Editorial: 'Just war' debate

Sydney
16 February 2003

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Editorial: 'Just war' debate

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Editorial: 'Just war' debate

As war with Iraq looms ever closer, a debate on the concept of 'a just war' has been running in the pages of The Catholic Weekly.

This is actually very positive. The last thing we want is to rush blindly into the abyss that is war.

It is interesting that John Owen - who replies this week to Gary Stone's recent plea against war with Iraq - compares fighting Saddam Hussein to fighting Hitler.

That both men have done wicked things is without doubt - in Hussein's case one has only to think of his regime's use of chemical weapons against the Iraqi Kurds, as well as the Iranians. But the analogy breaks down at this point: Hussein's invasionary adventures were stopped early on with his ousting from Kuwait in 1991. Hitler had annexed Austria, occupied most of Czechoslovakia and was about to swallow up Poland before any serious attempt was made to stop him.

It clear that Hussein is no fit person to have access to weapons of mass destruction, but it was the West who sold most of them to him in the first place. But, more important, there is no trigger, far less a smoking gun, justifying war with Iraq at this time. A cause for 'a just war' has not been proven.

One gets the impression that Iraq is indeed harbouring weapons of mass destruction and the reason the West knows this is because it is holding the invoices for the weapons. But this argues not for war, but for more time for the UN weapons inspectors to ferret them out. This is what France, in its capacity as a member of the UN Security Council, has urged.

What it does not argue for is moving quickly to a summary bombing of Iraq with all that that entails: the loss of civilian lives, including women, children and the elderly, all of whom will die alongside Iraqi soldiers.

Attempts to link Iraq with Islamic fundamentalist terrorists have undermined US pro-strike arguments, as it is clear that your average Islamic zealot views secular Arabs like Hussein with the same kind of contempt as he views infidels.

Such transparent arguments do little to persuade people that a war against Iraq would be 'a just war'. So what to do?

The French suggestion that the UN inspectors be given more time is eminently sensible. Let us also hope that the massing of military might on Iraq's borders - a modern version of gunboat diplomacy - will be enough to persuade Hussein to surrender his serious weaponry and the soldiers can go home in peace with no blood spilt on either side.

No one in this conflict of wills could claim to have the angels on their side; unlike the case with the Allies in World War II, who were most definitely on the side of the angels.