Of Lessons Learned in Sweet Fall Evenings

Keggers and "cowboy diplomacy"

by Tom Adkins
05/01/03

It was a beautiful fall evening in 1975, my freshman year at West Chester University. Friday night's frat party blowout was complete with idiotic antics, lawn retching and drunken girls. Lots of drunken girls. Nevertheless, I was bored. I'd just stepped off the porch, when a girl from my history class ran up to me in tears. "Tom, you HAVE to help…Jane is upstairs, WAY too drunk…with four guys."

My choice was stark: obey the unwritten rule that guys don't interfere with "guy business." Or, rescue a very nice young lady about to fall into deep trouble. I never hesitated. I went back in, kicked the door open, and demanded my "best friend's girlfriend" leave with me now or I'd start kicking some ass. I lied. I bluffed. But it worked. The next day, I discovered I lost "respect" among my "friends."

I have no regrets.

Today, after spending $70 billion and over 100 American lives, George W. Bush is facing barbs from the domestic left and our "friends" across the globe. Unilateralism! Immorality! Illegitimacy! Cowboys! And of course, the most vulnerable criticism of all: what happens if we don't find those weapons of mass destruction? You remember…the reason we went in to Iraq in the first place?

My answer is simple: I don't give damn. Not because George Bush is a Republican. Not because I love war. But because it was the right thing to do.

Now that we liberated the cradle of civilization, we've discovered the horrific depth of Saddam Hussein's sick tyranny. Wanton murder of innocents. Sadistic torture for fun. Institutionalized rape for sport. Human shredding machines. Children …children…tortured and jailed for years, to coerce parents. Every Iraqi citizen faced every form of gruesome torture that could be devised by evil minds. Now, they are free. Who can doubt that Iraq's impending transition difficulties are preferable to the awful status quo? To be clear, even without terrible weapons, someone should have done this long ago.

Let's examine that weapons issue. We know Hussein has them, or had them. He liked using them. And he wanted more. If we can't find them, where are they? Evidence points to Syria, who also harbors Iraqi fugitives. But soon, like other terrorist nations, Bashir Assad will bend or be broken. That leads to another quiet stroke of Bush wisdom.

Why Iraq first? Because terrorist hotbeds Syria, Iran, and the West Bank are now geographically divided. There's a new sheriff in town, bringing the rule of law, freedom, human rights, and democracy, the most feared weapons of mass destruction to the remaining tyrannical and theocratic states. Bush's vision of clear goals using precise power with minimal civilian casualties verified the brilliant Sun Tzu paradox that extreme violence tempered with benevolence creates the perfect victory. Korea, Vietnam and Somalia memories are exorcised. Iraq is free.

But the WMD inquisition begets a far deeper issue: does the United States have the right to attack other nations simply for regime change? Under what circumstances? And is pre-emption acceptable doctrine?

Now that oceans don't protect us, pre-emption and regime change have become American security requirements. But let's make the case for pre-emption and regime change for humanity's sake. First, tyrannical regimes consider American freedom their greatest enemy. Therefore, they are dangerous to our security. Second, Americans claim all men are born with inalienable rights. Everyone. Therefore, shouldn't we fight for those who have rights torn away? True, some societies like France and Sweden merrily surrender to the collective. But there is a clear case that for most, servitude is involuntary. As the most powerful and free nation on Earth, do we not have a moral imperative to rescue them?

Some of our "friends" disagree. Particularly those who broke the useless UN trade sanctions with Iraq, such as France, Germany and Russia, and those who engaged in the same practices, such as China. Now they angle for colonialist spoils. As for domestic objections? Except for the truly naïve, they are politically driven. All objectors cast aside even minimal moral standards to maintain Hussein's stranglehold for cynical self-interest. There can be no greater shame.

Therefore, I say to anyone who demands any pop-legitimization of this war: "Who's next?" With or without weapons of mass destruction, with or without United nation's blessing, this war was just. Cowboys? Maybe. But cowboys always save the girl from the railroad tracks.

Or frat party rapes.

Or rescue the world from hideous tyranny.

For that, I don't need to find a big bomb in a bunker.