From: matus (matus@snet.net)
Date: Sun Mar 30 2003 - 11:23:22 MST
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Robert J. Bradbury
>
> On Sat, 29 Mar 2003, matus wrote:
>
> > As Robert Bradbury pointed out, leaving Saddam in power will cause more
> > deaths of Iraqi people then taking him out of power. He asked anyone
> > to present a reasonable challenge to that notion, and received no
> > responses as of yet.
>
> Actually Michael I did receive a couple of offlist posts questioning
> (validly I think) some of my assumptions.
Sorry, I should have specified no *public* responses as of yet.
> The most significant of
> which (IMO) is the question of whether the U.S./U.K./Au will have
> to completely eliminate the Republican Guard (probably 100K+ individuals,
> similar to the casulties in Gulf War I) in order to take out Saddam
> and the ~100 top level individuals that constitute his "regime"...
> If that turns out to be necessary then my calculations may be
> somewhat more questionable from a utilitarian perspective.
That seems a good point, if the justification of this war relied on a dead
through action vs. dead through inaction comparison based on drawing out
rates of dead in the past linearly into the future, this would definately
deserve some deep consideration. Note my qualifier of drawing out past
rates linearly.
> > We do not support war because we like to see people die, or get
> our jollies
> > off of watching bombs fall in Iraq, and until you understand the reasons
> > *why* those of us who actually support this effort support it,
> and address
> > those points, your comments will not persuade anyone.
>
> I think this the key point that Hubert, Max and others need to understand.
> I refused to return my draft card during the Vietnam war until my father
> (who had served in WWII) made it clear he would throw me out of the house
> if I did not do so. I am *NOT* a "fan" of war. *But* I am very aware
> (much more aware than most people on the list) of how the technologies
> for developing/producing WMD are becoming increasingly available to
> both rogue nation-states as well as terrorist organizations.
>
I guess it should not surprise me that you received very little response to
this concern. You hit the nail on the head. This is, indeed, the primary
reason why I support this in addition to the previous ones mentioned. There
is nothing that scares me more than realizing that in the future fewer and
fewer people will be able to committ mass tragedies easier and easier. We
need, ASAP, to remove the primary cuases of all this animosity. Giving
everybody in the world an avenue to better themselves will remove a LOT of
the animosity that breeds terrorists, hatred, and intollerence. Nothing
would benefit the Arab community more than a wealthy free democracy in IRAQ.
While in the short term, this will cause more animosity, in the long term,
it will open up the Arab world to freedom and democracy, which will stem
animosity.
This whole scenerio scares me honestly, as there are a lot more 'tribes' who
animosity could wipe out life on earth. The greens, for example, may one
day see it better to wipe off all humans on this planet, we are just raping
and pillaging it, after all. And what does a 'reasonable' person do to
someone who is raping and pillaging? *shudder* I can not think of a way to
work to diminish the animosity of some of these groups, which is why I am
involved in and support the lifeboat foundation (www.lifeboat.com)
For starters though, lets try to bring the arab nations out of the corrupt,
oppressed middle ages their murderous dictators and theocracies keep them
in. Right now one must be a motivated billionaire or have connections to
one to really wreak mass havoc and thousands of deaths. In 10 years, one
may need only be a millionaire, 10 years after that, a moderately
intelligent well motivated individual could wipe out thousands to millions
of people. I see it in my head as a graph, the resources (intellect, money,
time) etc needed to commit massive tragedies continues to decline, while an
opposing line, how many people one can kill, rises. Linearly?
Exponentially? Logorithmically? Scary stuff. This was the reason why I
added my optimistic outcome in my list
6) There are no Arab Democracies, and a democratic IRAQ could potentially
become a 'shinning beacon of democracy in an arab sea of tyranny, oppresion,
and despair' When arab peoples see the life that can be lived in a free
Arab nation, it can help to diffuse the anti-west hatred and anti-progress
attitude that many arab theocracies, monarchies, and dictators have imposed
upon their people.
> People who promote "peace at all costs" simply do not recognize
> that these technologies have the capacity for eliminating civilization
> as we know it (note my recent posts on SARS -- and that is probably
> a natural situation).
>
> I'll make an assertion to people who object to my position (or the
> activities of the U.S./U.K./Au) -- *you* are *clueless* with respect
> to how bad it could get and how close people who have virtually
> no respect for "human dignity" are to bridging the gap to the point
> where they are executing your worst nightmare. How long do you need
> to watch Al-Jazeera before you figure out that they are promoting
> the "unextropic" concept that they want you ("us") dead?
Well said.
And this leads of course back to the question of assessing the causalties of
inaction vs. action, and why a linear projection of current rates isnt
valid. In the future, a pissed of terrorist could wipe out *the entire
human population* Yeah, some Iraqi civilians will be killed in this attempt
to overthrow a murderous dictatorial regime, but if we dont provide a
democratic peacefull aveneue for arabs and middle easterners to grow, they
may very well wipe humanity off the face of the earth. The most clinching
moment for this was probably reading Robert Wrights "A Real War On
Terrorism" (http://slate.msn.com/?id=2070210&entry=2070211ich some list
members have cited to support an stance against this war. I found it the
opposite, especially Wrights description of what Mohommad Atta went through
in various Arab countries trying to find a positive productive outlet for
his efforts and intellect, and was blocked every step of the way, eventually
finding the only avenue offered, terrorism. In fact, Wright recommends
democraticization in authoratarian Arab regimes to stem this tide of growing
animosity, along with globalization. Basically acknowledging that these
efforts will lead to resentment among arabs, Wright still recommends to
'Take your bitter medicine early' saying "But in the case of terrorism, I
have a decided preference because in 10 or 20 years, terrorism will have
much more lethal potential than it has now. So, if there are burdens we can
bear now-in money, even in lives-that will dampen future terrorism, they're
probably worth it." While some or much of this essay to some will lead them
to not support the current war, I found it a more compelling argument to
support it, although critical of particulars of some of Bush's actions.
>
> And thank you Michael for detailing points that need to responded
> to (i.e. the rationale behind a pro-war position) much better than
> I might have done.
>
> Robert
>
Thank you for the positive comments Robert. I am not surprised that no one
has yet respoded to these points with anything except "I dont like this war"
Regards,
Michael Dickey
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