dangerous weapons. Or so Presidents Bush, Clinton and Bush have told us over and over. The US has been committed, since World War II, to taking on menaces in various parts of the world. Yes, the choosing of battles to fight has often been poor: the Korean War was a much-needed faceoff against further aggression; Vietnam and some of the US battles since, though, have been marred by ill-conceived political considerations that resulted in the needless ruin of many lives, lots of them American. I'm not one to demonize Saddam Hussein; he's a politician like politicians around the world. His manipulations prove he's not just another madman. He wants to remain in power, to put his sons in power, to reap all the comforts and "rewards" of power. And he's sly, with a keen eye for public relations. His word is often headlines in the West, while our own political leaders are sometimes relegated to Section B. But it is in the interest of no one in the world for Saddam Hussein to stockpile any weapons that could kill thousands, in Iraq or elsewhere. And it is too big a risk for Saddam Hussein to acquire nuclear weapons. This is the "balance of power" argument going on in worldwide political circles and at parties right now. For the US to attack Iraq, well, that might upset the balance of power throughout the Middle East. But consider: For Iraq (which appears to be close) or for Iran or Jordan or Egypt or Saudi Arabia to gain atomic weapons -- that will not upset, it will entirely redefine the balance of power in the Middle East. Add missiles that can deliver nuclear weapons to whatever nation is deemed the "enemy" of the moment, and you have a redefining of the balance of power in the entire hemisphere. And depending on the range of those missiles (2,000 miles? 10,000 miles?), the balance of power is upset worldwide, and again there will be the fear that hostile nuclear weapons are, as President Clinton once put it, "aimed at the children of America." Israel is understandably already upset about the nuclear-weapons delivery potential of Iraq and Iran. It's assumed that Israel will be Target One should such weapons come into play. But the US started the whole thing with Nagasaki and Hiroshima, some say; it's incumbent upon us to do whatever we can to keep nuclear weapons out of "the hands of madmen." Too many nations already possess such weapons, perhaps a dozen at last count, though some nuke watchers believe the number of nations possessing nuclear weapons or the ability to build nuclear weapons given the right circumstances is more than two dozen! It's in no one's interest for an open membership drive into the Nuclear Weapons Club. And Iraq, UN experts have said, will likely have nuclear weapons within five years. Why not wait until Iraq is close to getting nuclear weapons, then attack? In other words, why now? Why not put off any attack until later? That argument is specious; Saddam has proven he only wants to talk about weapons in order to give himself more time (for what?); and he only wants to talk when the pressure's on. Meanwhile, he cooperates little with the UN, defying the will of most of the rest of the world, allowing economic sanctions to remain in place, starving his own people. Those who don't agree with this premise are those who haven't been paying attention or don't remember the past ten years. A war for oil? If Saddam already had a couple of crude nuclear weapons, he'd probably use them on the oil fields of Iraq, making much of them useless for years to come. It seems likely he'd use biological and chemical weapons on battlefields in his country, if he had them, making the oil fields inaccessible for years to come. Remember, he set fire to the oil wells when it looked like he was losing the Gulf War. The US is only interested in oil? Oh, some say, then that explains why the US and its allies planned an "invasion" of Afghanistan months before September 11th -- to put the long-planned oil pipeline from the Caspian Sea (home of one of the largest oil reserves in the world) through Afghanistan and Pakistan to a warm water port. This, too, is a foolish argument. It's a natural gas pipeline that was planned there. Sure, oil can be sent through such a pipeline too. But that's not been the plan, which was dismissed years ago. And any oil pipeline doesn't have to go through Afghanistan. It would be more expedient to bring the oil to the Mediterranean Sea, for dispersal to the West, if that be the intention. Logistically, it's not a good idea, but it can be done more simply that way. Just look at a world map. The "it's all for oil" argument seems like the premise some people have even before they've heard the facts. Just take the position, as some do, that the US is only out to conquer oil markets around the world. Then take the events of the day, whether chasing Osama or threatening Saddam or buddying up to Russia or suffering the worst terror attack in history, and bend the events to fit the premise. "Oh, it's all for oil." Never mind the geopolitical strategy of setting up allied military bases in Afghanistan and/or Iraq. Never mind the protecting of allies such as Europe and Israel and Egypt against possible later aggression by Saddam or anyone else. "Hey, the Europeans don't feel threatened by Saddam, what's the problem?" "And if we go after Saddam," the debate goes on, "the rest of the world will hate us and we'll lose the World's Most-Loved Nation contest that we've been striving to win for decades." News flash: We lost the World's Most-Loved Nation contest decades ago. Well, we can try harder to win friends, can't we? We could put a big smiley-face on the American flag, right there among the fifty stars. Or we can take an oath before the United Nations, pledging "No matter what we do, it's never to be for the oil." Or we can perfect our missile defense system, build bomb shelters galore, pull all our troops and ships back to the States, cross our fingers and hope for the best. Or maybe we can make a blanket apology to every other nation of the world for our ingenuity, wealth, power and concern for free markets and political stability everywhere. We can say we're sorry we're trying to lead the world to what we believe to be a better way of living, sorry we're trying to remove the threats that make the lives of billions of people miserable and short, sorry we want a better world where poverty is diminished if not wiped out, where human life has value and science and knowledge are a good thing and not anathema to Allah or God or Buddah. After all, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. And bad foresight. -- Mike Shiloh |
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