Iraq War

One day on a windy spring afternoon, a young man was getting ready for his future to be changed forever. It was the day of his eighteenth birthday and has going with his father to an army recruitment center to register for the armed forces. He had come from a long line of military men and he was eager to make his family proud as he served his country. "Dad? " the young man asked "What is it? " the father answered. "Is there any advice you have for me about all of this? " "Just be careful" the father responded. "It's war you're about to be apart of, and once you're in it you can't go back. " "What do you mean by that? " the young man inquired. "Let it like this, when I was in Vietnam a buddy of mine when running off into the forest one afternoon once we were off of patrol. " "Okay. ." "In the forest he came across some enemy territory and ended up stepping on a landmine. " "Well what happened to him? " "What do you think happened to him? He blew off his legs and damn near died. " "So you're telling me to watch out for landmines? " "I'm telling you to watch yourself. There are going to be times you have to make tough decisions, decisions that are a matter of life and death. And once you've made those decisions you're stuck with the consequences. " --- I stand in firm negation of the resolved, that "the United States should end the Iraq War". The war was started for poor reasons, and we should never have gone into Iraq in the first place; but now that we're there we're standing on a landmine that will certainly blow up beneath us if we leave before we're finished. I do not intend to justify the Iraq war, but instead I stand show that if we leave this war before we're finished establishing a firm democratic government that everything we've done up until this point is going to blow up and leave us is a state possibly beyond repair. The first argument to be considered is that democracy is beginning to take root in Iraq, and slowly spreading throughout the Middle East, and it's something that the Arab people want[1]. From Dr. Zubaida, professor of politics and sociology at Birbeck College, "I am now confronted by casual remarks from many sources to the effect that: "what Iraq needs now is another Saddam". The implication is that such a divided and fissiparous society is impossible to govern without violent authoritarianism. "Saddam kept the lid on" is another refrain. Iraq, in this view, is the extreme example of a middle-eastern society which cannot govern itself, characterised by tribal, religious and factional conflicts, to which notions of democracy are inappropriate and where any attempt at democratisation is sheer folly. My response is that the situation today is not somehow a "natural" tendency of Iraqi or middle-eastern society: it is the product of a particular history. Regimes such as that of the Ba"athists and Nasserists, rather than being a remedy to a natural anarchy, played a crucial role in producing these effects. I will expand on this theme, with reference to the arguments advanced in some other contributions to the " [1] . http://www.opendemocracy.net... We understand that the Arab People, for the most part, want democracy and if the American people pull out now, it will not only hinder that progressive march towards democracy and a democratic society. Furthermore American solders are still serving a very important role of protecting and establishing human rights[2], particularly that of women who are now beginning to attain human rights otherwise denied from them in prior years. From the United Nations, "[2]In Kirkuk on 24 November representatives of 20 NGOs gathered to make a statement on violence against women, demanding, inter alia, legislation on domestic violence and honour killing, greater representation of women in local councils, an end to harassment and abuse of women by police during investigations, and an end to the practice of religious leaders granting marriage and divorce outside the legal framework. " [2] . http://unami.unmissions.org... This work is far from being finished, and work is still needed to make sure that this goal of human rights work does not fail. Pulling out now before the work is finished will undeniable result in a terrible backlash, the bomb we've stepped on will blow up. From Sigir. mil[3], "The team sought out Iraqi technocrats to identify projects the city urgently needed for essential services. By mid-May RTI had hired about two dozen Iraqis and was working with the local council to implement emergency water and electricity projects. The Basra office was the first of what would become 22 offices that RTI opened across Iraq during the spring and summer of 2003.15 . .. Clarifying roles, responsibilities, and working relationships among the military, the CPA, and USAID and its contractors proved a major challenge. The military perceived USAID and its contractors as "relief in place" and "expected to rapidly hand over [to them] public services restoration, infrastructure reconstruction planning and coordination, and managing relationships with newly formed local councils throughout Iraq. " But neither USAID nor its contractors had sufficient resources to sustain this mission" [3] . http://www.sigir.mil... In conclusion, we've gotten ourselves into a mess, there is no doubt -- but if we leave this mess before we're finished cleaning it there will dire consequences we will have to face up to.