Saturday, February 15, 2003

John Robb points to an article which claims that France's opposition to war may be less out of a concern for a peaceful solution and more out of a concern for the oil contracts it signed with Saddam Hussein. I think you'll find that the governments opposed to war are opposed to it for more than their altruistic pursuit of peace. If this is true, then the French are being hypocrites on a grand scale. "No blood for oil" may be right, when it comes to them - no blood in war means more oil for the French!   10:09:17 AM

Dave Winer has some excellent commentary about the possible war in Iraq on Scripting News today. He does a good job of taking apart the anti-war faction for its continued reliance on the notion that this is a war for oil. I also have a real problem with the rhetoric of the anti-war movement. I think the case for giving peaceful options every chance to succeed before going to war is strong. But I think that by calling the United States "the biggest threat to peace in the world," George Bush "Hitler," and repeating the nonsensical mantra "No Blood for Oil," you close minds and lose credibility. I was opposed to the first Gulf War in 1991, but in hindsight, I'm not so sure that I was right in opposing it. History has shown clearly that it was not a war for oil (if it had been, the US would have been occupying Baghdad for the past twelve years). History has also shown Saddam to be the tyrant George Bush Sr. made him out to be - Iraqi forces committed atrocities in Kuwait, fired Scud missles on non-combatant Israel (who did nothing in response, to their credit), and gassed their own citizens. The rhetoric of both the pro-war and anti-war camps has closed minds and done more to make this war a reality than anything else.   9:56:38 AM