thoughts on Bush’s speech that practically declared war

Monday night I sat in the office of The Oracle and watched George W. Bush’s speech. Here are my thoughts on it.

With a calm voice but worried face George W. Bush declared that Iraq has not complied to the UN resolution and is therefore not worthy of any further pursuits of democratic means. Further he said that the world needs the United States to actively disarm Iraq and oust Saddam Hussein and gave him and his sons 48 hours to leave the country.

Saddam Hussein has not complied with the UN resolutions that required him to disarm and cooperate with the UN inspectors that were supposed to supervise said disarmament and so all nations (excluding Iraq) that have stated their position at the UN have agreed on this. This effort has lasted 12 years and is obviously not working very well.

However, it is deeply troubling that Bush, and Bush alone (Blair would never have pursued this course all by himself, at least not on this scale), thinks he has the right to go in and solve the problem with military means.

This is precisely why the United Nations was formed in the wake of WW II. No leader or nation was supposed to be allowed to attack any other nation for any reason whatsoever without the consent of the UN. Now the Bush administration pushes the UN aside and declares that they have “the right” to attack Iraq.

This creates a very dangerous precedent. If North Korea was to decide that South Korea posed a threat to their national security, as the U.S. has said Iraq poses to theirs, would they be allowed to invade South Korea?

Apart from the responses, be it in military form or just change of opinion, to the action the U.S. is pursuing in Iraq, one thing is clear: The U.S. definitely has a double standard.

The U.S. would never allow North Korea to invade South Korea even if they could prove that South Korea had weapons of mass destruction, a fact the U.S. has yet to prove about Iraq. Yet the U.S, expects the wold to condone their actions when they commit them. This will not improve the opinion other nations are holding of the U.S. in any way.

Further Bush said that the attack Iraq was warranted and the rebuilding of it will be an effort by the U.S. and other nations. But which other nations will that be?

Afghanistan, a nation the U.S. invaded with the consent of the world, is still trying to rebuild. In this case the meetings that formed the provisional government that is now “governing” Afghanistan happened in Bonn, Germany. Germany, France, and the U.K. have been more active in the rebuilding of Afghanistan than the U.S., and it is very likely that the rebuilding of Iraq will function in a similar way.

“Breaking” a state and then relying on other nations to “fix” it is definitely a good way to lose further trust. What will happen if other conflicts of intelligence in the “war on terrorism” make it necessary for the U.S. to get involved in other military actions? Do they expect other nations to help them again as the U.K. has promised (a vote is expected today) to give?

The removal of Saddam Hussein might be a good idea in the long run but in pursuing this goal the Bush administration has made the biggest mistakes any administration has made in centuries. They have not only alienated allies that have been thankful for their help for numerous centuries (Germany and France) but also Russia and China have expressed deep worries about the U.S. pursuing the matter of Iraq all by themselves. The actions will also affect (most likely in a bad way) how the U.S. is seen by other muslim nation throughout the Middle East and the rest of the world.

This, and the devaluation of the U.N. (not waiting for a vote that the U.S. government knew they would lose is as bad as actively acting against the UN) might destabilize and polarize the political landscape of the world more than it has been since the Cold War.

In two years (taking 9-11 into account or not does not really matter here because it has started even before 9-11 occurred) the U.S. government has actively oppose the Kyoto Protocol, the International Crime Court (yet they offered a list of war criminals that should be trialed for war crimes if Iraq opposes an invasion that has yet to happen. Which court is to rial those?), an antiballistic missile treaty with Russia and could have not acted more shortsighted in the conflict of Israel and Palestine (or rather lack of Palestine).

Bravo! In two years George W. Bush destroyed not only what Bill Clinton created over the team of his 8 years of presidency (not to mention turning he biggest surplus in U.S. history into a deficit), but also the work of his own father to establish a trust into the U.S. by the world as well as a work for a better, more peaceful planet earth into an atmosphere of distrust.

How is that for a legacy?