Is Mr. Bush a "War President?" - Democratic Underground

AuntiePinko

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Thu Jul-13-06 04:10 PM
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Is Mr. Bush a "War President?"

Dear Auntie Pinko,

Why does George W. Bush keep calling himself a “War President?” Aside from the fact that he really seems to like dressing up in war stuff, and saying things like “Bring it on” and “Dead or alive,” etc., that only serve to make you wonder how secure his manhood really is, does he really think America is at war? IS America at war? I know we’ve got soldiers dying every day because George likes the idea of guns shooting and people being scared of us, but is that ‘war?’ And what does he get out of being a “War President?” Should he get something special, like a tee shirt?

Laura
Ames, IA

Dear Laura,

Well, if Auntie is understanding this right, you only get the t-shirt when you’ve actually been there and done that. So let’s parse it out: Has Mr. Bush been a war President?

“War” is a word with many meanings, and it’s important to be clear about which meaning is actually relevant, especially when human lives are at stake. The word is often tossed around casually, as in “I’m at war with the Accounting Department over how the quarterly numbers are reported,” or “The Save-A-Lot Store has declared war on high prices!” That’s fine when the stakes are low. I have been known to mutter things about being at war with the community of ants that is trying to move in and occupy my kitchen counter, and I’d get annoyed with anyone who was offended at my trivialization of the concept in such a context. Lighten up and get a life, and all that.

But when you’re operating on the scale of governments and nations with military resources, the lives of soldiers and civilians at stake, and huge investments, being too casual about semantics can have devastating consequences. When you’re operating on the scale of a government, “war” has a very specific, very scary, very ominous meaning that has profound legal and moral implications. It is not a word that should be tossed around lightly. Even the construction “War on Poverty,” which I wholeheartedly approve in concept, is a little dangerous semantically.

There are international laws, treaties, and expectations that kick into gear when “war” is at issue. “War,” in that sense, requires certain conditions to apply. For one thing, “War” must be waged by one state upon another state. As a private citizen, I cannot prosecute a war against other private citizens. I can’t enter into internationally-binding treaties or contracts to end a war, to gain and enforce concessions from my opponent(s), or to set conditions for future interactions between myself and my opponent(s).

And that should give you some idea of what “war” is, in the larger sense of international law. There are a number of conventions that legally define war, and they are very complex, but the common points reference war as a state of hostilities between two legally-constituted entities that have the power to bind themselves by treaty or agreement, and to enforce treaties and agreements on their own citizenry, allies, member states, etc. By inference, the state of hostilities exists because one or several parties involved wishes the other(s) to so bind themselves (by, for example, surrendering territory, making legal trade concessions, affording particular rights or privileges, etc.) Those others, presumably, do not wish to so bind themselves, and/or want one or several other parties to bind themselves to renounce claims upon territories, accord special rights and privileges, trade concessions, etc.

One of the things Auntie Pinko finds so very ironic about the events of my lifetime is that the long ordeal in Vietnam, which was clearly a war by those criteria, was never acknowledged as a ‘war.’ It was called many things, but back then the spinmeisters of the Establishment seemed to believe it would be a bad thing for Americans to acknowledge that they were at war. Today, with our military tragically committed to an ongoing conflict that kills soldiers and civilians daily, our spinmeisters hype the “war,” angle even though the ‘enemy’ is no legally-constituted entity with the power to bind themselves and their citizens, allies, and/or member states to treaties and agreements. In other words, in Vietnam we were fighting a war that was mislabeled as a ‘police action” and in Iraq we are essentially engaging in a police action hyped as a ‘war!’

It might be marginally accurate, perhaps, to describe the brief campaign to destroy Mr. Saddam Hussein’s government as a “war,” since Mr. Saddam Hussein had the legal power (then,) to bind his government, citizenry, and allies to any treaty or agreement that the United States and its allies wanted to impose. Of our stated goals, (ensure that Mr. Hussein’s government did not possess and could not employ weapons of mass destruction against any other nations; stop the abuse, torture, and mass killings of Iraqi civilians; and endow the Iraqi people with political self-determination,) the first had already been effectively achieved through diplomatic action, and I can’t remember any attempt to achieve the second two through diplomatic action before proceeding directly to hostilities. Still, in that sense at least, it was a “war” until Mr. Hussein’s capture and replacement with another legally recognized governmental authority.

There are a good many words that can be correctly employed to describe what our government has committed lives and resources to since that time. We are engaged, as I previously noted, in a ‘police action’ with the cooperation and consent of a legally-recognized government, within their territory. We are also engaged in a long-term effort to reduce and/or eliminate terrorist actions against our citizens, which, if we wanted to be martial and macho about it, we could describe fairly as a ‘fight,’ or even a ‘campaign.’ It is not a war, since our enemy is no legally-recognized entity that has the power to bind itself, its citizens, member states, and allies to its agreements.

In fact, terrorism is a crime and terrorists are uniquely repulsive criminals. They are not “freedom fighters” in the sense of wanting to replace an oppressive authoritarian or totalitarian government with a less oppressive government. In fact, they want to replace existing governments with governments that match or exceed them in authoritarian cruelty, and to deny essential freedoms of religious expression and belief, and political and social self-determination, to anyone who disagrees with them. They are criminals engaged in a loose global network of conspiracy to commit appalling and repulsive crimes and to hamstring effective intervention against them by fomenting political, economic, and ideological conflict and dissension among those who might be capable of stopping them.

What does Mr. Bush get out of calling himself a “war President?” Presumably he believes, correctly, that when the nation is at war, the Executive Branch may legitimately assume some powers, and can postpone or elide some levels of public scrutiny, in order to effectively prosecute that war. Insofar as the U.S. was effectively at war with the Taliban government of Afghanistan, and Mr. Hussein’s government in Iraq for a couple of months until they collapsed and new governments were imposed, perhaps he qualifies for a t-shirt.

But there’s no Constitutional way he qualifies as a “War President” now, nor should Congress be enabling him to continue shredding the Constitution under that feeble excuse. I certainly hope that you and all the voters of America will send that message this fall, Laura, and thanks for asking Auntie Pinko!