[lbo-talk] "If that is making this country safer, it is hard to see how."

[Leigh Meyers]

>From The New York Times:

September 12, 2004
Preventive War: A Failed Doctrine

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/12/opinion/12sun1.html?th=&pagewanted=print&position

If facts mattered in American politics, the Bush-Cheney ticket would not be
basing its re-election campaign on the fear-mongering contention that the surest
defense against future terrorist attacks lies in the badly discredited doctrine
of preventive war. Vice President Dick Cheney took this argument to a
disgraceful low last week when he implied that electing John Kerry and returning
to traditional American foreign policy values would invite a devastating new
strike.

So far, the preventive war doctrine has had one real test: the invasion of Iraq.
Mr. Bush terrified millions of Americans into believing that forcibly changing
the regime in Baghdad was the only way to keep Iraq's supposed stockpiles of
unconventional weapons out of the hands of Al Qaeda. Then it turned out that
there were no stockpiles and no operational links between Saddam Hussein's
regime and Al Qaeda's anti-American terrorism. Meanwhile, America's longstanding
defensive alliances were weakened and the bulk of America's ground combat troops
tied down in Iraq for what now appears to be many years to come. If that is
making this country safer, it is hard to see how. The real lesson is that
America dangerously erodes its military and diplomatic defenses when
it charges off unwisely after hypothetical enemies.
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"I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to
promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people
want peace so much that one of these days governments had
better get out of the way and let them have it."
-- Dwight D. Eisenhower

Leigh Meyers
leighcmeyers at yahoo.com