U.S.: lead by example, not force
One day in August, 2001, I was walking home from high school, and as I walked through the school parking lot I saw a car that had a bumper sticker on it. The bumper sticker proudly said, “No one is free until everyone is free.” I thought about it a second and let out a chuckle and said “stupid liberal” under my breath. And I really felt that way. If citizens under Mugabe’s dictatorship in Zimbabwe aren’t free, does that mean that I, as an American, am not free? I didn’t think so.
As a conservative Republican at that time I never felt that it was America’s job to free people from their government. Throughout the past century it has been liberal democrats that put us in battles and wars we didn’t belong in. Take Vietnam, Korea, Serbia and even Kosovo. All these conflicts we involved ourselves in were for the liberty or democracy of the citizens of those countries.
On the other side, between 1870 and 1990, Republican Presidents had not authorized a single war. In that time span, Democratic Presidents had authorized four. Two of those wars were both World Wars (I believe they were justified, so I won’t judge Wilson and Roosevelt). The other two were Korea and Vietnam and should be heavily criticized historically. I’ve been a Conservative Republican as long as I can remember, and one of the major reasons is because Republicans typically don’t get America involved in unnecessary wars.
A month after I saw that bumper sticker, the world changed. America was attacked by Islamic terrorists and the Republican party changed their position. And so did I. The next month we were in Afghanistan, rightfully so, to hunt terrorists in their caves. The war in Afghanistan is a war that we did not choose, but one that we must fight.
In the months following the worst attack on American soil, President Bush outlined the “axis of evil” consisting of Iraq, Iran and North Korea. I, and most everyone else, had a beautiful vision. We could take over Iraq, Iran and North Korea and make it a beacon of hope for freedom and democracy in areas of turmoil.
To be perfectly honest in the first few years following the 9/11 attack I, probably like President Bush, had this vision that by the time the President leaves office in January 2009 that he could leave a world with a free Iraq, a free Iran and a Democratic North Korea. I just couldn’t imagine how an idea like that could be flawed.
After all, we are Americans. We love freedom. We think that everyone should be free, and have a right to vote for their leaders. And then I bought into the bumper sticker. No, I didn’t actually buy the bumper sticker, I haven’t found any stores selling it. But I bought into the premise of the bumper sticker that it was the American government’s duty to bring freedom and democracy to the world.
Iraqis were suffering under the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, so I supported the war in Iraq. North Koreans were suffering from that munchkin Kim Jung Il. I would have supported the U.S. carrying out covert operations to get rid of their nuclear weapons (if that’s even possible to do). Iranians suffer under anti-semite Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and for a time I would have supported the U.S. taking a brief detour in Iraq to deal with Iran.
But this logic is wrong and flawed. If we declare war on every nation that has policies that we don’t like, then where do we stop? And why have we still not even considered invading China which has an atrocious human rights record? It will only be a short time till even our staunchest allies tire of our war-mongering. As it is, the war in Iraq has spread us so thin militarily that we probably wouldn’t be able to appropriately fight another war without re-instating the draft.
The point of the war in Iraq was to depose Saddam Hussein, free the Iraqis and to provide backbone to the seventeen U.N. resolutions that Hussein violated. None of these three reasons justify war. Whenever I would debate with friends that were against the war, my very first point would be the U.N. resolutions. But sending our men and women to fight in combat to defend the integrity of paper with United Nations letterhead is not a good reason for war. And sure we want the Iraqis to be free but is it worth a brother or a sister, a son or a daughter? Most of us would probably agree that it’s not even worth an annoying cousin. In the end, our quest to free Iraqis (the war is titled “Operation: Iraqi Free-dom”) has brought Al Qaeda there to fight us, rampant insurgency and potential for a civil war. We invaded with good intentions, but as the cliche goes, the road to hell is paved in good intentions.
I don’t completely fault President Bush for his decisions. I believe that he did what he believed to be right. If I were President in a similar situation, I may have done the same thing. But I will find President Bush at fault if he sticks by this flawed, internationally invasive war strategy. I’m a very Conservative Republican, but I can’t support this war-hungry strategy that the majority of the Republican party has picked up. I say majority, because there is one Republican running for President that has been against the war from the start and even leads all other candidates in donations from military personnel. His name is Ron Paul and he sticks to the original conservative ideals of non-interventionism.
While over 70 percent of Americans believe America needs to pull out of Iraq, we should continue to support the troops. They willingly sacrifice a lot for our freedoms; many even sacrifice themselves. This is a great nation with a lot to offer the world, but we shouldn’t force our military men and women to export liberty out of the barrel of their M-16. We should lead by example, not by force.
Posted by Colonnade Archives
on Nov 30 2007. Filed under Opinion.
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