07-11-2004, 12:01 PM
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#1 (permalink)
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Banned
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The Lessons of History
I dedicate the following article to those who are characerizing the War to liberate Iraq as being one of imperialistic profiteering.
Quote:
ONE DAY the historians will look back on Washington's war against a smaller, weaker and less well-armed foe and write things that might be unpalatable to many American patriots and those in Canada and elsewhere who support them.
They will say all sorts of things. And many of them will be true.
They will, for instance, point out that the Republicans only won the election before the war after a very low turnout of the electorate and that there were allegations of corruption and tampering. They will explain that the U.S. president was very unpopular in many circles and that many in the press wrote against him week after week.
They will question the motives for the war, insisting that various business interests made profits out of the invasion and occupation. They will say that the reasons the president and his advisers gave for the war turned out to be doubtful if not absolutely untrue and that it was all an excuse to bludgeon this smaller country into submission and a new way of life.
They will say that the war was immoral and that the victorious American forces acted not as liberators but as oppressors. They will write that the local population resented the Yankees and that bands of armed men roared around the country killing Americans, murdering locals who collaborated with them and trying to destroy the new infrastructure of the state.
They will show that many Democrats were in favour of peace and campaigned before and during the war for all hostilities to cease. They will show that some of the more radical members of the Democratic Party even called the president and his Republicans a group of traitors and baby-killers.
They will paint horrific pictures of violent demonstrations in the United States against the war by those who thought it unethical and illegal, and talk of how some of those called to fight resisted and faced arrest and trial for their actions. They will describe how some lawyers tried to litigate against the war and even took their case to foreign governments so as to gain sympathy.
They will tell us that many of those who served in the U.S. military and fought and died were motivated as much by poverty as by patriotism and that some of them, frankly, didn't even know what the war was about. They will show that on occasion raw nationalism took the place of sober reflection.
They will say that the president and commander-in-chief was too motivated by his religious beliefs and that he read the Bible too often. As a result he actually thought he had God on his side and that the conflict was one between good and evil -- one that had to be won if people were to be free and equal.
They will give examples of the brutal treatment of some enemy prisoners by the Americans and say that this destroyed the entire moral argument for waging the war in the first place. They will write of camps where captured men were humiliated and denied their basic human rights as prisoners of war.
They will say that some of the new rulers of the conquered state were not universally liked by the rest of the population. They may have been local but they did not represent all of the people and were thought by some to be outsiders. They were also imposed on the masses by the Americans and needed American support to keep them in power.
They will tell us that the people and governments of many countries condemned the war and said that the Americans were barbarians. They will record how there were enormous protests against American policy, and Americans, in foreign cities and that some of them were ugly and violent.
They will say all of this -- at least, they would, but there's no need.
Because they already have. I speak not of Iraq but of the American Civil War.
The president, of course, was Abraham Lincoln. The cause was the preservation and integrity of the United States and the emancipation of people of colour. It was a war for freedom, dignity and the rule of law. A war that had to be fought.
I'd like to see the usual suspects make an argument against it.
But then, almost a century and a half ago, the usual suspects did.
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