----- Original Message ----- From: "Marvin Long, Jr." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "BRIN-L Mailing list" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Wednesday, February 05, 2003 11:56 PM Subject: war and peace
> > A musing that occurs to me as I stay up past my bedtime. > > One. Nobody has any moral credibility w/respect to acting in the > interests of the Iraqi people, which makes all moral posturing over the > issue highly suspect, no matter who does it. (Too many opportunities to > help the Iraqi people have been passed up or betrayed by the US and the > rest of the world already.) I'll agree that the main motivation is the perceived self interest of the United States. I'd also say that was the motivation for the Marshal Plan too. But, an argument could be made in both cases that the actions would benefit the people of the countries where the plan is implemented. Obviously, the Marshal Plan worked. Clearly there have been other instances where you could argue for good intentions but bad results for actions by the United States. The jury is out on what will happen with Iraq, and I'm not really all that sanguine about it. But, I think that the folks who have pushed the invasion of Iraq the hardest in the Bush administration actually do have a vision that Iraq can become a much better place for its people after the US intervenes. > Two. The way to create moral credibility on the matter is to put forward > a detailed long-term plan explaining either (a) how Iraq will be rebuilt > and improved after a war, or (b) why Iraq and the world will be better >off left alone. Or, more importantly, if we do change the government forcibly, as it looks like we will do, the proof will be in the pudding. > > The closest the US/UK have come to achieving the former is Bush mumbling a > rehashed version of manifest destiny suggesting it's America's turn to > take up the 21st century version of the White Man's Burden. Why mock his view like that? The US does not have colonies. I think that the actions and results in Japan and Europe after WWII is the ideal Bush wants to emulate. Unless you think that human rights just exist in a cultural context, and dictatorial rule and genocide are acceptable within other cultural contexts and it is terribly egotistical to think that other people think like we do and don't want totalitarian government. Plus some > mumblings about putting Iraqi exiles (whom Iraqis living in Iraq mostly > hate) in power; plus other mumblings about how costs of an invasion might > be defrayed by later oil profits, maybe. The details of occupation and > rebuilding are not forthcoming, not even in the sketchiest of terms. But, it does exist in broad outline. I know what it is, I'm just not sure they can pull it off. > A man who would be king is everbody's best customer. There is a positive > moral case to be made for dethroning Saddam, but BushCo has done a > miserable job of explaining why its war plan isn't just a way to cut > everybody else of a deal, IMO. If anybody in the UN gave a damn about >the Iraqi people, it seems to me, then there should be lots of argument and > wrangling over how to manage a post-war Iraq with a coalition of > interested parties. That would be the proper mix of idealism and cynical > opportunism. But everybody's pretending that self-interested opportunity > (TWAT aside) isn't an issue; it's a matter of principle! Well, I see a coherent argument on Bush's part, I just don't see the willingness to pay the price to execute it. Lets assume that, via deux ex machina, Iraq has a stable representative government that uses the oil revenue to build a modern economy with a nice broad middle class. How does this effect the US? My guess is that it would be of overwhelming benefit to the US, just as a prosperous Japan and Europe are. Whether it can be accomplished is a totally different question. My guess is no, that's why I lean against a regime change. But, it is a difficult question. > Which suggests to me that everybody is lying. About different things, > maybe, but lying nevertheless. I'm curious to see what you think is wrong with my picture. Dan M. _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
