The Aggression Hit Paradeby
Gordon Prather
According to the Washington Post, on the eve of President Bush's second inaugural, he believed his re-election constituted a "ratification" of his "approach toward Iraq." Far from being "ratified" in the rest of the world – including the United Kingdom – Bush's "approach toward Iraq" has given rise to concern about the current state of international law in general and whether or not the prohibitions against the use of force on which the United Nations Charter is founded are still respected by the United States. Last summer, 40 members of Parliament asked U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to seek the opinion of the U.N.'s International Court of Justice on the "legality" under the U.N. Charter of the Iraq invasion:
We look to the court for an advisory opinion on this war, not only to address the casualties and damage done to the people and country of Iraq, but also to offer clear guidelines for the future about the legality of pre-emptive wars. Operation Iraqi Freedom was neither justified to – nor sanctioned by – the United Nations Security Council and, hence, constituted a flagrant violation of the U.N. Charter, applicable sections of which are quoted below.
Article 39
In 2002, the United States provided no evidence to the Security Council that Iraq was a "threat to the peace." In fact, all evidence provided by Iraq and by U.N. inspectors was to the contrary. Hence, the Security Council didn't authorize any "actions" involving force against Iraq by member states. Nor were any plans even made for the application of force. But, none of that matters to Bush. The American electorate has "ratified" his approach to Iraq. His second inaugural address appears to promise more applications of the Bush Doctrine to those characterized in it as "rogue states," namely, those who:
According to the Bush Doctrine, "The United States has long maintained the option of pre-emptive actions to counter a sufficient threat to our national security … To forestall or prevent such hostile acts by our adversaries, the United States will, if necessary, act pre-emptively. … The purpose of our actions will always be to eliminate a specific threat to the United States or our allies and friends." So, you soccer moms have "ratified" the application of the Bush Doctrine to Iraq – haven't you? How about applying it to other "outposts of tyranny" identified by Bush's new secretary of state? Cuba? Burma? North Korea? Iran? Belarus? Zimbabwe? Did you ratify that? January 25, 2005 Physicist James Gordon Prather [send him mail] has served as a policy-implementing official for national security-related technical matters in the Federal Energy Agency, the Energy Research and Development Administration, the Department of Energy, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Department of the Army. Dr. Prather also served as legislative assistant for national security affairs to U.S. Sen. Henry Bellmon, R-Okla. – ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee and member of the Senate Energy Committee and Appropriations Committee. Dr. Prather had earlier worked as a nuclear weapons physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico. Copyright © 2005 Gordon Prather |