Justifying the War in Iraq

Please, Mr. Editor, please! tell me what a war with Iraq is meant to accomplish?

But before you give me some glib answer, consider carefully the war in Afghanistan.

The scenario as I remember it went like this:

Members of al-Qaeda, whose leader, Osama bin Laden, was in Afghanistan whose de facto government was the Taliban, took down the World Trade Center in New York. America then gave that government an ultimatum--surrender Mr. bin Laden or else! The Taliban said, Or else. So America spent billions killing Afghans, used billion dollar a piece smart bombs and missiles to pulverize mud huts, placed notoriously undemocratic war lords in power, and declared victory. But Osama bin Laden got away.

Then the claim became, we seriously disrupted the activities of al-Qaeda! But nobody, not even the American government believes it, for if that claim were true, our fear of terrorism should have been lessened rather than heightened. So measured by the stated objectives, the war in Afghanistan accomplished nothing whatsoever.

Now the American government and your editorial opinion advocate engaging in the same kind of effort again. Why? I defy you to make sense of this.

But if you answer, don't provide platitudes such as weve made life better for the Afghans or the world safer for democracy. It's way too early to make the former claim, and the latter has been uttered falsely too many times since the Great War which was, after all, the war to end all wars. (The Economist 7/10/2005)

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