We Still Have a Choice on Iraq
(this Op-Ed opinion appeared in the New York Times on September 6, 2002)
By JOHN F. KERRY
ASHINGTON — It may well be that the United States will go to
war with Iraq. But if so, it should be because we have to — not because
we want to. For the American people to accept the legitimacy of this conflict
and give their consent to it, the Bush administration must first present
detailed evidence of the threat of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and then
prove that all other avenues of protecting our nation's security interests have
been exhausted. Exhaustion of remedies is critical to winning the consent of a
civilized people in the decision to go to war. And consent, as we have learned
before, is essential to carrying out the mission. President Bush's overdue
statement this week that he would consult Congress is a beginning, but the
administration's strategy remains adrift.
Regime change in Iraq is a worthy goal. But regime change by
itself is not a justification for going to war. Absent a Qaeda connection,
overthrowing Saddam Hussein — the ultimate weapons-inspection enforcement
mechanism — should be the last step, not the first. Those who think that
the inspection process is merely a waste of time should be reminded that
legitimacy in the conduct of war, among our people and our allies, is not a
waste, but an essential foundation of success.
If we are to put American lives at risk in a foreign war,
President Bush must be able to say to this nation that we had no choice, that
this was the only way we could eliminate a threat we could not afford to
tolerate.
In the end there may be no choice. But so far, rather than making
the case for the legitimacy of an Iraq war, the administration has complicated
its own case and compromised America's credibility by casting about in an
unfocused, overly public internal debate in the search for a rationale for war.
By beginning its public discourse with talk of invasion and regime change, the
administration has diminished its most legitimate justification of war —
that in the post-Sept. 11 world, the unrestrained threat of weapons of mass
destruction in the hands of Saddam Hussein is unacceptable and that his refusal
to allow in inspectors is in blatant violation of the United Nations 1991
cease-fire agreement that left him in power.
The administration's hasty war talk makes it much more difficult
to manage our relations with other Arab governments, let alone the Arab street.
It has made it possible for other Arab regimes to shift their focus to the
implications of war for themselves rather than keep the focus where it belongs
— on the danger posed by Saddam Hussein and his deadly arsenal. Indeed,
the administration seems to have elevated Saddam Hussein in the eyes of his
neighbors to a level he would never have achieved on his own.
There is, of course, no question about our capacity to win
militarily, and perhaps to win easily. There is also no question that Saddam
Hussein continues to pursue weapons of mass destruction, and his success can
threaten both our interests in the region and our security at home. But knowing
ahead of time that our military intervention will remove him from power, and
that we will then inherit all or much of the burden for building a post-Saddam
Hussein Iraq, is all the more reason to insist on a process that invites
support from the region and from our allies. We will need that support for the
far tougher mission of ensuring a future democratic government after the war.
The question is not whether we should care if Saddam Hussein
remains openly scornful of international standards of behavior that he agreed
to live up to. The question is how we secure our rights with respect to that
agreement and the legitimacy it establishes for the actions we may have to
take. We are at a strange moment in history when an American administration has
to be persuaded of the virtue of utilizing the procedures of international law
and community — institutions American presidents from across the
ideological spectrum have insisted on as essential to global security.
For the sake of our country, the legitimacy of our cause and our
ultimate success in Iraq, the administration must seek advice and approval from
Congress, laying out the evidence and making the case. Then, in concert with
our allies, it must seek full enforcement of the existing cease-fire agreement
from the United Nations Security Council. We should at the same time offer a
clear ultimatum to Iraq before the world: Accept rigorous inspections without
negotiation or compromise. Some in the administration actually seem to fear
that such an ultimatum might frighten Saddam Hussein into cooperating. If Saddam
Hussein is unwilling to bend to the international community's already existing
order, then he will have invited enforcement, even if that enforcement is
mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the
Security Council fails to act. But until we have properly laid the groundwork
and proved to our fellow citizens and our allies that we really have no other
choice, we are not yet at the moment of unilateral decision-making in going to
war against Iraq.
John F. Kerry, a Democrat, is a senator from Massachusetts.
