It seems the time has come around again for another military misadventure in the Persian Gulf. Nobody wants this, the politicians and the pundits all say, but what can we do?
Saddam Hussein will not allow UN weapons inspectors to look at certain locations in Iraq. Bill Clinton cannot stand by and let this affront pass, so he sends warships and planes to the gulf. But this is a U.S. military action, we are not doing this on behalf of the UN. Kofi Annan still wants to talk, as do most of the nations whose stake in this is much higher than America’s. And as long as we’re wrapping ourselves in UN weapons inspectors, how’s about the U.S. paying up our billion or so dollars in delinquent UN dues? What if Saddam said, you can come see my sites when you pay up your dues? What would we say then? If that happened, at least one good thing would have come from this ridiculous situation.
I’m not a military strategist, but if a big war didn’t work in 1991, why do we think a little war will work now? The president says we’re just going to go in and destroy the weapons factories, but since the weapons inspectors never got in, how do we know where they are? If we do know where the weapons factories are, are we sure we can destroy them? If we do know where the weapons factories are and we do destroy them, won’t that release biological and chemical agents? And won’t that potentially kill thousands of innocent Iraqis, people who probably hate Saddam more than we do? Is this something we want to do?
I agree with everyone else that Saddam is crazy, but it seems to me that he is using the U.S. Air Force as his private goon squad every time he wants to terrorize his people. Bill Clinton, like George Bush before him, says Saddam is a madman who must be stopped, much as we regret having to use military force, but we have no other options. The problem I have with that is that George Bush, along with the rest of the Reagan Administration, built the Frankenstein Saddam out of spare parts all through the 1980s, hoping to turn him loose on Iran. Bill Clinton has had five years to support political opposition in Iraq or indigenous movements like the Kurds, but he has done nothing. Our government spent years helping Saddam become the madman he is, and now the president bites his lip and says we have no alternative but to use force. Which, let me say again, didn’t knock Saddam out of office seven years ago.
The way I see it, this is a no-lose situation for Saddam. Either we arrive at a negotiated solution, which means he’ll probably get something he wants, end up looking like he stared down Bill Clinton and probably pull the same shenanigans three years down the road – OR – he continues to flip Bill Clinton off, the U.S. cuts loose with the bombs, tens of thousands of Iraqis die whether we hit the bomb factories or not, Saddam comes out of his hole like Punxsatawny Phil, declares six more years of suffering in his police state and the U.S. winds up no further ahead than we are now and we have most of the Arab world and the Russians mad at us to boot.
An old adage says if you argue with a fool, you become a fool. What are we becoming?
Gulf War Syndrome
It seems the time has come around again for another military misadventure in the Persian Gulf. Nobody wants this, the politicians and the pundits all say, but what can we do?
Saddam Hussein will not allow UN weapons inspectors to look at certain locations in Iraq. Bill Clinton cannot stand by and let this affront pass, so he sends warships and planes to the gulf. But this is a U.S. military action, we are not doing this on behalf of the UN. Kofi Annan still wants to talk, as do most of the nations whose stake in this is much higher than America’s. And as long as we’re wrapping ourselves in UN weapons inspectors, how’s about the U.S. paying up our billion or so dollars in delinquent UN dues? What if Saddam said, you can come see my sites when you pay up your dues? What would we say then? If that happened, at least one good thing would have come from this ridiculous situation.
I’m not a military strategist, but if a big war didn’t work in 1991, why do we think a little war will work now? The president says we’re just going to go in and destroy the weapons factories, but since the weapons inspectors never got in, how do we know where they are? If we do know where the weapons factories are, are we sure we can destroy them? If we do know where the weapons factories are and we do destroy them, won’t that release biological and chemical agents? And won’t that potentially kill thousands of innocent Iraqis, people who probably hate Saddam more than we do? Is this something we want to do?
I agree with everyone else that Saddam is crazy, but it seems to me that he is using the U.S. Air Force as his private goon squad every time he wants to terrorize his people. Bill Clinton, like George Bush before him, says Saddam is a madman who must be stopped, much as we regret having to use military force, but we have no other options. The problem I have with that is that George Bush, along with the rest of the Reagan Administration, built the Frankenstein Saddam out of spare parts all through the 1980s, hoping to turn him loose on Iran. Bill Clinton has had five years to support political opposition in Iraq or indigenous movements like the Kurds, but he has done nothing. Our government spent years helping Saddam become the madman he is, and now the president bites his lip and says we have no alternative but to use force. Which, let me say again, didn’t knock Saddam out of office seven years ago.
The way I see it, this is a no-lose situation for Saddam. Either we arrive at a negotiated solution, which means he’ll probably get something he wants, end up looking like he stared down Bill Clinton and probably pull the same shenanigans three years down the road – OR – he continues to flip Bill Clinton off, the U.S. cuts loose with the bombs, tens of thousands of Iraqis die whether we hit the bomb factories or not, Saddam comes out of his hole like Punxsatawny Phil, declares six more years of suffering in his police state and the U.S. winds up no further ahead than we are now and we have most of the Arab world and the Russians mad at us to boot.
An old adage says if you argue with a fool, you become a fool. What are we becoming?