EDITORIAL
Bush's case for war leaves questions
President Bush's speech to the nation last night made it clear that he has given up on any political or diplomatic solution to our standoff with Saddam Hussein.
It is time, Bush said, for war.
There was one final fig leaf, of course. If Saddam and his family would depart within 48 hours, Bush said, there would be no need for hostilities.
By all accounts, that almost certainly will not happen. So the United States, backed primarily by Britain, will launch a pre-emptive attack on Saddam Hussein and his regime.
There seems little doubt that the United States will prevail. It has overwhelming military superiority.
The doubts do not surround victory but the aftermath:
- How many troops and how much effort will be required to keep the peace in Iraq once the war has been won? This could take a generation.
- What are our long-range intentions? Simply to bring democracy to this country and rid it of a dangerous and brutal dictator? Or to begin the process of building a permanent regional presence for the United States and its military?
- And how will the rest of the world react to this imposing, and near-unilateral, use of American might? This question applies to our allies, of course, but more critically to skeptics within the Muslim world.
Saddam has few good friends within that world, of course. But that won't stop a wave of anger over this show of American force deep within the Middle East.
As if to underscore this point, Homeland Defense authorities raised the threat of a terrorist attack to the second-highest level even as the president was delivering his speech.
Bush came closer last night than he has in the past to answering the bedrock questions that surround our intentions toward Iraq: Why war? And why now?
War is needed, Bush suggested, because Saddam will respond only to force, either threatened or applied. Diplomacy has served mostly to give the Iraqi leader time to consolidate his position.
As for why now, Bush said the day is close when the weapons of mass destruction Iraq either has or can create will fall into the hands of terrorists.
We share the president's view that this would be horrifying, though we cannot share his conclusion that an immediate war is the only way to prevent it.
Given last night's speech, however, it appears our best hope now is for a war that is short and as free as possible of casualties among our military forces and innocent civilians.
But we will have to remember that a short, surgical and successful war is only the first part of what is to come.
Bush and his administration must also demonstrate they have the will and the way to deal with the vast array of military, diplomatic and nation-building challenges that will follow.
