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It is a victory in the media. Even here on The Moderate
Independent our troops were congratulated for their success in killing
Saddam Hussein's sons.
But tell me, what crime did they commit against us? Even if you
believe their father had threatened us by possessing WMD's - which is
questionable - what does this have to do with the sons? If some
country has a problem with the policies of George W. Bush, should we
celebrate if that country succeeds in killing his daughters?
The issue, if there truly was one, was with Saddam. Even he never,
ever did anything directly to us; never attacked us, never participated
in terrorism against us. His only crime was using the weapons we
had provided to him to invade Kuwait. The idea of chemical weapon
use against his own people as a reason to wage a war against him does
not fly, because our government - the administrations of Bush, Sr. -
kept supporting Saddam with your tax payer dollars after these acts
occurred.
So our only issue directly with Saddam was his invasion of Kuwait, which
was not an attack on us, and would not have happened if we had not built
him into a monolithic, unparalleled power in the region.
At some point he had WMD's, but we had encouraged that, even helped with
it, knowingly allowed him to import precursors to biological agents, had
no problem with him using chemical weapons regularly against Iran's
army.
The reality is that Operation Iraqi Freedom is not necessarily a
justified military action. And as the President's war sales pitch
continues to unravel, it seems less and less likely that we were
justified in attacking Iraq pre-emptively, and more and more likely that
our troops are being used as a corporate resource for Haliburton and
campaign resource for the President's re-election drive.
But, even if you are one of the people who believe Saddam was a bad man
and so deserved to be toppled, what does that have to do with his sons?
What gives us the right to make a list - based on no criteria - of over
50 people we feel like hunting down and killing? No criteria!
We do not have cases against them. Odai and Qusai Hussein did what
to America? Committed what crime? Existing as the sons of a man we
had a problem with? Existing in a country we wanted to make a
political statement by attacking? Existing as relatives of a Muslim
leader while we are fighting a War on Terror? What was their crime
against us? Who was the judge that gave them a death sentence, and
what right did he have to do so?
War can not and must not allow our leader to make a list of people he
would like to kill. And our entire media is disgraced by
applauding the unprovoked murder of people who had never, at any point,
committed any crime nor presented any threat to America. Even if
their father had, which is questionable, we did not have a right to kill
Saddam's sons, no more than Saddam had a right to kill Jeb and George
after the first Gulf War.
And the reality? Not even Saddam stooped to this level. He
attempted to exact revenge against George Bush, Sr., but he never went
after the sons. Our current President and his administration have
sunk to levels even this horrible thug never did. Who are the
terrorists and who are the barbaric thugs in this?
And who will hold them accountable? Surely not the applauding
American public or press, who don't even question the making of a hit
list with no criteria other than the President saying he wants them
dead. Who will hold the President and his administration accountable for
carrying out a hit list of unprovoked, unjustified murders?
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