War

President Bush 2 introduced the concept of per-emptive war, which means we do not have to wait for some foreign power to attack us before we can respond. It means that if we feel we have an eminent threat we can attack first. When this policy was announced the immediate reaction by many liberal thinkers was disbelief and dismay. They publically announced their disagreement and went home, and after of few days of thinking it over they went silent. They thought through the scenario of a president who knew we were about to be attacked and did not respond and we were attacked. They thought about how the president would justify his inaction and concluded that there could be a time when pre-emption was the proper course of action. It reminds me of the “ticking bomb scenario” where a suspect is in custody and there is evidence that he knows the whereabouts of a nuke and it will detonate in a few days and the question is, can he be tortured to force him to reveal the location of the bomb? There are four alternative options. First he is not tortured and there is no bomb. Second he is not tortured and the bomb explodes, Third he is tortured and there is a no bomb and forth he is tortured and bomb is found and dismantled. The question again arises what happens to a president who fails to approve torture and bomb explodes. Let is make it more difficult. The suspect knows of two dozen bombs in two dozens cities and says that one will go off every week for the next 24 weeks. The president refused to torture and the first bomb goes off. Does the president then change his mind and allow torture or does he stay the course over the next 23 weeks at which time the entire economy has collapsed and the headline is, “President saves constitution and loses the country”.

The reason I write this is that President Obama in his speech before the graduates of West Point talked about his policy and the press reported that he refuted the Bush policy of pre-emption but if you read his speech he did no such thing. Here is a quote from the Washington Post,



Obama’s document appears to water down the concept of preemptive war favoured by the Bush administration, but preserves the option for a US president to deploy military might unilaterally. It says Washington will “adhere to standards that govern the use of force.



Is this double talk or what? What pray tell is the difference between pre-emptive strike and deploy military might unilaterally. The press is so opposed to pre-emption that they seem to read into words meanings that are not there. To them the news is not what is but what it is supposed to be.



In other parts of the speech Obama states his preference for diplomacy before war. Duh! Thank God for the Internet as it permits thinking people the opportunity to look at many sides of an issue before forming opinions. As an aside I recently saw a TV show where a panel of academic types were asked to opine on the ticking bomb idea and they concluded that the president should allow the torture and then be charged with a felony and removed from office. I believe this is why it is often said that a professor would have trouble changing a light bulb.



John/Jack



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