What a conundrum! One tends to think of the arguments in favour of the forthcoming war on Iraq as 'feeble'. One tends to laugh at the right-wingers who say that Saddam is the new Hitler because 'Saddam Hussein is not remotely comparable to Hitler'. But now Peter Hitchens has started saying these things! Oh why Peter have you done this too me? Not once in your career have I agreed with ANYTHING you have written, and now I agree with much of it. Sadly his article 'So what will you do if we step out of line, Mr Bush' was in the Mail on Sunday, and so not available on the internet, but I'd imagine it'll appear on his website at some point.
To summarise The Great Man's argument it basically is that a) Iraq isn't a threat or even more nasty than many other countries we ally ourselves to, b) by agreeing to Bush's war we are agreeing that the US has the right to interfere in any country at will, and c) this will come back to haunt us. I don't agree with all of it, but it's a refreshing change to here someone on the Right realise that the US's interests are not identical to the UK's, and that the UK's interests are given little thought in Washington if they do clash. Furthermore I like his point (which I have made) that to compare Saddam to Hitler, to argue that the West must act here because it did in World War II (trust me many right-wing arguments get no more complex than this) is an insult to the troops and civilians who fought in that war -- a war in which there was a real chance of losing.
posted by Matthew @ 12/29/2002 07:17:00 PM
Comments: 0
