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Re: casus belli
by Chris
29 January 2003 06:45 UTC
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The upshot is that the war is undertaken primarily out of ideological
considerations - it is about the defense of the leading US position
globally.  Both the means of this policy (projection of military power)
and its ultimate aim bespeak the fundamental weakness of the US position.

This is not to say that economic (i.e. oil) and geostrategic (i.e. Israel)
concerns are irrelevant to the adoption of the current course - the
background of the major players in this administration's security and
foreign policy teams make it impossible to argue otherwise.
I think this would be a classic case of "overdetermination". The necessary task is the assertion of US global dominance, OK. However, there are a lot of places that could serve that purpose. Afghanistan did quite well. Libya would work. Cuba. Iran. North Korea. Syria. Colombia (FARC). Somalia. However, Iraq has the distinct advantages of (1) massive oil reserves (2) proximity to Israel (3) no close allies, or neighbours that would strongly object to its invasion (4) an already decimated economy and military (5) a history of hostility to the US, including a culturally "pre-demonized" face and (importantly) an image of being a credible military threat (6) being previously defeated, but with "unfinished business" - amongst other factors. It will be noted that I think that "path dependency" plays a definite role here. In any case, the point is that there are multiple reasons that all lead to the same target - a greater density of reasons than any current alternative.

On a strict "king of the castle" logic, beating a country like Iran or North Korea - which could offer much more credible resistance - would actually be *more* effective. But they are not so overdetermined. Indeed, the fact that they could *actually* offer credible resistance, rather than just the image of it, is most likely a drawback. Which just goes to support the conclusion that current bluster, however deadly, is more a sign of weakness than of strength.

Chris

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