Peter K. wrote:
>Hitchens would like to see Saddam gone, but he has pointed out,
>as have others on this list, that the Bush Administration doesn't seem
>to have a plan for post-Saddam Iraq and they have no faith in the INC.
- Just wondering why it is that expat Brit journalists and the U.S.
- administration both think they have the standing to decide who should
- rule a country halfway around the world.
+CB: White man's burden and all that , you know. Thankless job, but
+ somebody has got to save all the natives from themselves. Someday,
+ the whole world will thank the Brits and Yanks for
+ saving humanity.
When the left cheered the overthrow of various dictators with the support of the Soviet Union, was that also "white mans burden" messing with the "natives"? Hell, Saddam is a product of support from both the Soviet Union and Europe (and the US) depending on who could help him most at various times. Same with folks like Noriega and other folks who "the natives" had little say in whether they were in power.
I'm not in favor of invading Iraq, but it's not because of some idea that would violate the democratic rights of Iraqis to self-determination. When South Africa bowed to the end of Apartheid, partly because of outside trade sanctions, I think that was a wonderful and justified violation of self-determination. And yes, I supported the military threat against Haiti to restore Aristide to the office to which he was democratically elected before being driven out by the death squads there. And supported the Kosovo intervention because Rugova and even the KLA was a far better alternative to Milosevic.
What would replace Saddam is highly relevant to the morality of any military or economic intervention. The immorality of the current economic sanctions is that they don't create an alternative, but just make the Iraqi people suffer. Hussein was recently quoted as saying that invasion and his overthrow is a preferable policy to the current economic sanctions, since the Iraqi people would suffer less. I think Hussein is a hypocrite in how he milks the economy for his military but the point is right that lack of military invasion is not always better than non-military pressure.
-- Nathan Newman