From the OP:
( the probability of Hussein initiating an attack in the foreseeable future is low )
Intl law aside, it’s so by a matter of definition. It’s what the term means.
No. Intl law has very little (if anything at all) to do with point I’m making. I’m saying that the terms used by Team Bush to sell the invasion did not fit with what the US intel community’s assessment was.
There needs to be a reasonable certainty that it’s about to come to pass.
It depends, did Clinton try to sell it as preemptive war or as some other thing?
If he tried to sell it as something other than preemptive war, then there would be no point in bringing up the preemptive war issue.
In the case in point, TB brought up the preemption issue. If they had sold the war as something other than preemption, then preemptive war issue would be moot.
Please understand that I’m not trying to make the case here that the invasion wasn’t a case of preemptive war and therefore wrong. (This seems to be the argument you’re rebutting.) Instead, I’m saying that TB invoked preemptive war when there was not an imminent attack to preempt. I’m not addressing the rightness/wrongness of the invasion in and of itself on this point.
I’m solely addressing the case made for the invasion. The case was not based on the best info available at the time.
As I noted above, these conditions are pretty much irrelevant to the point at hand which is about the sales pitch made for war rather than the actual conditions necessary. If TB had made a case that invoked something other than preemptive war, then this issue would not exist. Without an imminent threat, a war cannot be preemptive. It may be justified, but it’s not preemptive.
Yes, you are. His death may be inevitable, but, barring special yet unspecified circumstances, his death would not be considered “about to occur.”