Tuesday, August 31, 2004

Imagine

The following is a copy of a letter I've emailed to the editor of the News-Press, our local paper. I'll let you know if it gets published. I don't read the News-Press religiously, so if you happen upon my letter, let me know.

Just imagine if eighteen months ago President Bush had waited three more weeks—just three more weeks—until Hans Blix, who headed the United Nations weapons-inspection team in Iraq, had completed his work. Blix would have reported that there were no weapons of mass destruction (as indeed turns out was the case), the UN inspection teams would have remained active (under the terms of the previous Security Council resolution) and the “no-fly zones” over northern and southern Iraq would continue to be patrolled by US and UK warplanes, ensuring that Saddam Hussein would remain boxed, figuratively and literally.

Given the severity of the ongoing UN sanctions, Saddam may have decided, as did another evil-doer, Libya’s Muammar Qadaffi, that it made economic and political sense to change his approach and to join the community of nations. (Recall, Qadaffi was once considered as awful a tyrant and international demon as Saddam, so much so that US warplanes bombed his residence in 1986, killing his infant daughter.) But putting aside such speculation, this much is certain: Nine-hundred seventy-six American soldiers and 10,000 Iraqis would be alive; 6,000 American soldiers wouldn’t have been maimed; and $87 billions of American tax dollars would be here at home, benefiting Americans in ways we can only imagine.

Just imagine.

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