Ann Coulter: Liberal Arguments: Still A Quagmire

Italgato wrote:

Rumsfeld visited Iraq in 1983.
Desert Storm began in 1991, seven years later.

World War II ended in 1945.
The Berlin Blockade began in 1948--a mere three years later.

"The enemy of my enemy is my friend"

The Soviets in 1945
The IRAQI in 1983.

I do really hope that nimh wasn't too shocked by Rumsfeld's visit in 1983 followed by Desert Storm in 1991. [..]

Henery Kissinger calls it "Realpolitik"

Ah ... common ground.

Yes, Kissinger called it "realpolitik". "The enemy of my enemy is my friend".

Yes, it has inspired many a co-operation with greater and smaller tyrants around the world -including Stalin at some point in time.

More importantly still - it's mostly contraproductive, too. Realpolitik is the most short-sighted form of foreign policy imaginable, always sowing the seeds of tomorrow's trouble in its tactics to tackle today's enemies. Today we arm the Mujahedeen because they're fighting the communists, tomorrow we have heavily armed Mujahedeen on our hands.

You convey the idea deftly enough with your little timeline there. Yalta today does mean Budapest tomorrow - I'm not going into whether FDR had any alternative back then. Even while evidence and international condemnations of Saddam's use of WMD* poured in, President Reagan "codified U.S. determination [..] "to avert an Iraqi collapse"," because Iran was considered the greater enemy. And thus Rumsfeld was sent to Baghdad, to prepare the ground for renewed diplomatic relations, massive financial support, and "don't ask - don't tell" toleration of arms deliveries to Saddam's regime. Five years later - the Kurds are gassed by those WMD. Bush Sr. keeps pouring in money, making Iraq stronger - and three years later, Saddam occupies Kuwait. What goes around, comes around. Friends turn into enemies because - we chose the baddies to be our friends.

So, no qualms there, and since we apparently agree on how Reagan/Rumsfeld helped lead to Desert Storm, I trust you will no longer parrot Coulter's little nonsensicalities about "fifty years of Democratic guilt" (paraphrasing).

*(Joe pointed out that the definition of chemical weapons as WMD as questionable, but considering the Bush administration, I think, made the term WMD up itself, I guess we might as well go with its definition of them.)

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So - to your questions.

First of all - in your first post you confidently proclaimed, "to me, [this piece] is pratically unassailable." I succeeded to "assail" various propositions from Coulter's first paragraph alone. I notice that you didn't ask any questions about several of those points.

For example: Coulter talks of "uncovering [..] colonies of terrorists", "now that we've taken the country". Which? Where? Only terrorist camps US soldiers found upon liberating Iraq were the Ansar-al-Islam ones - outside of Saddam-controlled territory. Now there are reports of new terrorists coming in, but: "uncovered"? From Saddam-times? Where's her source, her evidence? Where's yours?

For example: Coulter slurs liberals by stating that Saddam Hussein was "their favorite world leader behind Jacques Chirac". How? Where? Who? As I said and showed, "The war opponents included some of the most fiery critics of Saddam". No questions there?

Italgato wrote:

who [do] you mean when you say- "War Opponents"? Do you mean all war opponents or just some of them?

I vaguely seem to recall some "war opponents" who did, in fact, deny that Saddam was a threat to America's interests in the region". However, I do not have your obvious powers of recall and would have to do research.

My powers of recall are not immensely greater than yours, alas - though I seem to be putting in a little more research. But then again, I'm relatively lucky. Because I'm not the one who has a submission to defend.

Ann Coulter stated: "Before the war, they said Saddam Hussein [..] was not a threat to America's interests in the region". Unfortunately, she didn't say who she was talking about, either - just, "they" - the "liberals" - those who opposed the war. Well, I guess I fit the ticket, 'ccording to Coulter, as do most of my friends and family - and as do Joschka Fischer, Gerhard Schroeder, Jacques Chirac, Lionel Jospin, Kofi Annan, Mary Robinson, Nelson Mandela ... Can Ann show me any quote, from any of them, in which they said they thought Saddam was no threat to American interests? Can you, as her "Coulter's-case-is-unassailable" stand-in here?

They might be hard to find, because the irony is, that's what "we" (liberals, war opponents, whatever) were saying all along: that this war was about "America's interests in the region". Forget WMD. Forget 9/11 and supposed terrorist links. Forget dubious uranium purchase contracts. Those who opposed the war - and of this you can easily find many quotes - submitted more or less subtly that those issues were smokescreens, and that the acute hurry the Bush administration was in to go to war, right now, indicated a blunt case of national-interest, instead.

I've never really gotten the meaning of "straw man argument", but thanks to Joe, I can recognize one here, now. "In effect, the speaker constructs a fallacious argument, ascribes it to her opponent, knocks it down, and then concludes that the opponent is wrong." The fallacious argument here is - Saddam was not a threat to American interests. Coulter ascribes it to handily unidentified war opponents, concludes it's fallacious, and blames her opponents.

She would do better to stick up for the argument "her" George Bush made when he announced war. When he made his address to the nation on 17 March, preparing the Americans for the "use [of] force" against Iraq, he made a very clear case. Lemme summarize - but you can read along with me here):

President Bush wrote:

[The Iraqi] regime pledged to reveal and destroy all its weapons of mass destruction as a condition for ending the Persian Gulf War in 1991. [..]Our good faith has not been returned. [..] Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised. [..] And it has aided, trained and harbored terrorists, including operatives of al Qaeda.

The danger is clear: using chemical, biological or, one day, nuclear weapons, obtained with the help of Iraq, the terrorists could fulfill their stated ambitions and kill thousands or hundreds of thousands of innocent people in our country [..] Before the day of horror can come, before it is too late to act, this danger will be removed.

Anything here Ann or you wouldn't have agreed with back in March? There's loads there that war opponents argued with, then: that there was "no doubt" that Iraq still posessed WMD; that it aided and harbored "operatives of Al Qaeda", that there was a clear and present danger of terrorists using Iraqi WMD to attack the US on a new "day of horror". So - half a year later - where's the beef? You heard of any operational WMD, Al-Qaeda operatives or attack plans targeting the US being "uncovered", "now that we've taken the country"? Coulter says there were some - sources? Evidence? An "unassailable" claim?

(tbc)

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georgeob1 wrote:

Indeed the UN has, at least tacitly acknowledged the legality of our actions, all the heated rhetoric of our political opponents notwithstanding.

How?

georgeob1 wrote:

Nimh cites the "legality" question in our decision to intervene in Iraq. Apart from the General precepts in the UN Charter, I am not aware of any settled law that governs the decision of a sovereign nation to make war on another.

Well, all I actually said was that "war opponents denied there was sufficient [etc] to legally justify starting a war" - and I've surely heard that "legality" case made on TV and in the press by war opponents big and small. They included high UN officials - Robinson was one, I believe - whom you would expect to be able of "elementary scrutiny".

Myself, I'm no legal expert. I have already, as an amateur, dissected the text of the relevant UN resolutions here with Tress and others, and have found them to be unable to make their case that the war was legal on the basis of what those texts said. You seem to be going a step further, implying that sovereign nations are free, barring what it says in the General precepts in the UN Charter, to make war on another without the question of legality coming up, UN resolution or no. I dont know what it says in the General precepts in the UN Charter, but what does it say in there that would make Iraq's invasion of Kuwait illegal, but leave the US invasion of Iraq hors concours on the question?

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Nimh,

Good response. I do indeed mean to say that sovereign nations can make war subject only to the general precepts in the UN charter. These forbid aggressive war merely to gain territory or achieve other related purposes. The rights of nations to act in the interests of their security is acknowledged. Of course judgements can and will vary as to what constitutes sufficient cause, but nothing in the charter forbids action without explicit Security Council authorization. Indeed the belated US/European intervention in Serbia and Bosnia was done without any prior UN authorization. France and Germany both participated in that intervention.

It seems to me that Europe is in the grip of some very narrow and legalistic concepts concerning the relations of sovereign nations. Perhaps it is a side effect of the process of forming the EU, writing economic, environmental rules for members, and vetting candidate nations. The wider world is not composed of candidates for membership in the EU: this particularly includes the United States.

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George,

Sovereignty is a two way street. It does not just cover the right to attack but also the right to not be attacked.

As such the issue of sovereignty can easily be said to be an issue the US struggles with.

Now I do have a question for you. You have ceded that the case for war (as related to WMDs) was based on lies and furthermore concluded that this is acceptable.

If the danger that Iraq was supposed to have represented was exagerrated (as you have agreed about multiple times) then how do you reconcile taht with your comments that declaring war is justified on the basis of self-defense?

Anything on earth can be construed as in the interests of security. I am listening to people telling me how Israel should keep stolen land in another thread for her dire security concerns (steissd claims taht all, yes every single one, of the Israelis would die if they were to return Golan).

So if aggressive war is forbidden but such leeway is given to the definition of self-defense isn't forbidding agressive war pointless?

With the same criteria I'd love to see you argue against a war campaign of my invention.

With that criteria I'd be hard pressed to find a nation that would not be justifiably invaded.

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georgeob1 wrote:

Good response. I do indeed mean to say that sovereign nations can make war subject only to the general precepts in the UN charter. These forbid aggressive war merely to gain territory or achieve other related purposes. The rights of nations to act in the interests of their security is acknowledged. Of course judgements can and will vary as to what constitutes sufficient cause, but nothing in the charter forbids action without explicit Security Council authorization.

You're right, george, that the UN Charter allows for differing opinions as to what constitutes "sufficient cause," but it seems clear that it only permits states to act in self-defense. Article 51 of the Charter states, in relevant part:

"Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security."

So there seems to be one clear-cut requirement, under the Charter, in order to claim the right to legitimate self-defense: an armed attack. This never happened in the latest Gulf War.

Instead, the Bush administration appears to be asserting, even at this late date, that it was acting on behalf of the UN. As Bush stated in hisaddress to the nation on Sept. 7: "I recognize that not all of our friends agreed with our decision to enforce the Security Council resolutions and remove Saddam Hussein from power."

The relevant UN Resolution, (Security Council Resolution 1441) however, says nothing about removing Saddam Hussein from power. Indeed, its a remarkably anodyne document, promising only that further defiance by Iraq to continued inspections will be met with a finding that it is in "material breach" of the resolution.

So, in a nutshell: a state cannot legitimately wage war unless it does so in self-defense; it cannot claim self-defense unless it was first the victim of "armed attack;" it cannot claim to be acting in the interests of the UN without UN authorization; the US never received authorization, despite Bush's pledge that the US would introduce a resolution and his promise that "No matter what the whip count is, we're calling for the vote."

There was no armed attack, there was no self-defense, there was no UN authorization. In short, there was no legitimate use of force.

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Take a bow Joe..

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Italgato wrote:

Please correct me if I am wrong but I do not think that the Congress of the United States declared war.

In fact, the Congress of the United States voted [..] to "give George W. Bush the right to use the military as he determines to be necessary and appropriate to defend against the threat of Iraq" [..] I did not find anything in the Congressional authorization that said we would be going to "war" with Iraq.

Funny that, eh? Betcha were surprised when suddenly, tens of thousands of real soldiers were battling real firefights on real battle fields. <grimaces>

And they were doing so despite the fact that the country they were fighting had never attacked them - not in the last twelve years, anyway.

Now, you were responding to my, "we did not feel that was a rationale for a full blown war". I understand that you have a lawyer's point to make about the definition there - there not having been a new, formal declaration of war, an' all. But am I to understand that you do not think there was "a full blown war" going on, those weeks that US soldiers died shooting Iraqi soldiers while driving their tanks across the deserts of a country that they were occupying - for better or for worse? I think I might be missing your point.

Italgato wrote:

Perhaps a strong president like William J. Clinton would have stood up to the American Public and said( as well may be the case): "There is absolutely no evidence that there is a tie between Iraq and Al Queda."

Alas, George W. Bush has not done so.

Perhaps he is listening to the war mongers on the right- the Wolfowitz contingent--who say "there is no evidence that there is no tie between Iraq and Al Queda"

Well ...

"there is no evidence that there is no tie between Syria and Al Queda", either. Or Lybia and Al Qaeda. Or Iran and Al Qaeda. Or the People's Republic of Laos and Al Qaeda. There might be evidence that there is a tie between Saudi-Arabia and Al Qaeda, but we don't know what was in those pages that were blacked out in the Congress report.

I'm not quite sure which point of mine you're adressing here, but mine would be that I consider it a bit bold to start a war on the argument of "the threat to our country" emanating from Iraqi WMD falling into the hands of Al-Qaeda terrorists, when no link between the two was ever unearthed. As we now know. And they knew then, already.

In this week's speech, mere weeks after the 900-page investigative Congress report that noted no link between 9/11 and Iraq, whatsoever, President Bush was a lot smarter with his words - though still making sure that they wouldn't change any popular misunderstanding about there being any kind of hint of a Saddam involvement in 9/11. This time around, he merely said, "we acted in Iraq, where the former regime sponsored terror, possessed and used weapons of mass destruction" - which is all true, of course, considering Saddam's use of WMD against Kurds and Iranians and his sponsorship of Palestinian terrorism - no matter that the US hadnt ever considered that a ground for war at the time, or that neither could possibly be phrased as the kind of "national security" matter that georgeob1 defines in the post above as the bottom-line legality requirement.

Italgato wrote:

What are we to do, nimh?
You are wise. How do you extract ourselves from this quagmire?
If the worst happens and Bush is re-elected, we may well be in Iraq for another four years.
How can we persuade the American people that we must not meddle in the Middle East and should leave the Israelis and Palestinians alone?
[etc]

That's an awful lot of questions, 'gato.

I aint wise enough for all that.

I have a few opinions ...

1. Planning and command over the "Operation Iraqi Freedom" should be turned over to the UN. Or shared with the UN - the US doing the military command, the UN civil command. To each his own.

2. US soldiers will have to stay. No misleading the public about that. The US created this specific mess (even when it did come in place of another mess) - they did so against the explicit advice of allies and enemies alike - they'll have to clean it up again, too.

My guess is that a lot more American soldiers will be needed, very quickly. There, I disagree with war opponents here on A2K who say the Americans should get (or be thrown) out.

3. If 1) is fulfilled, other countries will be prepared to substantially contribute as well. Lots of money will be needed - Iraq is a lot bigger than Kosovo. The focus should be on restoring basic conditions and services at least to the levels of Saddam's times, and preferably a significant degree better - that should prevent an influx of new Al-Qaeda recruits. Abuse of power by any soldier should be publicly persecuted - same reason.

We'll be there for a while ... that's what you get when you take on a responsibility.

4. Saddam and his folks need to be caught quickly - and extradited to an international war crimes court, to avoid the impression of victor's justice (US court) resp. the continued presence of the man within the country's borders (Iraqi court).

5. Al-Qaeda needs to be hunted down with all means necessary. That includes taking a peek into Saudi-Arabia.

6. As for the internecine Shi'ite assassinations ... the threat of Turkey vis-a-vis the Kurdish areas ... The Kurdish-Turkoman ethnic tensions ... or even the question of when and how to delegate power to what kind of national government ... Shocked

hellifiknow.

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<phew>

your turn, italgato ...

<smiles>

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joefromchicago,

Self-defense does not require waiting until an armed attack has already occurred. Opinions will vary as to what constitutes a proximate danger, but the notion that one must wait for the attack does not hold water.

The United States WAS attacked on 9/11/01. Afterwards, our government made it clear that we were faced with a new, supra-national terrorist threat and viewed with grave concern the actual and potential nexus between it and the "axis of evil" states. The essence of this new composite danger transcended the notions of individual nation states in both the threat and our needed response to it. We characterized it as a war, already initiated against us. Our actions since then have been consistent with those principles.

The overture to the UN over WMD was merely an argument offered in an attempt to meet the arbitrary criteria set by other nations on the Security Council. The effort failed, but that does not at all undermine the basic argument above for the appropriateness of our actions.

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George,

By your estimation how many uninvolved nations do we get to invade for 9/11? Being that Iraq had nothing to do with it my next question is if this is a pretext that can be used on France.

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This is sure sounding like the plot of "Minority Report" only we don't have any pre-cogs just extremely fallable intelligence agencies.

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Craven de Kere wrote:

George,

By your estimation how many uninvolved nations do we get to invade for 9/11? Being that Iraq had nothing to do with it my next question is if this is a pretext that can be used on France.

Or, more directly, Saudi Arabia...

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georgeob1 wrote:

Self-defense does not require waiting until an armed attack has already occurred. Opinions will vary as to what constitutes a proximate danger, but the notion that one must wait for the attack does not hold water.

That may be your opinion, and you have your right to it.

But joe was responding to your post, where you wrote,

georgeob1 wrote:

[..] sovereign nations can make war subject only to the general precepts in the UN charter. These forbid aggressive war merely to gain territory or achieve other related purposes [but] the rights of nations to act in the interests of their security is acknowledged.

That is, you implied that the UN charter allowed a sovereign nation to start a war, like the US did, "in the interests of their security".

Joe corrected you: "Article 51 of the Charter states, in relevant part: "Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations [..]".

I.e., yes, it does, but only in response to an armed attack.

Now among the "varying opinions as to what constitutes a proximate danger", yours may be that one need not wait for the attack - but don't state that that is what international law provides for, if that is not the case.

You may reject such "narrow and legalistic concepts", but you would seem to be rejecting the principle of having international law, period. Back to the days when?

The days where states acted solely on national interest, with interchanging ententes clashing in respective military stand-offs without any supranational body to call them to order, were pretty dark and violent days - especially here in Europe. That, more than any "side effect of the process of forming the EU", may be at the roots of our attachment to adherence to UN decisions and international law.

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georgeob1 wrote:

The United States WAS attacked on 9/11/01. Afterwards, our government made it clear that we were faced with a new, supra-national terrorist threat and viewed with grave concern the actual and potential nexus between it and the "axis of evil" states. The essence of this new composite danger transcended the notions of individual nation states in both the threat and our needed response to it. We characterized it as a war, already initiated against us. Our actions since then have been consistent with those principles.

OK, wait. You've put an awfully far-reaching implication in these here reasonable-sounding words.

The US was attacked, yes. By Al-Qaeda. That would give the right to the US to strike back - at Al-Qaeda. Hunt 'em down, bring 'em to justice.

But - what if they hide in states that do not want to partake in the hunt to bring them to justice? Al-Qaeda is not a country; you're right, we're dealing, here, with a "new composite danger transcend[ing] the notions of individual nation states". Fair enough: intervention seems reasonable, when Al-Qaeda hides in a country that is complicit in its hiding and refuses co-operation. E.g., the war against the Taliban regime.

But Iraq? You don't mention Iraq in here. Which part of this rationalisation applies to Iraq? Iraq did not harbour Al-Qaeda operatives - not even the US Congress would claim so - not even President Bush did anymore, in his latest speech. There is no "actual nexus" between Al-Qaeda and this particular Axis of Evil state, at least not that any of us, including your President and Congress, know of.

That's why you put that little word "potential" in, I assume. We consider the terrorist attack a declaration of war against us - considering the supra-national character of the enemy, our response in this war shall transcend the notions of individual nation state - and it will be directed at any "actual and potential nexus between [the terrorist threat] and the 'axis of evil' states". Did I get that right?

The consequence of your logic: because of 9/11, the US can legitimately attack (in "self-defence") any "Axis of Evil" country (i.e., any country the administration wants to call by that name) of which it thinks it could potentially have or develop a link with Al-Qaeda - at some unspecified time, in some unspecified way?

Shocked

With that reasoning, as Craven points out, you could justify attacking any country, whatsoever.

What if other countries would start reasoning in the same way?

'T may be a new experience for the US, but there's a lot of countries out there that've been attacked, you know. They should all consider it legitimate to retaliate against any other country that in their view potentially could (come to) be linked with their attackers?

Escalation would be swift. Somehow I suspect you don't mean other countries to share this prerogative, though.

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Nimh,

The fact is that other countries have long behaved in the way you described. India's invasion of Goa, China's of Tibet, Russia's of Chechnya; Numerous French armed interventions in the Francophone nations of Africa; the 1997 war between Ecuador and Peru; Turkey's seizure of northern Cyprus, Greek occupations of disputed Agean islands; Morrocco's invasion of the former Spanish Sahara - these are only relatively recent actions.

There is,of course also the ghastly history of European wars since the start of the 15th century. History is a more or less continuous stream. The forms the actions of nations, kings, and organized groups of humans take change much more rapidly than do the underlying appetites and drives that motivate them. You may believe that the signing of the UN charter in 1947 separated human history into distinct epochs, but I don't.

The Islamic world began falling rapidly behind the Western world in the 17th century. Since then it has been pushed around and exploited by the West -mostly at the hands of the very European states that so lavishly criticize us now. Now, in a world of modern communications Islam is forcefully confronted with its backwardness and inability to compete economically or culturally with an ascendent West. It reacts in contradictory ways, one of imitation and progress, and another of fanaticism, denial, and rage. This will be a conflict, both within Islam and between it and the West, of historical proportions, and it will have much at the core of it in common with previous like historical conflicts. Much depends on which of the two contradictory reactions - progress or fundamentalism - ends up dominating. Our actions in Iraq are intended to create a modern progressive state in precisely that part of the Islamic world in which one is most likely to thrive. They also have removed a particularly cruel tyrant from the backs of the Iraqi people. In my view this is entirely right and appropriate to the situation.

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georgeob1 wrote:

The fact is that other countries have long behaved in the way you described. India's invasion of Goa, China's of Tibet, Russia's of Chechnya; Numerous French armed interventions in the Francophone nations of Africa; the 1997 war between Ecuador and Peru; Turkey's seizure of northern Cyprus, Greek occupations of disputed Agean islands; Morrocco's invasion of the former Spanish Sahara - these are only relatively recent actions.

Yes, it happens, but would you defend any of these above, un-provoked invasions?

(In as far as they are that - Chechnya never formally was independent, and France hasnt occupied any African country to install its own direct rule there since colonial times.

Additionally, unlike the cases of Greece, Morocco, Peru and India you mention, the occupation of a country on the other side of the world cant be explained away in terms of the kind of border conflicts that will probably plague us for as long as countries exist, either. In fact, there doesnt seem to be any direct parallel to "Iraq" among them, at all - Cyprus and Tibet come closest, and have long been denounced by the US government as examples of the worst kind of practice).

I ask you because you defend the invasion of Iraq ... and it is a different thing to say, 'these things happen' (and then you can talk about whether you believe it worthwhile to try to do something about it or not), or to say, 'good thing'.

Interestingly, just now you were defending the invasion through the argument of self-defence. That necessitated stretching the definition of "self-defence" to an extent where you're talking of attacking a country because of a "potential link" it might have with your enemies, though - which is what we called you on. In your reply now, you seem to opt for a different rationalisation altogether - am I right?

georgeob1 wrote:

This will be a conflict, both within Islam and between it and the West, of historical proportions [..]. Much depends on which of the two contradictory reactions - progress or fundamentalism - ends up dominating. Our actions in Iraq are intended to create a modern progressive state in precisely that part of the Islamic world in which one is most likely to thrive. [..] In my view this is entirely right and appropriate to the situation.

You are talking now of invading and occupying a country in order to create a model state of progress and 'modern culture' out of it?

I'm not entirely sure whether to take that as a case for neo-colonialism or as a case for Orwellian social engineering ... :wink:

(I'm not being half as pissy as I might perhaps sound, by the way ... <smiles>)

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Guys, the problem I see with both your arguement is that the most populous "Muslim World" states are in Southeast Asia and the former Soviet Union, where economic pressures are pushing conflict in directions away from religion and more towards that of class. Poor Muslims hate rich Muslims as much as they hate rich Bhuddists, for example, and are more liely to identify with other poor people across religious barriers. See Amy Chua's book World On Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Global Instability, New York, Doubleday, 2003.
and
Benjamin Barber, Jihad Vs. McWorld: How Globalism and Tribalism Are Reshaping the World, New York, Ballantine, 1996.
Note: "JIhad" is used by Barber as a synionym for anger expressed toward forced modernization, not as an Islamic perjorative. The word had less "baggage" in 1996.

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Nimh,

I don't think you are being 'pissy' at all. We merely disagree.

I do believe the United States is acting to defend itself and its vital interests. I agree that the clearly proclaimed Bush doctrine of preemption in issues involving terrorism and outlaw states (as he defined them) flies in the face of the interpretations of international norms of many people and their political leaders. However I also believe that it is (1) appropriate to the situation we now face, and (2) defensible in terms of the norms of settled international law and practice.

I believe that the political leadership of France in particular is being grossly cynical and hypocritical in its shrill criticism in a situation in which its unique perception of its self-interest is so obviously the prime motivation for its actions. We have very different views of the many French armed interventions in Francophone African nations, mostly to protect French commercial interests.

There are lessons for us in the study of history. The narrow legalistic criticism we hear so much of today has very little to do with them, however.

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George, you responded to my post and I didn't want you to think that I was ignoring you, but nimh has pretty much said everything that I would have said in response to your arguments. I would just add this:

georgeob1 wrote:

There are lessons for us in the study of history. The narrow legalistic criticism we hear so much of today has very little to do with them, however.

I agree that there are lessons for us in the study of history. In relation to this particular issue, I would suggest that everyone look at the Nuremberg War Crimes trial. Some of the most grievous charges involved "waging aggressive war:" i.e. "the planning, preparation, initiation, and waging of wars of aggression, which were also wars in violation of international treaties, agreements, and assurances" (see the relevant portions of the indictment here).

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Ann Coulter: Liberal Arguments: Still A Quagmire

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