Iraqi Invasion: What's the rush? (Muscular Disarmament)

Great Debates
21

I don’t buy your assertion that it would be impossible for the US government to ferret out “distibuted” weapons. If the government has control of most, if not all, of the resources that Saddam had when he was in power, they are a hell of alot more likely to find those weapons than they are today. A die-hard is more likely to caugh up secrets if the threat of death for him and his family comes from the enemies of Saddam, rather than Saddam himself.

The potential of Saddam being a source is what we are concerned about. There are other sources in the world, even homemade devices, that we will probably have to deal with in the future. But like Ossama being a red herring in this debate. so is the likelyhood of terrorists getting the weapons because of our actions. We cannot ignore the concernes about Saddam’s WMD. Inspectors are not working. And more will only work a bit more. But it cannot be acceptable when, like you said, “potentially tens of thousands of people” are at stake. you cannot contain that hound if it does not want to be contained. period.

22

“I don’t buy your assertion that it would be impossible for the US government to ferret out “distibuted” weapons”
Sorry but this is just an assertion. The US has no knowledge of where these weapons are kept and there is no guarantee that the officials in Iraq will all co-operate or will even know where all the weapons are.

It doesn’t even have to be die-hard Saddam supporters. It could simply be an enterprising Iraqi officer who sees an opportunity to make money by stealing and selling bio/chemical weapons in the black market. Once the regime falls there will be no telling what happens at all those weapons sites. Certainly the US has no way of controlling them when it doesn’t even know where they are.

And remember that Saddam will try to make as hard as possible for the US to find the WMD and as easy as possible for America’s enemies to find them. Just assuming that the US will still be able to find all the weapons is the height of irrational optimism.

23

msmith537: “I love it when people trivialize economic issues. Especially since solving just about every other issue requires a strong economy.”

  1. The economic issues pale beside the loss of life and property engendered by war. If you disagree with this, please say so - though I would henceforth wonder about your, um, morality.

  2. Actually WWII went just fine coming off the period of greatest economic weakness in the US. Full scale wars can be conducted in a noninflationary manner when the economy has excess capacity, like it has now.

  3. BTW: Stock market strength does not equal “strong economy”. Not that you said that it did.

Tit for tat with december
--------Actually, we do not know that Saddam will give up his WMDs in any circumstances at all.

Actually, Saddam gave up quite a few of his WMDs during the 1990s. Of course, some were taken out with bombs. But most were taken out with inspections (and, less widely noted, defections).

-------Contrary to the implication above, Bush and the UK have said over and over that they are prepared to attack Iraq without UN authorization.

Um, I don’t get that “implication”: I read, “the United States wants international support for military action if it can possibly achieve it.” Emphasis added for clarity.

-------It’s more likely that cooperation will engender more cooperation. Especially, after we actually display the huge stores of WMDs. At that point, doves will be embarrassed and hawks will be vindicated.

If things go well. If they don’t, not. I’ll give you half credit for this one. :wink: The serious underlying point I would like to stress is that we’re dealing with decision making under intrinsic uncertainty here.

--------A failure to make war engenders these same risks; it delays the time to a point where Iraq might finally have nukes, making the risk much greater.

I hope to discuss this later.

------We have already seen that the risk of a multinational military did not lead Iraq to disarm. Why would Iraq cooperate and disarm under the Carnegie proposal?

Disarmament occurs as the weapons are found, like it happened during the 1990s.

--------quote:1. Put the right people in the field.It’s dubious that this could be done within the UN structure. There’s too much politics there.

I think Butler did a commendable job, given the resources that he had.

--------quote:2. Get the U-2s flying. Of course we should. And, Iraq’s failure to let them fly violates UNR 1441. Why would Iraq obey now?

From today’s NYT (Sat): “And both Mr. Blix and Dr. ElBaradel, the chief nuclear inspector. said they were satisfied with terms Iraq laid down for overflights by U-2, Mirage and Antonov surveillance aircraft and German pilotless drone aircraft”.

So, clearly General december has shown himself to be a serial miscalculator with regards to Iraqi behavior. Can we trust december with the bomb? “I don’t think so”, Admiral flowbark opines: he recommends that december be removed from the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

--------This entire proposal has a basic contradiction. We would need a level of intrusiveness that locates and destroys pretty much all of Iraq’s WMDs. For 12 years, Saddam has shown that he will not give up his WMDs under any threat. Also, given the nature of his regime, there’s no way that he would allow this level of intrusiveness.

Actually, the Carnegie proposal allows for war if Saddam vacillates. And Saddam did disarm during the 1990s, after weapons were found. If Saddam is really like you say he is, the Endowment’s plan loses little, as war proceeds forthwith. You need a fundamental rethink.

------The Carnegie proposal is dangerous. If it were tried, it would probably muddle along ineffectively, without preventing Iraq from continuing their store of WMDs. This is the worst of possibilities.

Ah, no. I can think of much worse scenarios.

24

I am not convinced by the Carnegie plan.

It appears to me to involve delaying the inevitable for “12 months”. Furthermore, it appears to call for a large backup force in the region. In Iraq: What Next?, the Carnegie Endowment (CE) admits, “Finally, the deployment is expensive, with some estimates at $1 billion per week to keep 150,000 troops in the Gulf.” That amounts to $365 billion for a year: this number -and numbers much lower- do not appear to be sustainable or advisable.*

Now, one of the purported advantages of delay is that it will get the French and Germans on our side. But, against that, the Saudi government isn’t going to like it. Their attitude is, “Make the invasion as short as possible. Just do the job: we’ll take care of our disgruntled populace. But don’t go testing theories of air power”. Their worst case scenario is to see the US attack Iraq and not remove Saddam. (I’m paraphrasing from my memory of Pollack).

The Point: It seems to me that siting inactive yet jumpy US troops in the region for lengthy periods of time will not make our important supporters happy, important supporters being those countries which border Iraq.

Furthermore.
Giving Saddam more time in the hopes that he will be overthrown plays into his strengths. It also gives him time to make mischief and plan preemptive WMD attacks on bordering US troops. I should note that Saddam has said that one of the lessons he learned from the first Gulf War was that he should have attacked US troops when they were first massing on his border. I am reluctant to hand the initiative to our adversary.

That said, war is an ugly thing, and I commend the Carnegie Endowment for attempting to devise a viable alternative. It’s not clear to me that they have quite finished the job though.

  • This argument turns on the precise nature and location of the backup force that the Endowment has in mind. This isn’t clear to me. If it was specified, I would like to see an independent military analyst take a look at it.

JimB: That had occured to me as well: all peacenik proposals seem to align well with the Republican 2004 campaign plans. But let’s keep this between you and me. :wink:

25

That’s 52 billion dollars for the year, for a continuous deployment of 150,000 troops. Much lower. Arg.

Still, I need more details about the scope, nature and costs of the CE’s backup ground troops.