Arguments for ground war - forget it

[Seth Ackerman]

Doug Henwood wrote:
> Can someone explain the UN situation to me. In the current In These
> Times, Ian Williams says the resolutions - supported by Russia &
> China, among others - give the U.S. full legal authorization for the
> war. At a Nation seminar last week, someone (don't know who)
> vociferously argued to the contrary. Anyone know the story?
.
The US deliberately did not seek explicit authorization from the Security
Council. But all permanent members and most of the others expressed their
verbal support for military action.

One possible argument I've never seen anyone make is that since the UN and
most governments recognize the Rabbani (Northern Alliance) regime as the
legitimate government of Afghanistan, the US bombing was "invited,"
therefore legal. It's possible the Bush administration never made this
argument because it didn't want to alienate Pakistan by portraying the
intervention as something done at the Northern Alliance's behest.

Seth