Essay by Martha Quillen
Politics – May 2004 – Colorado Central Magazine
I’M GENERALLY a pretty confident armchair politician, but at this point I’m really glad I don’t run this country — and I’m not in the least bit sure why John Kerry (or Howard Dean, John Edwards, Joe Lieberman, Dennis Kucinich or Wesley Clark, all lucky winners in my view) would want to.
My self-esteem hasn’t wholly deserted me, however. I still figure I know what tax measures and domestic policies would be best for our nation. But at this point, I have no idea what we should do about Iraq.
Of course, my friends all seem to know.
For example, in various letters, Slim Wolfe has suggested that we try George Bush and members of our armed services for war crimes. But I don’t see how that would work.
First off, war crimes are not under U.S. jurisdiction; they’ve been established by treaty and international councils and are generally overseen by the U.N.
— And something tells me that the U.N. is not going to try the U.S. President for war crimes.
In fact, the U.S. is one of the five elite nations which are permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, which “has the primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security.” The other four peacesetters are China, France, the Russian Federation, and the United Kingdom.
(And nope, it’s not too difficult to understand why these five were permanently posted at the peace table — nor to figure out why peace is such a rare commodity in our world.)
As for the other ten members of the National Security Council, they rotate. On January 1, 2004, Algeria, Benin, Brazil, the Philippines, and Romania began serving two-year memberships, and Chile, Germany, Pakistan, Spain and Angola will serve until their terms end on December 31, 2004.
Another one of my friends insists that the President should let the U.N. take charge of peace-keeping forces in Iraq — immediately. And I, for one, can understand his impulse (since it sure might be nice to have a few more allies fighting beside us).
But it doesn’t seem as if Iraq is ready for peace-keeping forces — since you presumably have to have peace before you can keep it.
Besides, if the U.N. were put in charge tomorrow, the U.S. would still have to supply the bulk of the troops, equipment, and weaponry needed to restore order in Iraq. And Bush has already promised to turn Iraq over to an interim government by June 30th.
Furthermore, with rebels attacking Iraqi civilians and U.S. troops, alike, rotating forces at this juncture would be uncomfortably akin to changing horses in mid-stream.
And to muck up matters more, if our troops actually ended up fighting as part of a U.N. coalition, I suspect many home-grown conservatives would want to launch a civil war.
That’s one of the most disturbing things about the Iraq War, though. From the beginning, Americans have had seriously divergent views about fighting there, and the rift keeps growing.
Now, due to the embarrassing absence of WMDs in Iraq, the Bush administration maintains that Saddam was a bad guy who had to be defeated. But critics are infuriated because they believe Bush and his men lied to buoy their plans to attack Iraq. Whereas Bush supporters insist that it’s important to stay the course.
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace currently offers forty pages of statements made by various government officials about Iraq’s weaponry:
“But we now know that Saddam has resumed his efforts to acquire nuclear weapons,” Vice President Cheney said, August 26, 2002.
“Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction,” Secretary Powell said, September 8, 2002.
“Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised,” President Bush said on March 17, 2003.
But as it turns out, we haven’t found WMDs in Iraq. And recently a counter-offensive was launched when President Bush tried to make light of that fact.
During his presentation at an annual media dinner, President Bush showed a slide of himself looking out of a window in the oval office.”Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere,” he quipped. Then he showed shots of himself looking under furniture and searching his office.
David Corn of The Nation reported, “Disapproval must have registered upon my face, for one of my tablemates said, ‘Come on, David, this is funny.’ I wanted to reply, Over 500 Americans and literally countless Iraqis are dead because of a war that was supposedly fought to find weapons of mass destruction, and Bush is joking about it.”
Within a few days numerous others criticized the President’s sense of humor. But regardless of the presence or absence of WMDs, the Bush administration stood firm regarding its policies.
And so the dispute spun into April, when we suddenly seemed to be losing the peace, even though we had presumably won the war.
In Fallujah, Shia and Sunni rebels revolted against the U.S. occupation; unrest spread into other Iraqi cities, and hundreds of civilians and dozens of American servicemen were killed. Tensions escalated at home as Condoleeza Rice testified about the Bush administration’s policies and the quality of U.S. intelligence. Rumors started that President Bush had actually decided to attack Saddam right after 9/11 , regardless of whether he had weapons of mass destruction.
SO WHAT SHOULD our country do now?
Well, some Americans hope that NATO and the United Nations will send in more troops; while others question whether the U.S. deadline for transferring power to the Iraqis should be delayed. Some Americans say we should wait and see, and some insist that we should get out of Iraq.
But at this point, the U.S. is thoroughly entangled in the country and will bear the brunt of blame no matter what happens. The U.S. will also have to assume financial responsibilities for repairing and rebuilding Iraqi cities and infrastructure; and if Iraq falls to fanatical insurgents, Americans may acquire new refugees and enemies.
Due to recent events, however, the U.S. will probably receive more help from the U.N.
But I don’t think the prospect of U.N. intervention is nearly as promising as some Americans seem to think.
Mindful of growing Islamic hostility toward the U.S., liberals tend to regard the U. N. as an international peace-keeping entity and objective negotiator, which can intercede and mediate, and thereby mitigate anti-American sentiments.
But Islamic fundamentalists often regard the United Nations in less optimistic terms. In fact, radical Moslems often view the U.N. as part and parcel of U.S. and Israeli authority.
For example, before 9/11 the Taliban lambasted the U.N. for refusing to recognize it as the government of Afghanistan. After all, the Taliban ruled over 95% of the country, but the U.N. recognized the Islamic State of Afghanistan (more familiarly known as the Northern Alliance) as the official government.
Then, after 9/11 , the U.S. sent troops into Afghanistan and Osama bin Laden railed against the United Nations:
Are not our tragedies but caused by the United Nations?” bin Laden asked in a videotaped message on Al-Jazeera. “Who issued the Partition Resolution on Palestine in 1947 and surrendered the land of Muslims to the Jews? It was the United Nations in its resolution in 1947.
Those who claim that they are the leaders of the Arabs and continue to appeal to the United Nations have disavowed what was revealed to Prophet Muhammad, God’s peace and blessings be upon him.
Those who refer things to the international legitimacy have disavowed the legitimacy of the Holy Book and the tradition of Prophet Muhammad, God’s peace and blessings be upon him.
This is the United Nations from which we have suffered greatly. Under no circumstances should any Muslim or sane person resort to the United Nations. The United Nations is nothing but a tool of crime.”
FORTUNATELY, MOST FOLLOWERS OF Islam don’t approve of bin Laden. But many are nonetheless wary of the U.N.
Recently the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution condemning the killing of the spiritual leader of the Palestinian group Hamas. But the U.S. vetoed the measure. Only the five permanent members of the Security Council have veto power, a situation which no doubt prompted Algeria, which sponsored the resolution, to conclude that the council was “doomed to fail” when dealing with Middle Eastern issues.
After the attacks by rebels in Fallujah, anti-American sentiments mounted among Iraqis. Now, many who once supported the U.S., fear civil war and the consequent destruction of their homeland.
And American relations on the home front don’t seem to be faring too well these days, either. Currently, commentators and columnists carp about WMDs and liars; or about patriotism and staying the course; or about winning the war on terror and soldiering on, or giving up and getting out.
As for me?
I don’t think things are quite as simple as many journalists imply.
SO DID Bush lie? Or merely exaggerate? Or was U.S. intelligence faulty?
In truth, I never believed Bush in the first place, so I don’t really see what difference it makes. In my view, all of this stuff about whether Bush lied or merely exaggerated is wholly irrelevant, and totally distracting.
And it keeps eclipsing the really important question:
Is this the end of our war on terror? Or merely the beginning?
An End to Evil, a recently released book by David Frum, a former special assistant to President George W. Bush, and Richard Perle, who served as chairman of the Defense Policy Board under Bush, contends:
…thus far our fellow Americans have passed every test. They have shown themselves, as President Bush said in his speech in the National Cathedral on September 14, 2001, ‘generous and kind, resourceful and brave.’ They have fought and won two campaigns on the opposite side of the globe, saving millions of Afghans from famine and the nation of Iraq from tyranny. They have hunted down terrorists and killers, while respecting the rights of the innocent. And they have uncomplainingly accepted inconvenience and danger through tiresome years of lineups at airports, searches at public buildings, and exposure to further acts of terror.
Now comes the hardest test of all. The war on terror is not over. In many ways, it has barely begun. Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, and Hamas still plot murder, and money still flows from donors worldwide to finance them. Mullahs preach jihad from the pulpits of mosques from Bengal to Brooklyn. Iran and North Korea are working frantically to develop nuclear weapons. While our enemies plot, our allies dither and carp, and much of our own government remains ominously unready for the fight. We have much to do and scant time in which to do it.
Yet at this dangerous moment many in the American political and media elite are losing their nerve for the fight. Perhaps it is the political cycle: For some Democrats, winning the war has become a less urgent priority than winning the next election. Perhaps it is the media, rediscovering its bias in favor of bad news and infecting the whole country with its ingrown pessimism. Perhaps it is Congress….
I DON’T KNOW ABOUT YOU, but this polemic gives me chills.
Where does all of this fervor lead?
Do these guys really want to make this so-called war on terror permanent?
Hezbollah? Hamas? Iran? North Korea? Will it ever end?
Must America fight until the end of time?
Here, during mud season in the backwaters of Colorado, it’s generally easy to ignore a lot of this stuff. Yesterday was a good day for a walk. There was fresh snow on the peaks; the grass was green, the trees budding; the breeze smelled fresh and loamy with a hint of wood smoke. Central Colorado isn’t the best place for commerce or profit, but it definitely offers some respite from the world: a wealth of beauty, tranquility, and majesty.
Perhaps that’s why I find it a little difficult to understand why anyone wants to be President these days.
Or why anyone would want to rule the world.
And yet many conservatives think that the United States should not only lead the war on terror, but they believe that our government has the ability, power, and responsibility to root out evil world-wide.
I don’t really understand why anyone thinks the U.S. should evaluate the world and determine which governments should be destroyed. What gives us the authority? The knowledge? Or the right to dominate?
At some point, it must be clear to everyone — be they liberal or conservative, Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Communist, Socialist, native born, naturalized, or registered alien — that Americans are no longer fighting bin Laden, Al Quaeda, the Taliban, or any other entity implicated in the attacks on the World Trade Center.
Our President has declared war on all of the terrorists in all of the world.
So how long will such an endeavor take?
I have no idea. But we appear to be inspiring more fledgling terrorists every day, so I suspect if we muster the will and determination, we could be at this for at least a century or so — which is why I’m going to vote for John Kerry. Although I find Kerry a bit annoying, I’m hoping he will stay content with two wars at a time. But if not….
I used to think that Colorado would be a great place to be in the event of World War III, since there are so many old hardrock mines with miles of underground tunnels.
Last week, however, Ed and I were hiking and happened upon an old mine that was fenced and barricaded with metal, welded shut, and padlocked closed.
I complained that these places would no longer make very good bomb shelters. But Ed assured me that in the event of a conflagration, he had some excellent bolt cutters.
ALAS, I’M WRITING THIS IN April, national poetry month, so I thought in conclusion I should select something solemn and fitting to reflect the agony of war. Toward that end, I read poetry about battles, trenches, injuries, fear, death, dismemberment and homesickness. I read poems by mothers who lost their children, and young men who lost their lives, and soldiers who lost their comrades.
And many of those verses were poignant, vivid, and dreadfully effective. But even the finest of them, failed to capture the full scope of war: the fear, pain, death, injury and suffering; lost families, lost children, lost homes, lost hope; the confusion, grief, rage, and resentment; the noise, destruction, disorder, and displacement.
Poetry doesn’t actually express the splendor of life or the horror of death in a realistic way, nor does it wholly communicate the emotional anguish of loss and despair — which is actually a good thing, for if it did, who would read it?
Instead, however, the war poems I’ve been reading tend to provoke tears and sentiment. Whereas actual war, I suspect, induces prolonged, recurrent misery.
Thus, I’ve decided not to conflate real war and fictional war in this letter, because even though I love poetry and movies and books, I think maybe our views about war have gotten too romantic and thus our society has grown a mite too enthusiastic about death, honor, glory, victory, and fallen heroes. So I’ll leave it to you to peruse war poems on your own, and instead, I’ve penned a cheerful little verse:
An Ode to Bolt Cutters
May you and I, and he and she
May Bush and Kerry, and all the Presidents’ men
May every last one of us
No matter what our faults, flaws, or politics
Find that we never need
— To join the underground
–Martha Quillen
