Are you willing to wait until Saddam announces he has Atomic bombs and will use them if attacked?
Of course not. No one would be. But there is that strange thing about the prediction game, it's very hard, particularly if it's about the future (or some such line from Yogi Berra, I can't ever get it right). No one seriously knows what he has or what he will do with it. Containment, as many are saying now, seems to work reasonably well, as long as it's pursued with a great deal of vigor. If we continue containment, Hussein, up to this point, has not shown a propensity to unleash wmd out of the blue. He appears to be willing to do that only if the threat level is ratcheted up.
So, if the question is, if I had the responsibility and know no more than I know now, would I recommend containment, the answer is definitely yes.
Pacifist academics . .
You do have some strange stereotypes about academics. Of all the academics I've known over my career, I can think of only one or two who professed such. That's much less than 1%.
Our ancestors had this argument in the '30s about Hitler, and we waited. Do you want to do it again?
Ah ha, the ol' Hitler analogy. I loved it when Bush I pulled that one out of his hat. Saddam may be a raging madman, I seriously have no idea, but the analogy with Hitler is way, way off base. Far too many ways in which the differences vitiate the comparison.
Last, I continue to think, as I've said here more times than I should, that (a) any attempt to topple Saddam will not be a short one, contrary to some popular opinion, and (b) since support for military action is thin and we don't even know if it's broad, if it doesn't go perfectly from the start, it's goodbye second term for Bush. And the Bushies know that very well. I think they've hoisted themselves on that old cliche the petard all by themselves and will have to find a way off. We should all hope not too many folk suffer as a consequence. |
