Devil's Advocate

Sean Hannity on the TV right now- "This was a man who gassed his own people, who killed and tortured, who was responsible for the death for one and a half million people. By anyone's definition, he was the embodiment of evil."

Here's one guy who disagrees. I don't agree with all the points made, but it's an interesting counter-perspective.

For some reason people in our government get away with calling the man evil. Evil is an ignorant word. What is evil? Does that mean he is possessed by the devil? Does that mean someone cast a spell on him, which controlled him to do bad things? Does it mean he is mentally ill? What is evil?

Evil is an ignorant word because it prevents us from looking at reasons why things happen. It is such an easy thing to say we need to stop Saddam because he is evil. When I ask what did Saddam do that was so evil, I hear that he killed his own people and tried to take over other countries like Kuwait. Okay so maybe that makes him brutal or an asshole, but evil?

Part of the reason why Iraq is such a mess is that I believe we ignored how Saddam ran his country. Where the hell was all of this factional violence before the US invaded? Why wasn't Iraq a mess under Saddam? Maybe, just maybe Saddam knew the only way to keep the country together was to install terror. Again, not evil but he definitely believed in the concept that the means justify the ends, hence he was brutally pragmatic.

The US is not brutally pragmatic. We know the best way to stop the violence in Iraq is just to kill enough people to make the Iraqis fear doing anything wrong. However, that stance goes against our beliefs and concept of morality. The US does not believe the means justify the ends.

Remember when the Iraqi people looted businesses and museums after Baghdad fell? Now picture our troops killing everyone in the street out past 9 o clock, do you think there would have been looting? Of course not.

The US will never win the war in Iraq because we will never run the country like Saddam did. Saddam did what most dictators do when someone tries to kill them, they kill that person, their families, their friends and anyone associated with them. If a crazy militia tries to kill Bush, wouldn't you expect the government to come down hard on the militia? I'm not saying Saddam was justified in slaughtering every person he did, but I'm sure many of the slaughtered deserved to die and were revolutionaries against the government.

If you listen to the Howard Stern Show, every week Howard pleads for the US government to put Saddam back in power because he at least could run the country. At first it started as a joke but Howard is now more serious. What I am trying to do is add some intellectual legitimacy to the argument that maybe Iraq was better off with Saddam.

Since the invasion, (Excuse me Zell Miller, liberation) how many innocents have died compared to when Saddam was in power? I'm not sure of the answer but I do know people didn't have to fear suicide bombings when they went to a mosque or market.

To wrap up the first part of the column, my point is that Saddam was a brutal man that used any means to justify the ends. He was not evil. He had a purpose, even if it was an immoral and flawed one. His brutality also stabilized a fractured nation that probably shouldn't be a nation to begin with. The US will not win the war because a democracy cannot be brutal and use any means necessary.

I have to say, in regards the concept of evil, there's a lot here that makes sense to me. If we're judging evil purely on willingness to kill and brutalize, we must conclude that there are many, many "evil" leaders and regimes in the world, many of which the US has and continues to support. What made Saddam different? If we say that we're going to take out anyone who we decide is evil, issues of relativism and pragmatism aside, doesn't that mean we're essentially going to be invading a FUCK-TON of countries? I mean, what does Sudan have to do to get on our shit list?

I'm less interested in the rest of this guy's column as it regards the war in Iraq than the consequences this has in regards the philosophy of US foreign policy- while I (and many others, I suspect) would have vastly preferred the explanation that we were going into Iraq because Saddam was a bastard and the Iraqis deserved better, it does beg the question-

1- Is this the US' job?, and more important,
2- How can this be our primary goal without us applying it across the board?

One of the biggest problems with the US assigning itself the role of global policeman is that it doesn't seem to enforce its own rules evenly or equally across the board- fundamentally, the US' primary interest is its own, NOT the world's. This is why we were content to not only let the Taliban murder and repress countless Afghans but also do business with them until they made us mad. Ditto for Saddam. Saddam's first act as leader of Iraq was to purge the Baath party. We didn't care. Saddam gassed Halabja in 1988, when he was still an official US ally. Again, we didn't even blink.

Go back to Afghanistan. Who did we back? The Northern Alliance. Swap out old warlords for new ones. What's the difference between Saddam and a sadist like Rashid Dostum? Body count? Opportunity?

Is interventionism always bad? I don't think so. The willingness of powerful nations to stand up to repressive regimes is important, sometimes vital, in saving lives, particularly of innocent civilians. Indeed, decisions about US isolationism/interventionism had major consequences for my relatives in Europe and millions of others during WWII. Foreign policy matters; it does make a difference. And that is why the argument that America should stand by while people die is at first blush extremely repugnant to me. I picture people like Pat Buchanan and Charles Lindbergh sitting back on their laurels in the states while Auschwitz was puffing away at full efficiency and I'm horrified and disgusted.

But what is the alternative? Can America realistically intercede in every global conflict? I'm not sure. In any event it's irrelevant, since it has never done this in the first place. For all the rhetoric about fighting for the Iraqis' or Afghans' freedom, the fact is that America doesn't care about liberating people as a goal unto itself, only as a limited bonus (we certainly haven't shied away from taking people's freedom away if it served our interests). So how can we claim with any degree of credibility that we are fighting on the behalf of others? It simply isn't so- we let people die when it serves our interests, we let dictators rule when it benefits us, and we topple others when it benefits us, whether they actually threaten us or not. Forget the issues of morality; we've got a problem as far as basic HONESTY.

So what are we supposed to do about Iraq and Afghanistan? I honestly don't know- the world is full of assholes and unfortunately, very often America supports just as many assholes- if not more- than it confronts them (and even then, it's got far more to do with self-interested strategy than any sense of humanitarianism or goodwill). And even when we do remove assholes, sometimes the only people around to get the job are other ones- how do you deal with a country when the only leaders and only armies all have blood on their hands, are all religious or nationalistic fanatics, and all want to butcher each other?

I don't know. Isolationism still seems like an immoral and selfish concept. But America's track record for interventionism seems equally so- if we are the world's policeman, we're corrupt, on the take, and more than willing to turn a blind eye if it benefits us. Maybe the answer is that we have to relinquish the illusion, pushed by the White House and various political organizations, that America is really going around the world to make things objectively better, that we are actually fighting for others. Because the reality is, not only is that not what we're doing, but it also isn't really possible. Sometimes America's interests and those of the world (or another country) simply don't line up- and we would be a hell of a lot better off if we would at least admit in those circumstances that we're looking out for number one and taking care of our own business. Like we always have.

We should apologize to the people of Iraq and Afghanistan. Not for removing Saddam and the Talbian, but fo not being able to offer them anything better. And for our selective consciences that switch on as soon as it affects us, but which we conveniently shut out as soon as there's no reason for them to be on our radar. Why are Iraqis not thanking Americans, Mr. Hannity? Maybe because they know that we never gave a shit about them in the first place- and we still don't. Even the people who say we should stay there and finish the job don't- we see them as a problem to deal with, and if we're really honest, I think it could be said that most Americans, liberal and conservative, resent the hell out of them. Should we have left Saddam in power? As much as I want to say no, it doesn't look like removing him has done a hell of a lot for the Iraqis.

The world is a shitty place. But we're kidding ourselves when we try to pretend that we're making it better by fucking with it.

Liberals are supposed to be the undying optimists, but what was the neocons' vision of "being greeted as liberators" if not utopian? As nice as the contrary would be, not every problem can be solved- and certainly not by us.

At some point there will be some sort of bloodbath in Iraq (more than usual). Maybe if they're lucky there will be an establishment of a feudal status-quo like Afghanistan. But this country is never going to be the enlightened bullwark of democracy people want it to be, certainly not in my lifetime. It isn't a Muslim issue or even a cultural issue per se- it's a question of values and priorities. The Iraqis want to kill each other more than anything else. Until that changes, our being there won't make a damn bit of difference- unless we're willing to take over Saddam's old job. And I don't think even Bush is crazy enough to do that.