----- Original Message ----- From: "Todd Archer" <todda39 at hotmail.com> To: <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Sent: Thursday, January 09, 2003 6:05 PM Subject: Re: Helen Thomas vs. Ari Fleischer
> Ian said:
>
> >Do you think Iraq's claim to Kuwait was legitimate enough to justify
its
> >aggression?
>
> You mention Michael Pollak's post wrt the Hague:
>
> http://squawk.ca/lbo-talk/0211/0327.html
>
> From what he posted, it sounds as though Iraq was using it's "claim"
on
> Kuwait to try to get it to lay off squeezing Iraq dry (not a good
thing for
> the Iraqi people, eh?) in a dispute about land. Basically it looks
like two
> capitalist thugs "beating each other up" for money, killing people in
the
> process (and, it seems, many people, especially Iraquis, were happy to
get
> mixed up in the fight).
>
> Would the Hague have gotten Kuwait to lay off? Maybe.
>
> I think your original question was the wrong one to ask. Perhaps
better
> might have been, "Do you think being economically attacked was THE
goad to
> get an already volatile regime to panic and react wildly?"
=========================
This just keeps us in the realm of explanation. Yes, the boundary between explanation and justification in understanding international relations is damn difficult to navigate and the Realists like to displace the latter as much as possible, but avoiding confronting all the contradictory justifications proffered by States as they strategize to dominate their constructed opponents is totally necessary. Isn't that precisely what the anti-war movement is doing fairly successfully right now, challenging the drivel that passes for justification from B,C,R,R&W?
> It all seems to come down to: do we give a country a pass for taking
an
> option which seems pretty "natural" given capitalism?
>
> Todd
=======================
No pass if other non-violent options are available for conflict resolution. Creating viable and sustainable modes of and institutions for non-violent conflict resolution are more necessary than ever and letting the warrior-nihilists co-opt/undermine what few institutions we still have for doing so will be an immense tragedy.
Ian