STABILITY IN THE MIDDLEEAST
A few weeks ago, I was telling a friend about this website. I described how I write mostly political editorials. I also reiterated to him, that the two of us are on opposite ends of the political spectrum; I’m a Republican, He is a Liberal democrat ( I guess I didn’t need to put Democrat). He asked me if I was a Bush supporter. Which of course, I am. ( Although I would like to see him focus more on domestic issues).
We became embroiled in a discussion on the war in Irag and the mideast situation. He believes we had no business going into Irag and removing Suddam Hussein. He believes Suddam was not a threat to that region or America. He felt we were able to ” keep an eye on him because we knew where he was and we knew he wasn’t going anywhere.” He also believes that ” We (America) are directly responsible for the deaths of 3000 Iragi citizens.”
His arguement is basically this; The people of Irag feared Suddam, because he dealt with uprisings, ( for lack of a better word) and lawlessness with iron fisted rule which included torture and murder. By removing him, we took away the one person standing in the way of anarchy. He doesn’t believe this kind of violence that we are seeing today took place under Suddam.
My friend also believes we can not pull our troops out without destablizing the entire region. I’ll get back to that.
I have these questions: Are torture and murder the way to curtail crime and violence? Should the world be willing to accept this as an acceptable means of law enforcement? Lets not forget, this man murdered 2 million people! And tortured how many more? He also stole billions from the Iragi people!
Now, we know Muslim and American cultures respectfully, are drastically different. Under thier system of justice it may be perfectly acceptable to cut off the hands of a thief. Okay. Or even to stone a murderer to death. Again, Okay. But it is not acceptable for the Red Guard ( Suddam’s personal execution squad), to enter the homes of his political rivals or people who disagree with him, and execute them! It wasn’t acceptable for him to use chemical weapons on the Kurds! Nor was it acceptable for him to invade Kuwait.
Did America escalate the violence between the Sunnis and the Shiites or, are we seeing more of it because of the MEDIA attention due to the American Military being present? I believe we are seeing it because we are there. I don’t believe we caused an upswing in it. These two groups hated each other long before we arrived, they will hate each other long after we are gone!
If we pulled out now, do we risk the stability of that region? I am 43 years old, during that time frame, I have never seen stability in the MiddleEast! NEVER! There has been constant fighting, whether it was between Israel and Egypt, Israel and the Palistinians, or Israel and anyboby else you can name, ( Syria comes to mind.) Lets not forget Iran and Irag, Iran and the whole hostage crisis, the war between Irag and the former Soviet Union, Irag and Kuwait, Lebanon and Israel. I could probably go on all night! STABILITY! This part of the world has no idea what STABILITY is!
I value and respect this person and his opinions, but I cannot under any circustances agree that the removal and subsequent execution of Suddam Hussein was a mistake! Look at this man’s reign of terror! He is a murderer! The Iragi people must have believed they would be better off without him. If they didn’t they would have found a way to protect him. They didn’t.
The one thing I do agree with, We should not have supported him the way we did years ago. So in that respect, we do share part of the blame for HIS actions.
