The Bush Doctrine Defended: Iraq and U.S. Foreign Policy

The war has been a major subject of debate in recent years which, I believe, peaked with the 2006 Democratic sweeps of the House and Senate. Their victories were a direct result of lack of support for the war among the population. Since then, however, the war has taken a back seat to gas prices and the economy due mainly to the fact that things are much better in Iraq than two years ago. This is mainly the result of the surge that McCain was a strong advocate for. On a side note, there would not be a need for a surge if Bush would have have an adequate amount of troops for the campaign in the first place. So on that note, he dropped the ball big time on that one. If you're going to fight a war, fight it.

While I would like to focus more on what our current policy should be, I must devote some time to dispel some myths and talk about results of the Bush doctrine and our national image abroad.
The Myths:
First, we must remember that the war on terror did not start on September 11th 2001. There were the US embassy bombings, Khobar Towers Bombings, USS Cole and the World Trade Center bombing in 1993. For so long America's response was weak in response to these attacks. Osama bin Laden was offered to the United States by Sudan during the Clinton administration but the President chose not to bring him into custody.

Second, the whole mantra "Bush lied, people died" is poppycock. He never lied about the weapons. He made the wrong assessment on whether they existed but he never lied. If he lied, then Hillary Clinton lied, John Kerry lied and a whole host of Democratic and Republican Congressmen and Senators lied too. They had the intelligence briefings that Bush had and they authorized Bush to go to war in the first place. Remember, Congress controls the power of the purse. By the bye, if the Democrats want to leave Iraq so bad, they could have left in 2006 when they took control of the House and Senate by cutting off funding. We still have yet to leave Iraq even though that was the platform the Dems ran on in 2006 to win, so who's kidding who?

Third, this is not a war for oil. If it was, we would be reaping the benefits of the Iraqi oil which now abundantly flows and has provided Iraq with an $80 billion dollar surplus.


Bush Doctrine and National Image:
The Bush Doctrine supports preemptive strikes against potential enemies and promoting democratic regime change. President Bush made a statement of this principle in his September 20, 2001 address to the United States Congress saying, "We will pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism. Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists. From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime." As I write to this day, I concede that world opinion has fallen for the United States. Many countries and leaders do not like our "Cowboy Diplomacy" and they have used the United Nations, primarily funded by the U.S., as a pulpit for telling the rest of the world how bad America is by going it alone. However, we only need to look as far as Iran, North Korea and Darfur to see how well diplomacy works. Iran is giving the world the finger and pursuing the bomb. North Korea, in light of their leader Kim Jong Il's current problems is firing up its nuclear plants and already has tested a bomb. Darfur is in crisis thousands are dead and millions are displaced. So, on the whole, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have produced more tangible results than any other diplomatic means recently.

As far as our national image is concerned, if the world is going to call us bad for getting rid of Saddam in the course of looking of the weapons that we haven't found, I say, who cares? The reason they oppose us is basically fiscal in nature, as all things are. The U.N. had the oil for food scandal with Saddam. The French had contracts to build reactors in Iraq and that would hurt them financially. Europeans can talk all they want. It's easy for pacifist nations that are protected by the U.S. through NATO to criticize. They use the money they don't have to spend defending themselves on social programs that encourage people not to take responsibility for themselves and they aren't better off for it. We should stop funding a disproportionate amount of money for NATO if the other member counties continue to bite the hand that feeds them. Not all the world hates us, though. One only need to look as far as France to see Nicolas Sarkozy elected as a strong pro-American reformer bent on curbing the welfare state that has left France stagnant.

-Eric