THE WAR IN IRAQ

Why the war?
It has taken me some time before I felt able (or courageous) to put forth these ideas on the war in Iraq.
But speaking out of an countercultural faith, I submit the following thoughts for your consideration.
Under the guise of patriotism, our government may doing more damage to the rights of the people of the United States than any terrorist attack.
Anyone who disagrees with or criticizes the Administration’s war making is stamped with the disapproving brand, unpatriotic.
Wasn’t that the same accusation made against those who rebelled against the Vietnam War?
Shades or rather ghosts of the Nixonian era have come back to haunt us.
According to a news report on September 27, 2006, the United States Defense Department awarded a contract of billions of dollars to a private firm to monitor news organizations’ coverage of the Iraq war.
The Administration’s stick to the warfare until perhaps the last Iraqi person is killed, the determination to torture prisoners, the lack of proper equipment for the military personnel in Iraq are just a few of the signs of the Administration’s plot to keep the homebound citizens in a state of fear and turmoil to the extent that Big Brother is the only one who can dictate how we should react.
But is the generality of citizens really fearful? Are they really paying attention to what our government is doing or what is going on in Iraq?
Yet the generality will stand at attention and salute whatever patriotic bromide our government hoists.
In fact, our government depends on its citizens not to think, not analyze whatever it tells them. It’s the Nation of Sheep syndrome in a tantalizing and tragic déjà vu.
It’s as if our government is saying, "There’s going to be democracy in the Middle East if we have to kill everyone to get it."
It’s reminiscent of Judge Roy Bean’s statement in the wild west: "Above all else there’s goin’ be peace and I don’t care who I have to kill, there’s goin’ be peace. (The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean ).
Yes, a dictator has been brought down. Yes, an elected government is in place.
But to what avail. Is there peace? Absolutely not.
Over 130,000 Iraqi citizens have been killed since this war began. The number of American military personnel killed is rapidly approaching 3,000 – the number killed in the 9/11 attacks. 2700 as of 9/27/06.
Perhaps the numbers are too numbing to be internalized.
Sometimes the sons and daughters, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers of those killed in battle are so overwhelming that they do not have a sufficient impact on our consciousness.
But think of just one individual who was killed in battle
For example, a young man who had joined the Service to learn a trade, but then was sent off to fight in Iraq.
His dream was to get a worthwhile job after he was discharged, marry his sweetheart and begin a family.
Dreams of watching his children grow, helping them with homework, teaching them various sports, saving for further education.
Dreams of growing closer to his wife in loving friendship, having friends together, sharing possibilities for mutual enrichment, sensitively supporting one another through dispiriting hardships and joining with one another in celebrating triumphs.
Dreams to become a productive member of his community, to get involved in local affairs, perhaps even to enter local politics.
All these dreams he carried with him into battle.
All these dreams that would never be fulfilled.
His body is shipped back, and, according to the dictates of our government, not even a picture of his flag-draped coffin.
The question is: Should democracy be established by warfare? Can it be established by warfare?
The Pentagon budget for 2006 is $500 billion. For $40 billion we could give everyone in developing countries sufficient aid for basic needs such as clean drinking water, purer sanitation, basic nutrition and education, reproductive health care for women.
This, according to a report of the United Nations Development Programme.
Our government is spending $11 billion a month on the war in Iraq, That is $96 billion a year. Remember what we could do with $40 billion invested in third world developing countries?
Why, then, the war?
It seems that a more humane and caring invasion of Iraq would bring about the goal our government is seeking more than the constant killing and being killed that is now the daily fare of the present invasion.
Isn’t the war we are conducting in or foisting on Iraq saying in effect: We of the United States of America are morally superior therefore we can dictate what is good for you who are inferior?
As a result, the insurgents with suicide bombers and cowardly terrorist attacks.
Instead of war, we need a great dream, an imaginative view of what might be.
How seriously, literally do we, citizens of the most powerful nation in the world, take Jesus’ words that those who live by the sword will perish by the sword?
How seriously, literally do we take to heart Jesus’ challenge, "Blessed are the peacemakers …"
Pope John Paul II in his World Day of Peace address of 1999 said: "Peace is not imposed; it rises instead from the heart of every individual, every human community and aims at the good of all. Respect for the rights of individuals and of every people therefore guarantees and promotes true peace."
A vital lesson you learn from warfare is that peace is as fragile as a cobweb, that peace does not come as easily as sliding down a snow covered hill on a toboggan.
Norma Hardy in Ecumenical Decade: Churches in Solidarity with Women said,
"We look forward to the age of peace, when violence is banished, both women and men are able to love and to be loved and the work and wealth of our world is justly shared."
That is the ideal of peace as opposed to war making.
You can be peacemakers by not being deaf to the cries of the poor, the powerless, the needy – those who usually suffer the most in wars.
Being a peacemaker frees us from the weighty burden of anger, bitterness and the desire for revenge whether personally or nationally.
You will never have peace preserved between, among nations while the spiked fence of long and short-range missiles are pointed ominously at one another like the fingers of a kung fu master poised to strike at the jugular vein of an enemy.
Denise Priestly in her book, Bringing Forth In Hope: Being Creative In A Nuclear Age, "Our hope for the future must help us discover the real possibilities for siding with the poor and oppressed against their oppressors, with peace against war, with life against death."
Whatever happened to Jesus’ command, "Love your enemies"?
Do we who profess following Jesus actually live a schizophrenic life?
On the one hand, nodding our heads to Jesus’ teachings but on the other hand, making our decisions, living our lives, judging our political loyalties as if Jesus had never spoken.
The goal of our government initially was that if democracy could be established in Iraq, democracy would spread throughout the Middle East.
Granted it takes time to establish democracy. But the facts are that Afghanistan which we thought we had under control has erupted again. Iran is once more posing another threat.
The goal seems to be evaporating, but the war goes on and on.
Peace is not the absence of conflict it is the presence of collaboration.
Again, the question: Why the war?