To War or Not to War

John D'Aloia

John D'Aloia Jr. is a retired navy captain and a submarine commander. He is a columnist for several newspapers in Kansas.

"The problem is, the public only knows what is printed or broadcast." So said Cokie Roberts. On October 7, the President gave a major speech setting forth the dangers facing the nation and his policy. ABC, the network with which Cokie Roberts was associated for many years, refused to carry it. So much for the media being the means by which the public gains knowledge. Could it be that ABC (and the other networks which failed to carry the speech) is so opposed to the President that it made an attempt to keep what he said from the American public? So who needs the national media?

A war against Iraq is being predicated on the belief that Saddam Hussein was directly involved in 9/11, possesses weapons of mass destruction or soon will, has the will to use them outside his borders, and is more than willing to hand them off to terrorists who will act as his proxy. The validity of these predicates is entirely dependent upon the validity of intelligence data and estimates, evidence that is cloaked in the mantle of national security and estimates that are murky at best. Given the evidence of how our national intelligence agencies failed to put two and two together in our own country prior to 9/11, it is difficult to have faith and confidence that they can produce the information needed to assure the American public that the blood of 9/11 is on Saddam Hussein's hands or predict anything concerning his weaponry with the certainty needed for that ultimate action in human history, war. It comes down to a matter of trust in the basic honesty and integrity of our leaders, and in particular George W. Bush. God knows that we have been deceived by Presidents in the past; now is the time for prayer that our President is not leading us along a war path for his own power and glory.

Evaluating "to war or not to war" does not involve reinventing the wheel. Over the course of western civilization, philosophers, statesmen, and theologians have debated the question and evolved a concept that applies just as much today as it did in the first and second millennium. Failure to consider and conform to the "just war" concept means we risk rejecting a thesis that has provided a degree of sanity to society that otherwise could descend into an inferno of global devastation and self-destruction.

Do we as a nation have a right to defend ourselves? No. Self-defense against an aggressor is recognized as an element of a just war. The fact that the aggressor in the war forced upon us by terrorist actions is not a sovereign nation but a transnational assortment of thugs complicates the right of self-defense but does not negate it. The terrorists must not be allowed to hide behind the skirts of nations that privately rejoice at our losses. Nations that aid the terrorists become one and the same with them, legitimate locations upon which to place our crosshairs.

Do we have to get anyone's permission to defend ourselves? Darn right we do not. If we have to get permission from any foreign nation, or the United Nations, we are no longer a sovereign nation and you can kiss the Constitution and your freedom goodbye-if not today, then tomorrow. Under the just war concept, the war must be waged only by the sovereign, that is, by a legitimate government acting in accordance with its own laws. The debate playing out in Washington is fitting and proper, conforming to constitutional requirements.

From this point in the discussion on, the debate gets murky. If we go to war against Iraq, would we vanquish Saddam Hussein and his military? Under the just war concept, one should have a reasonable chance of success. I have no doubt that we would prevail. It might not be as easy as in the Gulf War, for we would be opposed by a cornered villain. In the Gulf War, we publicly announced that we were not out to stomp Saddam into the sands of the desert and scatter his regime to the four winds. Today, he knows that if and when the Marines land, his demise, politically or otherwise, and the similar dispatch of all his tribe, are at the top of our strategic priority list. Being the villain that he is, it would be unwise to believe that he would not use whatever means possible to survive and to inflict as much harm as he could on the way out.