Topic awaiting preservation: Stop the war against Iraq II (Page 3 of 3)

Doesn't the "law" we're referring to here state that a sovereign nation can only attack another after it has been physically attacked already?

No.
The law we are talking about is the United Nations Charter
More specifically, we are talking about chapter 7, articles 39, 41, 42 and 51
Article 39 gives the Security Council authority to determine a threat and determine an action
Article 41 gives authority to Security Council to use non-force methods to resolve situation
Article 42 gives authority to Security Council to use military methods to resolce situation
Article 51 specifically allows for self-defense "unitl the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security."

dictionary.com defines self-defense as "The right to protect oneself against violence or threatened violence with whatever force or means are reasonably necessary."
You can't possibly tell me that you think Nicaragua in the 1980s or Iraq today pose(d) any sort of real threat to the US, today (or in the 1980s) or anytime in the near future. There were no threats of attack (in either instance), there were no amassing of troops on our borders, there were no 'missle tests' over our airspace. The best GW and his administration can do is point to an Afghan (potential terrorist) who got medical treatment in northern Iraq. This is not, was not, and will not be 'self-defense'.

And let's make no mistake here at all. This is not some law thrown down upon us from an oppressive force...some law stacked against us. This law was largely written by the US, and was specifically written to give the US (and a few others) special priviledges. We are a member of the oligarchy.

Thanks for the clarification. But Iraq does in fact pose a direct threat to the United States and so what I was going to suggest is that we need to amend the law in order to allow for pre-emption like what we are doing right now in Iraq.

I want to hear more on that theory. How do you propose governing that sort of a situation? To allow preemptive strikes, without the Security Council approval, would be to encourage 'preemptive strikes' everywhere.
No problems solved, more created.

Lets take this situation back to the 1980s, when we were sponsering terrorism in Nicaragua. Would it have been justified for Nicaragua to bomb Washington? It is certainly the case that the US posed far more of a threat to Nicaragua and its people than Iraq poses to us today.

Today, India poses a threat to Pakistan. One could very easily argue that India is a greater threat to Pakistan (and vice versa) than Iraq poses to the US today. What is to keep Pakistan from firing a couple nukes into New Delhi in 'preemptive self-defense'? Would that be justified?

Where is the line? The line can not be 'wherever the US says it is'. That is not law. That is rule by the fear of an unstable dictator.

This is not to say that the way things are today are great. They aren't. There are better ways to deal with this sort of situation, for sure.
One thing that I'm in favor of is doing away with the Security Council as a permanent body. I'd like to see the members, all members, rotate on and off the Council in staggered terms of some relatively short amount of time (6 years maybe?). Also, no veto power to anybody. Everything is passed (or not passed) by a 66% majority of the Security Council OR at least a simple majority of the General Assembly.
Any member should be able to bring a grievance to the Security Council.

My rambling thoughts on restructuring the UN, though, are not worth much.
Tell me more about how you would keep this preemptive strike policy from letting the world be overrun by the most powerful? How would your way bring more law, more peace, more justice?

mobrul makes some good points. The links between Saddam and a potential WMD attack on the US are tenuous (and thats being charitable) and much better cases can be made as mobrul's examples show. Another one would be that a much stronger case could be made for the UK making a pre-emptive strike on the US thanks to its fund raising for the IRA (Noraid). Only Jack Ryan made much of an impact on that subject

Self-defense can only be claimed if there is a direct threat and despite some very weak and tortuous reasoning there is no evidence of a direct link.

Most of the legal discussion I have read about was focused on whether 1441 was worded so that it provided a mandate for war. Arguing about the meaning of the wording must always be a grey area open to interpretation which leaves the politicians and the soldiers open to charges of war crimes I'm afraid.

And yes I'm sure G.W. Bush could be arrested if you travelled to a country that was inclined to extradite him for war crimes but as he was never mcuh of a traveller before he became president I can't see that being much of a risk for him afterwards

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Emps

FAQs: Emperor

Hmmm...Bugs this

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But Iraq does in fact pose a direct threat to the United States

--Bugs

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Is just not true. Iraq may (or may not) at some time in the future, have posed a direct threat to America...but that is all postulation. The fact is, Iraq has never posed a direct threat to the US. To Kuwait, and other Arab states(and Israel), yes, but never America.

Potiential threat is something else, entirely. But on this, one cannot base a decision to go to war. There must be a will by the suspected aggressor to actually do this, and actions, that support this. Otherwise, one is reduced to the fantasy, and suspicion. On such, one cannot base a decision to go to war. Otherwise, we will have war everytime someone looks at someone else a bit cross-eyed.

In the case with Iraq, there was never a direct threat to the US. Never. There was an indirect threat to our national interests (Oil), but that was dealt with soundly, in the Gulf War. Unfortunately, that War also produced Bin Laden and Al Qaida.

Bin Laden, for example, has proved to be a direct threat to the US (though I hardly think he is capable of destroying the US, he has shown that he is capable of attacking and damaging the US).

The Soviets of the Cold War were a direct threat to the US...and were capable of destroying the US. China could be considered a direct threat to the US...and could destroy it.

Most other threats are more along the lines of indirect threats, and not really capable of destroying the US (though many of them could cause a lot of destruction and misery).

It appears that the central part of the British Government's September dossier on Iraq was forged (and the FBI have been asked to investigate):
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A59403-2003Mar7.html
www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0308-06.htm
www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0314-11.htm

The dossier is here (the relevant bit is chapter 3 section 20):
http://usinfo.state.gov/regional/nea/iraq/text/dossier01c.htm

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Following the departure of weapons inspectors in 1998 there has been an accumulation of intelligence indicating that Iraq is making concerted covert efforts to acquire dual-use technology and materials with nuclear applications. Iraq's known holdings of processed uranium are under IAEA supervision. But there is intelligence that Iraq has sought the supply of significant quantities of uranium from Africa. Iraq has no active civil nuclear power programme or nuclear power plants and therefore has no legitimate reason to acquire uranium.

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Emps

FAQs: Emperor

I honestly don't know how this should work in the Security Council. I have not given much thought to how it could be reconfigured to actually be a force for good in this world. Currently it is not a force for good *and* it is impotent.

I like the idea of doing some reorganizing of the UN though. It should be abundantly clear it is useless when it comes to taking action in the Security Council. I am not quarreling with the UN's humanitarian functions and I would like to see those continue.

In fact, perhaps that is where the UN should begin and end its functions and we can pull together another international mechanism for actually dealing with real geo-political problems with the ability to enforce corrective actions.

That being said, I have *serious* misgivings about treating every nation equally. How can we speak of justice, freedom, and democratic ideals when we give equal weight to totalitarian states, dictatorships, and liberal democracies alike? It makes no sense to me and it represents what I see in much of the UN now.

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Where is the line? The line can not be 'wherever the US says it is'. That is not law. That is rule by the fear of an unstable dictator.

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I will agree with you it cannot be just the US say so. But it can be part of the say so of nations that are democracies. We must make a distinction between nations and I reject this treatment of heinous governments on an equal footing with countries that do live by democratic ideals and the rule of law.

How can you equate Nicragua in the 80s to the US? Communism is not as good as Democracy. That is why we opposed Nicaragua. I am not going to argue our methods in this post but I am going to state that our opposition to Soviet satellites in Central America as most definitely justified.

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What is to keep Pakistan from firing a couple nukes into New Delhi in 'preemptive self-defense'? Would that be justified?

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Again, every situation is different. This cookie cutter approach is doomed if we cannot take into account individual situations. India and Pakistan are both nations where diplomacy has more than a good chance of having a positive effect. They have not blown each other to bits yet because they recognize the danger of war and believe it or not, recognize that negotiations can be productive when both sides have a certain agreement on principle.

Saddam Hussein's Iraq has demontrated since its inception that diplomacy is used only as a means to weaken the other side. He has repeatedly attacked his neighbors without regard to international law, the UN, or any other entity. He acts solely for his own purposes. In other words, diplomacy has been taken to the nth degree with his regime it is NO LONGER A VIABLE OPTION. That is why Iraq is a different situation.

The UN knows it. France even knows it. So the only other option would be to allow him to grow until he does it again. That is crazy! And we are not going to let him get that far and I am glad that someone is willing to do this especially when the UN is not.

mobrul, my biggest problem with your last post is the moral equivalence in your words. I am reading from it that you see no difference between communist states, right wing dicactorships, liberal democracies, or benevolent monarchies, when it comes to internation relations. Is that how you see all these countries? Please tell me if I'm off base on that.

I am trying to understand your point of view and please bear with me as I try to articulate my feelings and thoughts on this. I know emotions are running high right now and mine are definitlely higher than normal so if anything I've just said raises blood pressure, please take a moment to reflect and help me see why because it is not my intention to inflame our discussion but it's just hard to articulate when passions are high.

[edit] double post madness [/edit]

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Tell me more about how you would keep this preemptive strike policy from letting the world be overrun by the most powerful? How would your way bring more law, more peace, more justice?

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mobrul, I don't know why we can't see this jointly. The only way to ensure peace, law, and justice is to ensure that the most powerful agrees with those values.

Might does make Right as a practical matter of world governance. This is why I get so confused when we discuss this. How can it be any other way?

That being said, I believe we can work toward what you describe but we have to constantly be careful not to allow states that don't hold these ideals hijack institutions established by countries that do. You cannot have Sudan heading up human rights committees and say we have a viable UN. They still have slavery! What am I missing?

Here is an article that lays out some guidelines (albeit in the Just War tradition) about how and why "preemption" must be integrated in today's international dealings.

Moral Clarity in a Time of War

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This ?regime factor? is crucial in the moral analysis, for weapons of mass destruction are clearly not aggressions waiting to happen when they are possessed by stable, law?abiding states. No Frenchman goes to bed nervous about Great Britain?s nuclear weapons, and no sane Mexican or Canadian worries about a preemptive nuclear attack from the United States. Every sane Israeli, Turk, or Bahraini, on the other hand, is deeply concerned about the possibility of an Iraq or Iran with nuclear weapons and medium?range ballistic missiles. If the ?regime factor? is crucial in the moral analysis, then preemptive military action to deny the rogue state that kind of destructive capacity would not, in my judgment, contravene the ?defense against aggression? concept of just cause. Indeed, it would do precisely the opposite, by giving the concept of ?defense against aggression? real traction in the world we must live in, and transform.

Some will argue that this violates the principle of sovereignty and risks a global descent into chaos. To that, I would reply that the post?Westphalian notions of state equality and sovereign immunity assume at least a minimum of acquiescence to minimal international norms of order. Today?s rogue states cannot, on the basis of their behavior, be granted that assumption. Therefore, they have forfeited that immunity. The ?regime factor? is determinative, in these extreme instances.

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As for rogue states developing or deploying weapons of mass destruction, a developed just war tradition would recognize that here, too, last resort cannot be understood mathematically, as the terminal point of a lengthy series of nonmilitary alternatives. Can we not say that last resort has been satisfied in those cases when a rogue state has made plain, by its conduct, that it holds international law in contempt and that no diplomatic solution to the threat it poses is likely, and when it can be demonstrated that the threat the rogue state poses is intensifying? I think we can. Indeed, I think we must.

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[This message has been edited by Bugimus (edited 03-19-2003).]

Heh. Well, military advisors have been saying such for a long time...about every time someone comes out with a new type of weapon, that is 'unstopable', or largely feared.

Fazit : Pre-emption must be a last option. It's also one, that carries with it a huge responsibility. And in the wake of a post-humiliated UN, the policy of pre-emption leaves major questions behind it...and before it : who is allowed (and under what circumstances) to pre-empt? As it is now, just about anyone, that has a 'grievance'...or any reason to do it. Because Mr. Bush did not lay enough 'evidence' at the feet of the UN, it gives a precidence, for anyone to pre-empt anyone...a very dangerous world, if you ask me...irregardless of how one 'justifies it'. What if that (which you posted) is taken and used by every country? America, as the 'Super power' does set the tone, for most of the world, in what it does. In light of that, Mr. Bush has really given the world the 'green light' to pre-empt away...under any 'pretense'.

I find that not only scary, but irresponsible. This is why it was so important (IMHO) to get UN support on this. I expect drastic consequences from the failure to do so...

What if North Korea 'pre-emps' South Korea? Under the actions taken by the US against Iraq, they would have just as valid reasons to do that, as the US did to attack Iraq. It also leaves the question fully open, about what Isreal has been doing to it's neighbors...and may be planning against Syria. Or Iran. It also leaves the door wide open for China to 'assimilate' Taiwan.

Now, history shows that pre-emption as a tactic and as a policy has always bourne with it grave consequences. It is, in fact, a short-term solution, that in the long run, only causes greater problems (even if the pre-emption totally eliminates the current threat). A policy of pre-emption tends to make friends nervous of allies, and enemies downright paranoid of each other, which is really not conducive to a peaceful atmosphere. In fact, enemies will be tempted to pre-empt one another before they are pre-empted in turn...which then leads to a deadly spiral downwards...and any suspicion (real or imagined) is the 'trigger' for a pre-emption.

Personally, I believe that there are better methods of dealing with the worlds problems....as was demonstrated in the Cold War. More diplomacy, less war.

As for India and Pakistan, well, they've been in a conflict for years...over the Kashmir region. And no amount of diplomacy has solved the question. As for the nuclear issue, they were really on the brink...and it could happen again, as fast as one can blink.

Bugs, I am very sorry I only have a short time to post this morning. I wish I could write longer, but I simply don't have the time today.

There are differences in regimes. Some are good. Some are bad. Most are just kinda there. The problem with you drawing this sort of line between human rights and this attack (very middle-class suburban leftist of you =) ) is what I've been saying all along. Namely, we are not going to install anyone who is any better!
Of course this is all theory at this point, I, nor most anybody else, could possibly know what is on Bush's mind right now, but we can look at the evidence and take a good guess.

All the things that the New American Century people have been writing (that would be most of the Bush staff), all of the stuff that the other right wing think tanks have been writing, all point to a desire to use Iraq as the first step in total regional domination.
Secondly, look at our history. Since WWII, the US has used force and the threat of force, legally and otherwise, to install and/or support some of the most brutal dictators of our time.
It started, as far as I can tell, with hiring Nazis to help us dominate Argentina almost immediately after the war.
Some of our favorites, in no particular order:

Pol Pot -- we gave some $85 million to Pol Pot over the course of a decade
Pinochet
Hussein -- when he 'gassed his own people' in 1988, we praised him and sent him more weapons
Suharto -- referred to by an official of the C*****n administration in 1996 as "our kind of guy."
Supporting Turkey oppression of the Kurds
Supporting Indonesia oppression, occupation, murder and torture in East Timor
Supporting apartheid in South Africa
Supporting Israeli oppression, occupation, murder and torture of the Palestinians
Death squads in Guatemala -- some trained at an army run terrorist camp right here in the USA
Death squads in El Salvador -- some trained at an army run terrorist camp right here in the USA
Saudi Arabia

So, as I've said all along, if you or anybody else can convince me of three things I'll step in and totally, absolutely support the war, UN or not:
a) the seeds of a liberal, multi-ethnic, secular democracy will be formed in Iraq
b) the people of Iraq will be encouraged and given every chance in the world to use and sell their resources as they see fit. Not as US or UK oil companies see fit, but as the people of Iraq see fit.
c) we do everything we can to minimize, even eliminate civilian casualties

I don't see either of those first two things happening. This isn't ancient history I'm talking about. I'm not digging up Jackson purposefully giving the Indians small pox infested blankets, the Trail of Tears or slavery. Most of the things I've listed above were supported by our President's father, either while he was Pres., VP, or head of the CIA. Some of them are still happening today.
When the sun rises every morning and sets every night, one can only assume it is going to do the same tomorrow.

Attempt to fix...

Those are some of the reasons, Mobrul, that I think the US should be allowed to go in and deal with some of these guys. We MADE them. It's our responsibility to fix the issues we've created. From the sounds of it we're also trying to keep Turkey out of Northern Iraq, effectively supplying precedence to the Kurds in southern Turkey (Providing the Kurds in Northern Iraq manage to build a Kurdistan). People can't continue to blame us for making/helping these guys be the terrors they are and then oppose us when we try to fix the issue. God forbid they actually help us and then have a say in what happens afterwards. Such as keeping the US/UK hands off of the oil fields so that they actually go to the Iraqi's (which is still a supposition on your part).

It's just as well that you aren't bringing up ancient history. The US doesn't have one. As it goes, the US is a young country and we've made many mistakes. Our country was built by war and it will take a long time to shake that out of the American mindset I would imagine. How many other coutries around the world were perfect and pristine in their first couple hundred years of sovereignity?

A 10 year old with an M16 is going to make some terrible mistakes and do some terrible things. How fast is he going to learn from those mistakes? Pretty damn fast, if you ask me. I'm not saying that the US should go unopposed but I think that direct opposition only for the sake of opposition is going to make a beast out of the US. Some tempering aid and understanding would probably be a better influence.

GrythusDraconis
"I'm sick of hearing that beauty is only skin-deep. That's deep enough. Who wants an adorable pancreas?" - Unknown

Actually the US was build on genocide, slavery and war. Violence has always played a core role in American history, and in the soul...and is offset by bravery, freedom, and the spirit of adventure. A strange mixture...