For a while I would have described myself as anti-war; this is no longer the case. I am not pro-war either, however, by any means. Allow me to explain.

I have done a great deal of thinking recently, looking back on all of the articles I have been collecting from countless sources over the past few months, weighing carefully the opinions of all I have talked to (including those expressed on this message board) and trying to determine the answer to one question and one question only: "Why is it neccesary that we do this now?" Previously, I felt that the lack of links to Al-Qaeda and also Sadaam's inability to succesfully deliver any payload of chemical or biological weapons to any far-away targets was sufficient enough to define an educated anti-war stance, and that he would not sell any of these weapons to terrorist organizations due to ideological differences and also because many of them would, in one way or another, use them against him. The blatant hypocrisy of our past dealings with Iraq only bolstered this opinion, that we were not pushing this war solely for oil, but that we certainly had our own interests (and by interests I don't mean safety) in mind when we chose to begin the path to war.

I have now come to the conlusion that no one but the United States government has sufficient knowledge to determine whether or not there is enough evidence that Iraq's possible selling of WMDs to terrorist organizations is an immediate threat to the United States. This brings up two scenarios in my mind:

1) The United States is correct, and Iraq poses a "clear and present danger" to the United States, whatever terminology you want to use. If this is the case, we have handled this situation more poorly than I previously thought humanly possible. We have absolutely no support from the international community, and I feel that is mostly because the Bush administration is behaving almost like a carbon-copy of the current Democratic party: contradictory and confused, with several stated goals but no real coherent priorities. Regime change and disarmament became interchangable words very quickly, and the hypocrisy of the United States stance regarding Iraq quickly came to the forefront when one considered the U.S.'s blind support of Israel and also due to it's past dealings with Iraq (read: support).

Following our complete diplomatic failure (and the very real erosion of human rights for Americans, both citizens and "enemy combatants") we proceeded to twist the arms of seemingly every small nation in the world in order to force them to join "The Coalition of the Willing" which would attack Iraq. The rhetoric of the administration continued to be nothing but straight propaganda, at no time managing to be honest, insightful, or convincing. Why should the word "maybe" be mentioned by anyone if we have such amazingly conclusive evidence? And this brings me up to the current situation.
For a while I would have described myself as anti-war; this is no longer the case. I am not pro-war either, however, by any means. Allow me to explain.

I have done a great deal of thinking recently, looking back on all of the articles I have been collecting from countless sources over the past few months, weighing carefully the opinions of all I have talked to (including those expressed on this message board) and trying to determine the answer to one question and one question only: "Why is it neccesary that we do this now?" Previously, I felt that the lack of links to Al-Qaeda and also Sadaam's inability to succesfully deliver any payload of chemical or biological weapons to any far-away targets was sufficient enough to define an educated anti-war stance, and that he would not sell any of these weapons to terrorist organizations due to ideological differences and also because many of them would, in one way or another, use them against him. The blatant hypocrisy of our past dealings with Iraq only bolstered this opinion, that we were not pushing this war solely for oil, but that we certainly had our own interests (and by interests I don't mean safety) in mind when we chose to begin the path to war.

I have now come to the conlusion that no one but the United States government has sufficient knowledge to determine whether or not there is enough evidence that Iraq's possible selling of WMDs to terrorist organizations is an immediate threat to the United States. This brings up two scenarios in my mind:

1) The United States has exagerrated the evidence they have to such an extent that it was in fact not neccesary to strike immediately, in which case I have absolutely no sympathy for our government whatsoever; this is what I fear, because I have absolutely no reason to believe Powell, Rumsfield, Wolfowitz, or Rice. Seriously, if this is the case, I just can't imagine how much worse what we're currently doing will look in light of this truth.

2) The United States is correct, and Iraq poses a "clear and present danger" to the United States, whatever terminology you want to use. If this is the case, we have handled this situation more poorly than I previously thought humanly possible. We have absolutely no support from the international community, and I feel that is mostly because the Bush administration is behaving almost like a carbon-copy of the current Democratic party: contradictory and confused, with several stated goals but no real coherent priorities. Regime change and disarmament became interchangable words very quickly, and the hypocrisy of the United States stance regarding Iraq quickly came to the forefront when one considered the U.S.'s blind support of Israel and also due to it's past dealings with Iraq (read: support). The attempts to exploit people's fear resulting from September 11th were atrocious, yet another example of the culture of fear.

Following our complete diplomatic failure (and the very real erosion of human rights for Americans, both citizens and "enemy combatants") we proceeded to twist the arms of seemingly every small nation in the world in order to force them to join "The Coalition of the Willing" which would attack Iraq. The rhetoric of the administration continued to be nothing but straight propaganda, at no time managing to be honest, insightful, or convincing. Why should the word "maybe" be mentioned by anyone if we have such amazingly conclusive evidence? And this brings me up to the current situation.

America is currently poised to start what can only accurately be described as a slaughter. The "shock and awe" military strategy is one of the most blatant uses of excessive force in history, an absolutely ludicrous way of disarming this country and removing its leader. The Iraqi people will abhor America following this rain of death, I assure you of that.

And following this war, there is no reason to believe that the United States will set up any sort of democratic government over there; if Afghanastan proved anything, it was that the United States only truly backs up its words when it comes to ones concerning violence. The shameful exploitation of Iraq's people that will no doubt follow the end of U.S. led military operations will serve as yet another example of the hollow nature of U.S. rhetoric regarding "freedom".

YET DESPITE ALL OF THIS, I think that if we did have evidence supporting the idea that they were an immediate threat to American security, that it was necessary to do something right now, something SHOULD have been done. What that something should have been would no doubt have involved presenting our evidence to the furthest extent possible without posing a national security threat (and if you think Powell actually did that, you didn't read that transcript.) This would have undoubtedly resulted in the support of a much greater portion of the world community. Also, the military attack should have (and hopefully in this hypothetical would have) been much less severe than "shock and awe", and while some would argue that precision surgical strikes against weapons factories etc. would have been insufficient since the Elite Republican Guards would have hidden in Bagdhad etc., I propose that you read up on "shock and awe" and if you still support it get back to me with what you think.

So basically in this scenario (one assuming we have evidence that a strike was necessary prior to the weather no longer being conducive to a strike of any kind) the Bush administration still gets called out on practically everything they did, because it should have been much much easier to get support than it would have been to blatantly lie as we did about damn near everything related to this war.

Bottom line: We might be doing something necessary, but that doesn't excuse how we're going about doing it in any way shape or fashion. And if it actually wasn't necessary, then I just might have lost any faith I had left in this country.

Oh and just in case he wants to claim that I have come around to his viewpoint just like he knew I would or whatever, I'd like to say this in advance: Seenic, you are full of shit like no other person on earth, and your complete inability to question anything associated with a) fundamentalist Christianity, b) misogony, or c) the actions of the United States government has provided me with a constant source of comedy like nothing else in recent memory. Keep up the good work.

"There's a lot you can do with a giant four foot dried, curling, boomerang seed pod from the Botang Tree that grows only in Indonesia."
-Tom Waits

"It's not about a salary it's all about reality."
-KRS-One

"Me being wack is like naps on Kojack."
-RZA