The privilege of power
The US is right to oust Hussein - but it must better balance national values with national interests
By every indication, the US is about to enter armed conflict with Iraq. Although this will disappoint many of my friends in the faith community, I come down on the side of President Bush, firmly believing that all reasonable avenues of conflict avoidance have come and gone. Armed conflict, the last resort, is imminent. Total disarmament of weapons of mass destruction and regime change through outside intervention are, in my mind, both acceptable initiatives at this time.
After all, war is already under way. Some of the most horrific cables available to me during two years in the State Department had to do with Saddam Hussein's wholesale torture and destruction of theShiite Muslims within his own country. Weapons of mass destruction have already been used. The pictures of gassed Kurds should be indelibly etched on all of our minds. This is one of the most hideous regimes in the past 100 years.
There is, of course, much to be concerned about in the sharp opposition coming from much of the rest of the world. But some of the hand-wringing about antiwar backlash is misplaced.
The obstructionism of the French, for instance, does not represent the moral high ground - their parochial interests in Iraq make all of their philosophical protestations ring hollow. Nor do I think the US lost a great deal with a negative vote in the Turkish parliament. Indeed, the endgame in northern Iraq may be much less complicated and much more amenable to peaceful solution.
And for its part, the UN Security Council's wobbly-kneed posture should not be the overriding worry. Such will always be the state of collective leadership in a body that was created with avoidance of war in mind, sometimes at all costs.
What should concern us all, though, are the issues brought into relief by the massive protests around the world during these past few weeks.
First, the question of "why the world hates Americans" has spawned a veritable cottage industry of publications. Though many come from a left-of-center perspective and are sometimes intent on grinding predicable axes, they are nonetheless provocative and sobering.
The second question is even more troubling: How in the world could the US lose the public-relations battle to a dictator with Saddam Hussein's track record? Hussein gets elevated, not merely as a potential victim but in some casesto hero status, while the leadership of the US is uniformly mocked.
Most disconcerting, however, is the fact that, according to all the polling data, the majority of the world now sees the US as the biggest threat to peace. For those of us who've served America in both peacetime and war and know the values that undergird such service, this defamation of public image is very hard to accept.
America should not be apologizing for being the last remaining superpower. Americans are who they are. By any measure, this status will not change in the foreseeable future. This does not absolve them, however, of their responsibility for understanding the increasing perception of so many in the world today.
