Never Thought Of It That Way

In a lengthy guest column to the Seattle Times, former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Bill Owens put a new spin on the uniqueness of the "threat" to the world's people posed by Saddam Hussein.

He ran down the usual laundry list, of course: Saddam gassed his own people (forgot to mention, as may be some sort of rule, that the U.S. supported that activity), Saddam invaded two other countries (forgot to mention that the U.S. supported Iraq's invasion of Iran, and probably goaded him into invading Kuwait, as well as that the U.S. has invaded and/or bombed literally scores of countries since World War II -- as well as plenty before that), Saddam has defied UN Resolutions (forgot to mention that the U.S. is far in the lead among World actors on this score as well), etc..

But here comes the kicker: "Further, Iraq is the only country that fires at U.S. and allied aircraft on an almost daily basis." Okay, doublethink is one thing. Righteous indignation over Iraq's firing at U.S. and "allied" aircraft -- even though the no-fly zones have since day one been imposed unilaterally, without permission from any international body, and even though the U.S. bombs Iraqi "targets" almost daily (can you say "terrorism") -- is fine (so to speak). But the "only" stipulation seems to come straight out of left field -- or Mars.

What you can do: Write a letter to the editor of the Times, explaining that Iraq would probably be joined by other countries in almost daily firing at U.S. aircraft just as soon as the U.S. imposed no-fly zones upon, and engaged in almost daily bombing runs over, them.

Posted by Eddie Tews at January 29, 2003 05:51 PM