DETROIT -- President Bush has already alerted the Pentagon what his command order will be to launch the war on Iraq. "Fire! Ready! Aim!" That's how reckless it is and the president is showing the strain that desperation and folly create.
He runs off to the Azores for a last minute powwow with our allies Spain and Great Britain. Those nations, with long imperial pasts, will advise us on how to get hopelessly entangled in a faraway place.
Bulgaria, our new best friend, was not invited -- yet another example of Bush's diplomatic bungling. Forgiving the slight, the Bulgarian navy will join the coalition of the willing (i.e., bribed) and participate in whatever war duties we request.
Doesn't it warm your heart to know the Bush administration has lined up most of the old Warsaw Pact nations, former Soviet lackeys, to now become American lackeys?
Bush briefly considered bringing his case for war with Iraq before the European Parliament, but when he found out he couldn't be guaranteed a standing ovation, like for the State of the Union address, the president nixed the idea. No kidding. Those Europeans are so difficult.
While the British and Spanish governments support our senseless adventure, make no mistake about it, the people in those nations don't.
A friend who recently returned from London told me antiwar protesters were everywhere and if the Brits join us in an attack on Iraq without UN authorization, the opponents of the violence will bring the United Kingdom to a screeching halt.
Another friend from Spain told me how proud he was that millions took to the streets in Barcelona to protest the planned war. He noted that the few who do support war are typically vestiges of Franco's fascist party.
Bowing to pressure from British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Bush, at long last, spoke publicly about Middle Eastern peace and the creation of a Palestinian state.
Why don't we spend our time, energy, talents and money making that happen, instead of bombing Baghdad?
How did we get into this mess? How did a monstrously bad idea bring us to the brink of our first preemptive war, diplomatic disaster and the widely held perception that the richest and most powerful nation on earth is a petulant bully ready to spill blood in an impoverished nation in order to "spread democracy"?
What seemed like the unimaginable has become a frightening reality. In 18 months, our wounded nation, which had the world's sympathy and support as the victim of terrorism, has evolved into a militant machine ready to use violence to get its way and depose a third-rate dictator who poses no immediate threat to our security, in spite of the lies, disinformation and propaganda Bush and his minions spew.
Thomas Friedman of The New York Times, one of the keenest minds on the Middle East, writes, "The invasion of Iraq today is not vital to American security. Saddam Hussein has neither the intention nor the capability to threaten American security, and is easily deterrable if he did."
This is not a war of necessity. It is a war of choice that will mark the United States as an aggressor ready to thumb its nose at international law, march into Iraq and make our nation less secure in the process.
War with Iraq is the best recruitment tool Islamist terrorist like bin Laden could imagine. The violence will radicalize an entire generation in the Muslim world and make Americans at home and abroad increasingly vulnerable.
It took only a few people with the bad idea and the right ears to create the monster. The idea of taking preemptive military action against Iraq and making the United States the dominant force in the Gulf long predated Sept. 11.
The plan was hatched by a small group of willful men who used the terrorist attacks as the pretext to carry out an agenda of world domination in the 21st century.
The deceptively benign name -- Project for the New American Century -- brought together a cabal of generally wealthy, powerful men who were frustrated after the Cold War. They longed to have new enemies to confront and to take the world's only remaining superpower on a perilous path to flex our military muscles around the world in order to protect and enhance our economic interests.
Dick Cheney was a charter member, along with Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Dan Quayle, Donald Rumsfeld and Jeb Bush, the president's brother. They joined with an assortment of other neo-conservative politicos, policy wonks and pundits and came up with an ambitious vision that included regime change in Iraq.
This plan was developed in 1997 and the group pressed the "Get Saddam" agenda long before most people ever considered him an imminent threat to our national security -- which, of course, he is not.
The New American Century crowd masterfully seized the initiative after Sept. 11 and convinced President Bush that the war on terror should focus on Iraq, even though it had nothing whatsoever to do with the terrorist attacks.
Rumsfeld started talking about going after Iraq within two hours after the hijacked planes crashed.
Two characteristics mark most of the members:
The New American Century boys don't view war as the last resort, but rather the first. They want our nation to use military might at every juncture where our will runs up against any kind of resistance on the global stage.
They also despise the United Nations and supported scrapping any international treaties, from global warming to banning land mines. These guys are scary and, while they could do little harm sipping martinis, smoking cigars and pontificating on world dominance, now they are firmly in power.
These hawks are convinced war with Iraq will create a domino effect for democracy in the Middle East, and American civic virtue will spread with the desert wind. They were never serious about finding a diplomatic solution in dealing with Saddam and have been salivating about the prospect of a military attack on Iraq.
They won't stop there, either. The New American Century boys also have Iran in their crosshairs, and with George W. Bush in their pocket, they'll press the issue.
The chaos we'll create in Iraq will ignite Islamist passions in Iran, and lest we forget, that nation is close to developing or already has nuclear weapons.
The Bush administration has shamelessly used fear to rally support for war with Iraq. When we take on Iran, we really will have something to fear.
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | March 18 2003 |