Andy Borgmann's Blog

As Colbert would say: "Alright, I'll bite."

Here's the problem with the Iraq War (among many):

The ends don't justify the means.

While history may look back upon Iraq and say that it's better to have a democracy, that's not why we went in. And while I'm far from an expert on foregin policy, just because history will perhaps look kindly on the actions we've taken does not make them right to begin with, nor does it make it acceptable to stay quiet about the actions taken to get us into a country just because there will be eventual benefits after we're done.

Also, where do we draw the line? Do we do the same thing for Iran, Syria, North Korea, Cuba, and every other government we disagree with? I just have never adhered to the U.S. "world police" philosophy.

And as far as a democracy affecting a change-how does it do that with other sovereign nations? How can the citizens of the countries listed above rise up and begin a revolution any more easily than the Iraqis could?

I surely don't have the solution to the situation in the Middle East, but I just think that Iraq was the wrong decision.

To use lawyerspeak :-) I respectfully disagree with the analogy of the Iraq War to WWII. Hitler had gone out of Germany and intended to spread Nazism into an empire-Saddam went into Kuwait and the Gulf War started, but this time he was just acting like an 8 year old. He was digging his heels in to the UN, but our intelligence was faulty and I think we definitely jumped the gun-the pre-emptive doctrine is just not good foreign policy in my opinion.

Further, Saddam is not the only Middle East leader to do so-look at Iran's reaction to the nuclear situation. A crazy leader doesn't merit nation building.

Anyway, I don't mean to just come to your blog and totally attack you-I always enjoy your opinions and I hope that you'll reply, because I think that whatever you say will be really insightful. Hopefully you don't take offense to this comment-you know I just get excited when politics gets brought up, so I thought I'd throw in my two cents-but you know I think you're fabulous and I'm only debating ideas, not anything personal. :-)

Ahh Lissa...I love the conversation you and I share. It truly brings joy to my heart.

First off, this post wasn't so much a justification of the Iraq-war (although I have that on other posts), but rather a reason for not going to war with Iran. In addition to that, I brought up the Iraq war because it is just a truth of reality that we are in the war, so given that fact, how can we use that (regardless of our stance on it) to better the world and the region.

Now, you are right. The ends don't justify the means, and I think we all need to be very hesitant on going to war to begin with. In the spring of 03, I was very hesitant about the Iraq war and I was hardly a "supporter." I don't like the fact Bush lied to us. I don't like the fact it is clear Rumsfeld had an agenda and wasn't steering away from that no matter what the intelligence said. But, since deciding to go, I think we should do it whole-heartedly, and not half-assed, so to provide the most amount of security to the Iraqi-people as quickly as possible. I have other internal reasons why I think the Iraq war will eventually yield a better Iraq for Iraqis, but regardless of whether we should or shouldn't have gone, we are there: now lets deal with it. "Bringing the troops home now" (as Shean has suggested) will not correct anything in my mind.

Now, onto another point. You say Saddam was no Hitler, and it is true, he wasn't. And I am not sure if he ever could be. However, to say that he was just an 8-year old is a bit naive. Tell the tens-of-thousands of Kurds he killed within his own country, or the 1.7 million Iraqis & Iranians killed in the Iraq-Iran War in the 80s, or the 2.4 million Kuwaittis he threatened, or better yet, the man I met in the West Bank who fled Iraq and was grateful for the (then new) Iraq-American war because finally someone had taken down the evil dictator, that Saddam was just an 8-year old. Even if you take the 2,553 Americans killed thus far in Iraq, and go with the highest of estimates of 43,575 Iraqis killed (which that number is hardly confirmed), you still would have to multiply that number by THIRTY-SEVEN (37) to get the number of killed by Saddam (or maybe better put, at the current "death-pace" in Iraq, this war would have to continue for 110 years to match what Saddam was responsible for). I think if anything we should have learned from Hitler that we all (and I am including myself in this) have the capability of doing grave things, and those that have exercised that need to be taken out of power. But just for a geo-political lesson, it should be noted that Saddam, like Hitler, did leave his borders when he attacked Iran and Kuwait.

It isn't about not agreeing with "politics." I don't like how Russia does everything, but Vladimir Putin seems like a competent leader (except when he belly-kisses little children). Even Castro in Cuba and Chavez in Venezuela, who in my mind are awful leaders, don't deserve to be removed because they haven't killed mass numbers of people. And while I can't logically advocate that we have the ability to take out every leader in this world that is the vilest of dictators, that doesn't mean we shouldn't do what we can. Even Ahmadinejad and Jong-il are nutballs, but to my knowledge they haven't killed nearly as many people as Saddam did (yet).

In the end, my reasons for taking out Saddam and my reasons for not bombing Iran are one in the same: I want what is best for the most amount of people. I truly think Iraq will be a safer place in 10 years, and I truly believe that the average Iranian is just trying to provide for their family and get by, so bombing them off the planet (which was the original "solution" posed in the post) solves nothing. And I think what will work better with Iran and Syria is a positive result in Iraq than bombing them ever could. I will admit that I could be wrong, but only history will tell.

Lis, you know I love our conversation. Don't take any of this as "ill-will" or hateful, ya know I love you.