John Compton – Emeritus Professor of Philosophy

1. We (the people) have been ill-served by an administration which has taken us on the road to war without our permission. From the middle of last summer on, for its private reasons only, it began to beat the drums for unilateral, preemptive war. Only reluctantly, under pressure from within and without, did it consult congress and, eventually, move to engage the U. N. Even this latter move, because it has been clouded by the administration’s operative conviction that it is but a prelude to war, will all too likely result in just that very outcome — no matter what Mr. Bush proclaims about his desire for a peaceful solution. And even if a war were the only way to disarm Iraq, the manner in which we will have arrived at that unhappy endpoint has (justifiably) alienated our would-be allies as well as our citizens. As Mr. Bryzinski recently put it, “We have played the game badly.”
2. The war has not, in any case, been shown to be necessary — at least not now. A possible threat to us from Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction is not an actual threat, much less an imminent threat. And so far the “al Qaeda connection” is tenuous. We should be pursuing the al Qaeda threat directly, first and foremost. A war in Iraq could well inflame the entire middle East and incite further terrorism. We in the U.S. should be, and should have been, engaged in mitigating the economic and political and other causes of unrest and resentment of America in the middle East which are the causes of Islamic terrorism in the first place.
3. Perhaps, given the (fortunate) continued resistance of other Security Council nations to immediate hostilities, a program and schedule for the final peaceful disarming of Iraq (or its effective neutralization by the presence of inspectors) can be implemented. There is every reason for the U. S. to acquiesce in this as an evidence of international solidarity, even at considerable monetary cost (in keeping forces in the Gulf area), for the cost of war, to human lives and international relationships, is far, far greater. The threat of force which the U. S. has prepared could remain, as it should always have been, the very last resort.
4. Unfortunately, this rush to war follows from a complete rewriting of American foreign policy toward the view that, given our supreme military power, we should use it to change the character of governments we find dangerous and otherwise to support our perceived national interests around the world, irrespective of international support and cooperation. Somehow it is thought that our power is enough to put us above international agreements, international law, and international good sense, when, in truth, our power — especially in the long term — depends on these things. No one elected our present administration to embark on such an interventionist program; this sort of issue was not a part of our last presidential election and never explicitly a part of the more recent congressional elections. Without our leave, we and our children and children’s children will suffer from the shortsightedness and self-righteousness of a dangerous administrative clique — moderated only partially by one or two figures like Secretary Powell. I’d march in the streets if I thought it would do any good.