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July 20, 2003

Revenge and Rescue

Another political timebomb is ticking for the Bush Administration as yet another interestingly marginal rationale for war is deconstructed.

In the 14 weeks since the fall of Baghdad, coalition forces have not brought to light any significant evidence demonstrating the bond between Iraq and Al Qaeda. Uncovering such a link should be much easier than finding weapons of mass destruction. Instead of having to inspect hundreds of suspected weapons sites around the country, military and intelligence officials need only comb through the files of Iraq's intelligence agency and a handful of other government ministries.

Our intelligence experts have been doing exactly that since April and so far there has been no report of any proof (and we can assume that any supporting information would have quickly been publicized). Of the more than 3,000 Qaeda operatives arrested around the world, only a handful of prisoners in Guantánamo — all with an incentive to please their captors — have claimed there was cooperation between Osama bin Laden's organization and Saddam Hussein's regime, and their remarks have yet to be confirmed by any of the high-ranking Iraqi officials now in American hands.

We will find nothing of political relevance. This is a lose-lose rabbit hole.

There are only two reasons, apparently, that Americans are willing to war over. They are revenge and rescue. Kill the killer or free the hostage. The objectives, if and when accomplished will become self-evident. But if you use dodgy or even stellar intelligence, you lose. The American public can and will be spun endlessly over this and that evidence. Even a smoking gun is not enough, especially not if Americans weren't shot. In Iraq we can't even find a cold gun. Now that we are debating endlessly policies and procedures, we are turning the US Military into the LAPD. Ugly. Ugly. Ugly.

I like the kind of military we have today. One that can shock and awe. In fact the longer it takes to rebuild Iraq, the more profoundly impressive the amount of mass destrcution we are able to wreak without 'weapons of mass destruction' becomes. But GWBush and Rumsfeld, unaware, are about to transform the American armed forces into something much less than a force for non-nuclear detente. They are going to turn them into police. They are going to turn the great American three-headed Rottweiler into a flea-bitten mutt on a short leash.

The politics and circumstances of this war will have long term consequences that to me, spell even more reluctance from the international community to acquiesce to their deployment anywhere in the future. There will be limits on the number of divisions that can go in. There will be limits on the kinds of armaments they can use. The American president will say, hell we'll go in alone, and the Europeans will say fine. Then one day an American will shoot a French trooper and that will be the beginning of the end, and the end of my speculation.

The ability for us to punish Korea is no geopolitically diminished. We can only pray that GWBush doesn't have to be the man to unleash the beast once again.

Posted by mbowen at July 20, 2003 10:23 AM

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Posted by: Nick at July 21, 2003 08:18 AM