Resolved: On balance, the United States was justified in going to war with Iraq

I would like to note that both my opponent and I have stipulated to only include the legal and moral sections in this debate, mostly the moral. Moral In this section, my opponent argues for intervention due to utilitarianistic. I attempt to refute why utilitarianism should not be used in this context and use the NAP instead. Refutation: Utilitarianism Observation 1: My opponent does not support Saddam Hussein's killings- which means that he believes in an objective right to life My opponent's main case rests upon that Hussein killed his own people- which was unjust- and therefore intervention on utilitarianistic grounds should be used. However, by acknowledging that killing is inherently bad in Iraq, he cannot double back and say that some killings were justified to prevent others. Utilitarianism states that rights are not objective- but are subject to whatever creates the greatest amount of happiness in a society; an objective right to life supersedes this. Furthermore, my opponent is only using utilitarianism one way, in the sense that American intervention was justified because it created the greatest amount of happiness. However, utilitarianism can also be used to acknowledge that the massacre of the Kurds were justified in the eyes of the Iraqis since they were a minority, and majority will of the Iraqis should be taken due to utilitarianistic reasons (1). As Williams writes in his critique of utilitarianism: "There is a small minority in a country. The majority doesn't like the minority. They are prejudiced against them. So they decide it would be best to wipe them out. .. It could be possible that wiping out the minority (if it is sufficiently small in number) might actually bring about the greatest consequences. .. So their feelings about injustice are discounted, and they are wiped out. " (2) Therefore, my opponent here has a contradiction, in which he believes that the killings of the Kurds are objectively wrong (hence supports right to life), while he advocates a utilitarianistic point of few that deprives American soldiers of their own objective right to life. Observation 2: My opponent fails to mention that Utilitarianism is forward looking (3) What this means is that we adopt a utilitarianistic point of view, we should only look at present events and see how our actions will effect future events- past events have no play in this since they already happened. The atrocities that my opponent listed happened between 1986 and 1989. I would like to point out that none of these genocidal acts that my opponents stipulates to justify intervention happened within a decade of the Iraq War invasion. As such, invading a country for acts that already happened under the pre-tense of the "end justifies the means" is nonsensical- since utilitarianism only cares about future effects of your actions. In fact, Hussein committed very few genocides/atrocities within a decade before the invasion (4). For my opponent to justify this point, he must show that Hussein had an inclination to continue on committing these killings- despite a 10 year stagnation- and that the Iraqi casualties of the war would dwarf Hussein's killings, which leads me to my next point. Point 1: The Iraq War was responsible for the indirect and direct killing of 655 000 Iraqis (5) As CNN writes (5): "War has wiped out about 655,000 Iraqis or more than 500 people a day since the U. S. -led invasion, a new study reports. Violence including gunfire and bombs caused the majority of deaths but thousands of people died from worsening health and environmental conditions directly related to the conflict that began in 2003, U. S. and Iraqi public health researchers said. " My opponent talks about how only 4 000 US soldiers died, but neglects the fact that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died during the war. For the "end justifies the means" argument to be valid, my opponent must prove that the possible future deaths of Saddam Hussein's regime would have totaled more than about 650 000. Note: This study was taken in 2006 so the death toll surely increased by now. Moral Argument Summary 1. My opponent has a contradiction in which he argues against a right to life in one area- the killing of US soldiers, but states that the genocide was "disgusting conduct" and with a negative connotation of objective wrong doing- in other words supporting the right to life. 2. My opponent mentions these genocides that occurred but fails to mention that they happened more than a decade before the Iraqi War and they were not continuing on until any time near the Iraqi War. Thus, utilitarianism does not apply in this regard since it is solely forward-looking. 3. I presented empirical evidence that shows that the amount of Iraqi deaths in the war total hundreds of thousands. For his utilitarianistic point to be accurate, my opponent must show empirical evidence that if Hussein's regime was undisturbed, it would have killed more than 650 000 people- despite not participating in any genocides for over ten years before the war. My opponent also talks about how Iraq voted in a Kurdish minority, which is absolutely irrelevant. Moral Counter-Argument I propose the NAP (Non-aggression principle) as the counter moral argument for this debate. I don't have room to elaborate, but my opponent must rebut why the NAP ought to not be used in this situation along with defending his utilitarianistic point. Legal Rebuttal - My opponent states that the war was justified because the UN called it a genocide. This does not follow from his original point. The proclamation of genocide is simply a positive point. On the other hand, my opponent somehow infers a normative point from this with no rationale whatsoever. - Something being listed as a "genocide" in no way justifies intervention unless specific directly within a legal document- which it isn't in the US. - According to UK lawyers, the Iraqi War was illegal (6): "The 2003 invasion of Iraq was illegal, a former senior legal adviser to Britain's foreign ministry at the time of the conflict has told a public inquiry. Michael Wood said on Tuesday that the use of force against Iraq was "contrary to international law" because it had not been authorised by the UN Security Council. " Since the war from the US side was not authorized by the UN Security Council, the war can be argued as internationally unjust, since by participating in the UN, you are supposed to abide by its protocol. Sources (1). http://en.wikipedia.org... (2) . http://www2.drury.edu... (3). http://www.religiouseducation.co.uk... (4). http://civilliberty.about.com... (5). http://articles.cnn.com... (6). http://www.aljazeera.com...