Saddam First?

I want to address a recent comment by millersam. He comments that, as a dialysis patient, it should have been easy to get Bin Laden and the US should have gone after the worst first (Bin Laden) then North Korea, Iran, and Saddam. He point is that Bush failed by not following the right order.

First, I want to thank millersam and everyone who comments on this page. I am still naïve enough to believe that debate can change a persons mind and I, like Jon Stewart, abhor the partisan screaming seen in the United States, exemplified by shows like Crossfire. All those who comment intelligently add to the debate, and it warms me to think that not everyone is a partisan, screaming automaton for their respective ideologies.

However, I must strongly disagree with millersam regarding the war on terror.

Bin Laden is a dialysis patient, and, at first glance, it should be easy to get the guy. However, there are many logical reasons for why the US has been unable to get him so far. Just because many Arabs are poor and live in less developed countries does not mean they are stupid. We tend to see the US as all powerful and can do anything they want at any time. Is it so hard to believe that Bin Laden can outsmart US intelligence services? This depends on your cultural bias. Also, the GF reminded me that Bin Laden is a very rich guy and that he can afford to purchase any type of electronic device, scrambler, encryption, etc. He likely is using communications devices that even the US military cannot crack. He may be a more sophisticated enemy then we think.

In addition, there may be reasons not to catch the guy. In WWII, the Allies cracked the German code machine and often did not act on intelligence they received because to do so would tip the Germans off that their code was compromised. Perhaps we have something similar. Maybe we have broken one of Bin Laden’s bodyguards and are getting great intelligence from him and killing/capturing Bin Laden would stop us from getting good intelligence on future attacks. Personally, I do not believe this to be true, but I just use it to make the point that there may be other reasons not to get Bin Laden. We just do not have enough information on this.

For these reasons, I am not ready to condemn Bush for not getting Bin Laden. I am reserving judgment.

However, I will not reserve judgment on the order of the war on terror. I think the order Bush has approached it is correct. This is not to say that the war in Iraq is being run perfectly. Mistakes are being made. Specifically, it is clear that there were not enough troops to secure Iraq, and keeping many of the Ba’ath party types in the army may have prevented them from going over to the insurgents. However, this is typical Monday morning quarterbacking. War is chaotic, the Bush Administration made mistakes. The best thing to do is analize those mistakes and not to make them again.

Now we get to the crux of the matter: the order of the war. Some say we should have gone after the biggest fish first and worked our way down, dealing with Saddam last. There are several reasons that this is not the way to go and I will use an analogy to demonstrate this.

Let’s say there are 3 bullies in the playground that are bugging you. You think you can take number 3, but not sure you can take number 1 or 2. Why not take out the one you are sure you can? Maybe the other two will be deterred by your willingness to fight and stop bugging you. As well, you may learn something about fighting bullies which may help when you have to take on the rest. Maybe you will gain some allies or find out some weakness about them you did not know.

These are all valid reasons for going after the weakest member of the axis of evil. Notice that John Kerry and his supporters’ best make the argument for going after Saddam first. Kerry talks a lot about how many mistakes the Bush Administration is making in Iraq. Better to make your mistakes on your weakest opponent, where the mistake will be less costly, then on the guy you are not sure you can take.

This leads me to North Korea. Those on the left seem to hate war and constantly moan about the casualties. The approach to the war taken by Bush seeks to keep these causalities at their lowest. Take out the weak bully and maybe the rest will fall into line. No need for war with the rest. Does anyone think a war with North Korea would be less bloody than the present war in Iraq? Remember that North Korea has nuclear weapons and I doubt crazy Kim lacks the will to use them.

Which leads me to my last point: this war is about the will to fight it. Bin Laden knows he cannot beat the US militarily. He is conducting the classic North Vietnam Tet Offensive and trying to destroy the enemy’s will to fight. The US will to fight the war on terror is waning, as evidenced by the tight US presidential race. If the people of the US are losing their will after 1,000 causalities in Iraq, imagine what would have happened if a US beachhead in North Korea was nuked and they lost 50,000 soldiers in a split second?

If Kerry wins the US presidency it will signal a lack of will in the US to continue this war. This means the rest of us will no longer be able ride on Uncle Sam’s coattails. Without the US to defend us and our own government's lack of will to do the same, this should make every Canadian very worried.