RE: Join the not-knowers, was RE: Giant anti-war demonstration in Melbourne

From: Greg Burch (gregburch@gregburch.net)
Date: Mon Feb 17 2003 - 19:23:05 MST

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    . . . zipping through for one rapid-fire burst and then back to shallow
    list skimming ...

    > -----Original Message-----
    > From: Emlyn O'regan
    > Sent: Monday, February 17, 2003 7:32 PM
    > Lee Daniel Crocker wrote:
    > > I'm still in the undecided camp; if my rhetoric lately has been
    > > somewhat hawkish, it's only because I'm truly embarrassed at the
    > > pathetic quality of arguments I see from the other side. There
    > > probably are some legitimate arguments for not acting right
    > away, but
    > > all I've heard from the anti-war crowd is the usual pacifist drivel
    > > that war is wrong, there must be a better way, yada yada.

    For the record, I'm still undecided and ambivalent.
     
    > My general argument is that you don't go to war against
    > someone unless you have a good reason to. I haven't seen a
    > single argument supporting going to war with Iraq that didn't
    > look plain stupid.
    >
    > Someone tell me, poor silly fool that I am, why anyone would
    > want to go to war with Iraq?

    Here's the best reason I can articulate: In 1991 Saddam Hussein agreed
    to the terms of an armistice that mandated complete disarmament of WMDs
    and transparent disclosure of all information regarding the WMD programs
    Iraq had at the time. This shifted the burden of proof to the Baghdad
    regime to prove they had completely disarmed. Hussein has not complied
    with that complete disclosure and, over the last 12 years, has
    repeatedly interfered with attempts to verify his compliance. On a
    purely legalistic basis, this is a breach of the terms of the armistice
    and restores the situation to the status quo ante, i.e. UN-sanctioned
    hostilities between the coalition powers and Iraq. Further, given the
    shifting of the burden of proof inherent in the terms of the armistice,
    those favoring war can argue that we can presume Iraq's possession of
    WMDs, justifying forced disarmament. These are "reasons" to go to war
    with Iraq in the simple sense that failure to do so undermines the force
    of all international order: If the Baghdad regime can violate the terms
    of the armistice with impunity, then no treaty is worth the paper it's
    written on.

    Given the above, I'd say there is an ironclad "legal" argument
    supporting resumption of hostilities against Iraq to carry through to
    fulfillment the terms of the armistice. Over against this are less
    clear-cut, but nonetheless weighty arguments of diplomacy, statecraft
    and humanitarianism, none of which support one side or the other of the
    debate without doubt. Thus my ambivalence.

    Greg Burch
    Vice-President, Extropy Institute
    http://www.gregburch.net



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