Pretext For War on Iraq is Questionable
By Anthony Barboza
Opinions Staff Writer

According to Saul Landau, a recent speaker at Pomona’s International Relations Colloquium, the Bush administration is pursuing a war in Iraq on the grounds of two claims that have yet to be substantiated: one, that the country is developing chemical and biological weapons, and two, that the Iraqi government has direct ties to Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda.

The first claim is not very strong, especially given that it relies on only dubious evidence of Iraqi chemical-weapons capabilities. The Iraqi government is willing to allow unconditional U.N. inspections once again. Only after the U.S.’s resolution was revised to include the threat of certain invasion as a punishment for noncompliance have they become less willing to allow inspectors in.

The second claim, that Iraq has ties to Al Qaeda, is no more substantial than the first. Given that after more than a year of exhaustive research and investigation, the federal government has not found a single shred of evidence linking anyone in the Iraqi government to the September 11 hijackings, or, more broadly, to anyone in Al Qaeda, it seems inappropriate even to suggest a connection between the two, let alone go to war over it.

So why are Bush and his cabinet so eager initiate a clearly unjust war? The only thing left to consider is economics. Ever since sanctions were enacted against Iraq, its oil production has been significantly lower; as a result, Iraqis have suffered immensely. Sanctions created a gap in production, one eagerly filled by Saudi Arabia, a country generally friendly towards U.S. and British policies. It seems that economically, a policy of periodic crisis and long-term sanctions against Iraq is beneficial to U.S. interests, as it leaves important oil resources under U.S. control. Never mind the fact that the majority of the September 11 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, a country controlled by a regime vastly more fundamentalist and no more admirable, with regard to democracy, than Iraq’s. France and Russia, on the other hand, generally support lifting sanctions and oppose any military actions in Iraq, as they have lucrative agreements with Iraq and would greatly suffer from a U.S. attack.

With all the recent attention on the opponent in this “preemptive war,” it might be helpful to step back and look at the country carrying out the attack, to see if these same claims could be made against it. In other words, how successfully could another country with vested interest in U.S. resources justify an invasion of the United States on the same grounds?
The biological weapons question would be the easiest to answer, as it is common knowledge that we have chemical, biological and nuclear weapons in mass quantities. In fact, we invented, developed, and continue to stockpile the very weapons we condemn. Is our government so totally secure that we should be allowed to keep unchecked quantities of weapons of mass destruction without ever being subjected to inspections, while even unwarranted suspicion of similar capabilities in Iraq is good enough reason to invade? The fact that the most recent biological weapons attack occurred within the United States—and that it took the form of anthrax almost certainly traced back to a U.S. government facility in Ft. Detrick, Maryland—should answer that question.

But to address the second part of the argument, we have to see if the United States has had any ties to Al-Qaeda. I think the CIA’s funding of the Mujahideen against the Soviets in the 1980’s takes care of that. Al-Qaeda is made up of some of the very people we funded and supported. If the U.S. had not intervened in Afghanistan, both the Taliban and Al-Qaeda might not ever have existed.

When President Bush speaks of “rogue states,” he fails to mention the most important one: our own. What this administration is pursuing in Iraq is unilateral, unjustified and, despite the rhetoric the administration employs, primarily economic in motivation. Hence, the emergence of a new imperialism, or “Pax Americana,” under the guise of anti-terrorism. We have been busy looking abroad for answers to our questions about September 11; we should instead be looking at ourselves. And perhaps, rather than accepting the president’s ungrounded rallying cries for war, we should be examining his reasons.