Sunday, September 15, 2002

The March to War

Countries are shifting toward our position and are willing to go to war against Iraq. Only Germany of the major countries in Europe are adamant against attacking. Britain, France, Turkey, Italy, and Spain all seem with us. In the Middle East, Kuwait, Jordan, and Qatar are already with us. Egypt is open to attacking. And even Saudi Arabia has expressed willingness to allow America to use the bases there. The President’s speech to the UN seems to have really done the trick. Already, it was apparent from newspapers that the world was coming to accept the inevitable. Upcoming German elections may reverse the current German position.

Domestic opposition had previously counted on allied opposition to bolster their case against invasion. Now that this pillar is collapsing, they are placed in the uncomfortable position of having to defend the Iraqi regime or argue that the evidence made public thus far does not indicate that Iraq is a threat. Even the pillar of so-called Republican opposition is collapsing as they begin to make clear that they really only opposed action outside the UN. Not exactly the opposition to war that war opponents made them out to be. Now there us only the hilarious recourse by hard core leftists to the superior wisdom of the uniformed military's purported opposition to attacking Iraq! When we do go to war and the military argues for a ruthless prosecution of the war to avoid having to fight Iraq a third time, we’ll see if the anti-war crowd still endows the military with wisdom.

Very soon, Congress will debate the war. They will have a difficult time arguing that war should not be debated before the elections. Are the people who loudly claimed they wanted a "debate" going to now complain that a debate on the war is not a proper thing for Congress to do? Is such a serious question really "too political" for pre-election debate? Really, on such an important issue, a democracy really does have the duty to put its leaders on the record and make them accountable to the voters. Otherwise it is a cynical attempt to avoid voter anger for arguing against taking action against Saddam Hussein, while simultaneously assuming easy victory will erase voter anger in two years the next time an election rolls around.

Congress will authorize war before the election. The UN will demand Iraqi compliance before the election and set a short deadline. Opposition to the war will create enough noise to convince Saddam that he can stiff the UN safely and not have to confront America. Honestly, if everybody had lined up behind President Bush, Saddam might have retreated in fear. With the loud frenzied (but doomed) opposition, Saddam will believe he can win this one as he has for eleven years. That and the fear of his subordinates to tell Saddam that he can’t bluff us again will give us all the excuse we need to invade with UN backing.

Of course, we’ll need to overcome the loyal Saddam lap dog Galloway. With so much going our way, this prosepct makes me almost giddy. Could we really be this lucky? Labor MP Galloway, idiot minion of Saddam Hussein, wants international volunteers to be a human shield to protect Iraq! Sadly, according to the article, "Galloway said he did not intend staying in Baghdad with any volunteer human peace shield."

Darn it all, Galloway is merely anti-American and not suicidal.

Hey chap, by the way, you should know what we in America call "peace shields" in Iraq—it’s called "collateral damage." Really, we couldn’t get away with rounding them up and shooting them as a service to humanity’s gene pool, but if they all gather in Iraq…

On to Baghdad.