Sunday, March 19, 2006
On the eve of the three-year anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, President Bush chose to reaffirm his administration's policy that pre-emptive war is legitimate when the president makes a unilateral determination that another country poses a threat to the United States.
On the eve of the Iraq war, we wrote: "It appears that nothing anyone can say is going to change the president's mind. He sees deposing Saddam as his mission and has said he won't listen to the polls, demonstrators or commentators."
Today, the costs of that single-minded determination are clear: More than 2,317 U.S. service men and women are dead, more than 16,653 are wounded, and one is listed as captured. The monetary cost of the war through 2006 will total about $500 billion -- every dollar kept off budget and added to the national debt.
The benefits of the war are less clear. Saddam Hussein has been deposed, captured and is being tried. Elections have been held, but the politics of Iraq stand between unsettled and civil war.
Defining victory
In his address to the American people on March 19, 2003, President Bush declared: "This will not be a campaign of half-measures, and we will accept no outcome but victory." Defining victory is as elusive today as it was three years ago.
The president's restatement of his policy of pre-emption appears aimed at Iran, a nation that elected a veteran of the Iranian Revolution who clearly has nothing but contempt for the United States.
That is why it will be important for the American people to demand that the administration answer the questions that should have been asked before we went into Iraq, before we go into Iran.
What is the specific goal, is it feasible and at what cost? How would the nation pay for another military operation, how can an already strained military force assume additional burdens? What role will our allies play? What are the likely diplomatic implications if the United States acts unilaterally?
Similar questions were asked three years ago, but went unanswered; as we said, President Bush made it clear that he would not be swayed. That cannot happen again, at least not if this nation is to remain a representative democracy with three co-equal branches of government.