Wednesday, September 17, 2003
From an email exchange on the RCUS chat list- you might find this interesting.
Rev. MacLeod,
> 1. The US does indeed act as an imperialist power in that it acts more
or less unilaterally in defiance of world opinion
There were some 40 other nations that joined us in the war on Iraq. We had security council resolutions condemning Saddam, NATO support (except for France and Germany), etc etc. How is this unilateral?
Besides, the president of the United States and our congress and everyone else, is tasked to serve and protect America, not France or Scotland or anyone else. I would not vote for any of them if they served your interest instead of ours. They spent a lot of time building a coalition and getting people on board, but in the end they did what was right for America. I'm glad they did.
And if it's the UN you're worried about, they gave us the authorization to attack Hussein in 1991, in order to expel him from Kuwait, destroy his WMD, and stop the human rights violations. The ceasefire that Hussein signed after the war was on condition that he end his WMD program and stop the human rights violations. He never did either, by anyone's account. Therefore, we still had authorization under the 1991 resolution to attack Hussein. All the other stuff we did was just diplomatic cover, and the world still whined.
> 2. It is irrational to attempt to claim the moral high ground when the
action is clearly for political and/or economic reasons
This statement is specious. Something can be in our interest, and yet morally right. In fact, if you believe Scripture, this will always be the case. Acting in morally wrong ways will be destructive to our own interest. So, it can be morally right for us to rescue people from a man who would rape your wife if you spoke against him and torture children if their parents kept them from joining his political party, and at the same time good for America to do so. Did you miss all that?
Is it your argument then that I should not help my neighbor if he is being attacked, if it is possible I might benefit by doing so?
> 3. The criteria which it's vital to employ in analysing whether or not
the actions of the US (or for that matter Saddam Hussein ) are right are
BIBLICAL criteria. It matters not a whit whether your opinion or mine is
more popular -- what matters is what is right in terms of God's revealed will.
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you".
If I were Iraqi, I'd want to be liberated. And we have seen that the great majority of Iraqis, except those directly profiting from Hussein's bloody rule, and the various extremists which have been imported into Iraq for the purpose of destabilizing our liberation of them, are delighted to have us there. The western media, anxious to have us fail in a war they opposed, anxious to have another Vietnam when they can crow about their influence, don't show a lot of that, but it's true. Do a little research and you'll see. We had the ability and the opportunity to do something and we did.
So why was Europe so unwilling to help people who were being butchered and raped and tortured? Why did the French and the Germans actively lobby against us to prevent us from doing it? Why were so many of your countrymen against it? Just because it was big bad America doing it? You didn't have a problem with it when it was Kosovo, and Clinton doing it, and the Security Council was on board.
"Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's"
That's right, we're Caesar. We're the biggest kid on the block, by a long shot. Now that doesn't justify whatever we do. We still are held accountable. But there's no point whining and acting like we should behave like a poor excuse for a second-rate power like France. They would act unilaterally if they could, but they can't, because they're weak. Compared to us, everyone's weak. We spend more on our military than the next 20 countries combined. And if we didn't, the world would be a worse place, not better.
God gave you the Caesar you have. Be thankful we're not like the other Caesars that have ruled the earth. Think you'd be better off if the Soviets won the Cold War? The reason they lost is because we spent all that money to become Caesar. Your main complaint seems to be that we're not angels. Criticism accepted. But we could be ruling your country and all of Europe right now if we wanted to. What we did instead, after 1945, was rebuild all your countries at great expense to ourselves, after we had saved your countries from a murderous dictator at great expense to ourselves, and never asked anything in return (except in the words of Colin Powell, a little land to bury our dead). Would France have done that? Would England? Would Rome? So now we do it for someone else, and you're complaining that we didn't spend enough time asking your opinion? You piped and we didn't dance, you wept and we didn't mourn. Pardon us if we don't care much. We'll just carry on protecting all of you, and I expect you'll carry on kicking us in the shins for it.
Matt Powell
Rev. MacLeod,
> 1. The US does indeed act as an imperialist power in that it acts more
or less unilaterally in defiance of world opinion
There were some 40 other nations that joined us in the war on Iraq. We had security council resolutions condemning Saddam, NATO support (except for France and Germany), etc etc. How is this unilateral?
Besides, the president of the United States and our congress and everyone else, is tasked to serve and protect America, not France or Scotland or anyone else. I would not vote for any of them if they served your interest instead of ours. They spent a lot of time building a coalition and getting people on board, but in the end they did what was right for America. I'm glad they did.
And if it's the UN you're worried about, they gave us the authorization to attack Hussein in 1991, in order to expel him from Kuwait, destroy his WMD, and stop the human rights violations. The ceasefire that Hussein signed after the war was on condition that he end his WMD program and stop the human rights violations. He never did either, by anyone's account. Therefore, we still had authorization under the 1991 resolution to attack Hussein. All the other stuff we did was just diplomatic cover, and the world still whined.
> 2. It is irrational to attempt to claim the moral high ground when the
action is clearly for political and/or economic reasons
This statement is specious. Something can be in our interest, and yet morally right. In fact, if you believe Scripture, this will always be the case. Acting in morally wrong ways will be destructive to our own interest. So, it can be morally right for us to rescue people from a man who would rape your wife if you spoke against him and torture children if their parents kept them from joining his political party, and at the same time good for America to do so. Did you miss all that?
Is it your argument then that I should not help my neighbor if he is being attacked, if it is possible I might benefit by doing so?
> 3. The criteria which it's vital to employ in analysing whether or not
the actions of the US (or for that matter Saddam Hussein ) are right are
BIBLICAL criteria. It matters not a whit whether your opinion or mine is
more popular -- what matters is what is right in terms of God's revealed will.
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you".
If I were Iraqi, I'd want to be liberated. And we have seen that the great majority of Iraqis, except those directly profiting from Hussein's bloody rule, and the various extremists which have been imported into Iraq for the purpose of destabilizing our liberation of them, are delighted to have us there. The western media, anxious to have us fail in a war they opposed, anxious to have another Vietnam when they can crow about their influence, don't show a lot of that, but it's true. Do a little research and you'll see. We had the ability and the opportunity to do something and we did.
So why was Europe so unwilling to help people who were being butchered and raped and tortured? Why did the French and the Germans actively lobby against us to prevent us from doing it? Why were so many of your countrymen against it? Just because it was big bad America doing it? You didn't have a problem with it when it was Kosovo, and Clinton doing it, and the Security Council was on board.
"Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's"
That's right, we're Caesar. We're the biggest kid on the block, by a long shot. Now that doesn't justify whatever we do. We still are held accountable. But there's no point whining and acting like we should behave like a poor excuse for a second-rate power like France. They would act unilaterally if they could, but they can't, because they're weak. Compared to us, everyone's weak. We spend more on our military than the next 20 countries combined. And if we didn't, the world would be a worse place, not better.
God gave you the Caesar you have. Be thankful we're not like the other Caesars that have ruled the earth. Think you'd be better off if the Soviets won the Cold War? The reason they lost is because we spent all that money to become Caesar. Your main complaint seems to be that we're not angels. Criticism accepted. But we could be ruling your country and all of Europe right now if we wanted to. What we did instead, after 1945, was rebuild all your countries at great expense to ourselves, after we had saved your countries from a murderous dictator at great expense to ourselves, and never asked anything in return (except in the words of Colin Powell, a little land to bury our dead). Would France have done that? Would England? Would Rome? So now we do it for someone else, and you're complaining that we didn't spend enough time asking your opinion? You piped and we didn't dance, you wept and we didn't mourn. Pardon us if we don't care much. We'll just carry on protecting all of you, and I expect you'll carry on kicking us in the shins for it.
Matt Powell
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