What the heck are you doing bloviating on a message board? You need to get out of your chair, strap on your body army (if it will fit over your moral superiority) and get out there! If you are too old or unfit to join the military, then there must be a militia you can join, the Guardian Angels, or your local neighborhood watch.
Thing is, hawk, the history of the past fifty years are full of example where governments reformed WITHOUT foreign invasion:
South Korea
Taiwan
Thailand
Malaysia
Indonesia
Argentina
Nicaragua
Chile
South Africa
Not to mention a small construct called the Former Soviet Union and the members of the Warsaw Pact.
...and yes, even China, Egypt, Jordan, are less vile than they used to be. In fact, the list of countries and even regimes that have curtailed their worst human rights abuses is far, far longer than the countries who have been reformed through invasion. How the hell did this happen?
Through persuation, sanctions, criticism, diplomacy, and most important, through the expansion of trade and economic growth. You want democracy and an end to human rights abuses? Encourage and support the emergence of a middle class.
Intervening forcefully has been the least effective way to end human rights abuses and encourage democracy and rule of law. It did not work in Vietnam, Haiti, Sudan, Lebanon, or Afghanistan, and it will not work in Iraq.
It is not a matter of caring. It is about recognizing the limits of power. By your criteria, we should invade North Korea tomorrow. They proclaim to have real nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them. North Korea is the most brutal regime on the face of the earth. They are a clear and present danger by any metric you want to use, far more so than Iraq ever was. So what's the problem? Won't peace through superior firepower work just fine.
Iraq is only in our vital interest because we were stupid enough to follow a pack of ideologues who were willing to lie to justify an invasion. The Pottery Barn rule applies: we broke it, we own it. |
