Bush: A new Iraq to inspire freedom
Posted on 02/27/2003 1:54:04 AM PST by MeekOneGOP
Bush: A new Iraq to inspire freedom
Critics of regime change say war will provoke radicalism
02/27/2003
WASHINGTON - President Bush said Wednesday that disarming Saddam Hussein would pave the way for democracy in Iraq and throughout the Middle East - no easy task, he acknowledged.
"Stable and free nations do not breed the ideologies of murder," Mr. Bush said, adding that "a new regime in Iraq would serve as a dramatic and inspiring example of freedom for other nations of the region."
Appearing at the annual dinner of the American Enterprise Institute, Mr. Bush spoke to a receptive audience: conservative intellectuals who have long lobbied for Mr. Hussein's removal.
Critics of war in Iraq, meanwhile, said conservative theories about the benefits of regime change in Iraq are about to crash into the realities of a volatile and violent Middle East.
"What it will do is provoke Islamic radicalism," said Charles A. Kupchan, an international relations professor at Georgetown University. "It will appear - especially without a United Nations mandate - as an example of U.S. imperialism at work."
International allies have also argued that invading Iraq will wind up disrupting global stability.
"A military intervention today, when all the chances for a peaceful solution have not been explored, would divide the international community," French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin told French lawmakers. "Let us make no mistake, it would be perceived as precipitous and illegitimate."
Mr. Bush said Iraq's pursuit of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons makes disarmament a matter of American security.
"Bringing stability and unity to a free Iraq will not be easy," he said. "Yet that is no excuse to leave the Iraqi regime's torture chambers and poison labs in operation."
Mr. Hussein, meanwhile, denied possession of illegal weapons during an interview on CBS' 60 Minutes II and accused Mr. Bush of being interested only in Iraqi oil.
In delivering what aides billed as a major address, Mr. Bush also sought to reach a global audience, the United Nations Security Council in particular. It is considering a new resolution holding Iraq in continued violation of U.N. demands to disarm, a vote that could clear a path to a U.S.-led invasion.
In the meantime, France, Russia, and Germany are pushing a plan to give U.N. weapons inspectors more time to force disarmament peacefully. France and Russia are permanent council members who could veto approval of the resolution sponsored by the United States, Great Britain and Spain.
The United States on Wednesday rejected a compromise proposed by Canada that would have given Mr. Hussein an explicit disarmament deadline of March 28. Administration officials said they wanted to pursue the resolution that they proposed in the Security Council earlier this week.
Mr. Bush's critics said the international friction would make it harder to rebuild a post-Saddam Iraq, an effort the president said requires "a sustained commitment from many nations."
"We will remain in Iraq as long as necessary, and not a day more," Mr. Bush said.
As for those who questioned whether democracy is feasible in the Middle East, Mr. Bush cited the experiences of Japan and Germany after World War II.
"In societies that once bred fascism and militarism, liberty found a permanent home," Mr. Bush said.
Many of his comments echoed arguments made in years past by members of the American Enterprise Institute, which has served as an incubator for conservatives who have built an intellectual framework for regime change in Iraq.
Institute members include Richard Perle, a Pentagon adviser who often argues the administration's case on television. Vice President Dick Cheney is an alumnus, and his wife, Lynne, still has an office there.
While skeptics accuse Mr. Bush of "rushing to war," some supporters have been touting military action against Mr. Hussein for years, ever since the end of the Persian Gulf War. Many in this group argued it was a mistake to leave Mr. Hussein in power, especially after he brutally crushed a revolt of the Kurds in northern Iraq.
The American Enterprise Institute is only one of the organizations seeking to provide intellectual fuel to the Iraqi fire. The Weekly Standard, a conservative magazine, has also campaigned for regime change, devoting an issue to the subject on Dec. 1, 1997.
The co-author of an article in that issue entitled "Overthrow Him," was than Paul Wolfowitz, deputy defense secretary and one of the architects of the administration's Iraqi battle plan.
But these conservatives have said their arguments did not influence Mr. Bush nearly as much as the sight of hijacked airplanes slicing into the towers of the World Trade Center and a west wall of the Pentagon.
Before then, "nobody in the Bush White House was saying, 'Oh, my God, we've got to get rid of Saddam,' " said Gary Schmitt, executive director of the Project For The New American Century. "It really did change with 9-11."
In making his case against Mr. Hussein in recent months, Mr. Bush has said the United States would not allow the possibility that he might try to give chemical, biological and nuclear weapons to terrorists.
"He [has] linked the issue of terror with the issue of dictators developing weapons of mass destruction," said William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard. "He's given America a big agenda for the next few years."
That agenda is too big in the eyes of critics who believe an invasion will lead not to democracy in Iraq, but chaos throughout the Middle East. They say an attack on Iraq is likely to create new terrorist recruits for Sept. 11 mastermind Osama bin Laden, many of whom will retaliate against Americans.
In addition to spurring more terrorism, critics say, war will further divide the United States from traditional allies like France and Germany, creating difficulties on other issues like trade.
"My prediction is the U.S. will lose its international legitimacy," said Mr. Kupchan, author of End of the American Era: U.S. Foreign Policy and the Geopolitics of the Twenty-First Century. "It will be seen as less benign and more predatory."
White House officials said Mr. Bush takes advice from a wide array of people. That includes Secretary of State Colin Powell, whose arguments to Mr. Bush that he should seek U.N. approval before launching war drew attacks from some conservatives.
Aides also said Mr. Bush has not made a final decision on war in Iraq and won't base it on pressure from conservative think tanks.
"He's the one who makes the decisions," one aide said.
E-mail djackson@dallasnews.com
I hope so. Easier to slaughter them when they come out in the open.
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