March 15, 2003
"TRACKING DOWN terrorists is a
"TRACKING DOWN terrorists is a job for intelligence services and police forces, not armies," writes Hugh Mackay. Fine. We'll let this guy take care of Iraq. Mackay also mounts the ingenious argument that Saddam Hussein should not be deposed because there are too many reasons to do so:
Long ago, I was taught that if someone gives you two reasons for declining an invitation, that probably means they're hiding the truth (which is, presumably, that they simply don't want to come). The anti-Iraq propaganda is a bit like that.
Hugh no doubt has more experience than I in the area of declined invitations, so I'll skip to his next point:
First we were told Saddam had to be disarmed by force before he had a chance to deploy his weapons of mass destruction. When it became less certain that he had such weapons, and even less clear why or where he might want to deploy them, the focus switched to the need for "regime change" in order to establish democracy in Iraq (though not, we assume, the Florida-style democracy that installed Bush in the White House).
How has the discovery of missiles and drones made their existence "less certain"? As well, how does Mackay square away the comments of former Australian senior intelligence officer Andrew Wilkie, who on Thursday was telling peaceniks that "if war proceeds Saddam Hussein is likely to use weapons of mass destruction"? Seems like Wilkie knows something, Hugh.
Now we're being told an invasion can be justified on humanitarian grounds and we will be the heroic liberators of an oppressed people. Too many reasons, John.
The humanitarian argument was raised in response to claims that thousands of innocents would be killed by a US-led attack. It added to the existing arguments. Too many reasons? Indeed.
Posted by Tim Blair at March 15, 2003 02:45 AM