Is Iraq worth the Life of a single British Soldier?

Although there is a moral argument as to why a war should never be entered into, there is undeniably a counter argument saying that the war is worth the life of a British soldier. Many feel that the west and the “developed” countries of the world have a duty not to ignore the tyrannical regime of Saddam Hussein, for if we do then we imply it can continue, and then we become as guilty as him. Seeing as it was the West who partially supplied Iraq with the weapons that we now so ferociously condemn, do we not have a duty to clear up the mess that we chose to ignore for so long? Surely it is worth the life of a British soldier to try and stop the oppression of millions of innocent Iraqi’s by the tyranny of a maniac? Is it not justifiable to try and stop the further murder of thousands, and attempt to give them the freedom and democracy that is taken for granted in the West? If it is not the worth the life of a British soldier to try and help those in oppression under the rule of a tyrant, then we must ask ourselves, what is?

The advances in technology in the 20th century have meant that the average citizen now has access to the lives of people all over the world. Real-Time news services mean that we can find out what is going on in the rest of the world, even in countries that are physically a long way away. This was first proved in the Vietnam War, when Americans woke each morning and watched horrific images of war being shown on channels such as CNN. As President Nixon quickly found out, this globalisation turned public opinion so much against the war that the Americans had no choice but to pull out of Vietnam. “Far-Off” does not apply in the world of today, for the British public can find out exactly what is going on all over the world with the press of a button. Or as the slogan for a magazine puts it, “Their lives in your hands.”

Much of the reason that many members of the public are against military action, and the loss of life of British soldiers, is because many believe that Bush is trying to get revenge for September 11th and that he has decided to manipulate the current patriotic feelings of Americans created after September 11th to try and do something that George Bush Snr. could not. This implies that he has turned his guns on Iraq too suddenly and without reason. This is not the case; Iraq has been in the forefront of American foreign policy since 1979, shortly before the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-88. However after the unprovoked invasion of Kuwait in 1989, Iraq has been a public enemy of the United States, and after the attempted assassination of President Bush senior in 1993, it became clear that Iraq, underneath Saddam Hussein, was not going to be considered friendly any longer. This culminated in the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998, signed by US President Bill Clinton, pledging that the USA was prepared to take decisive action against Iraq until there was a regime change.

The hypocrisy continues. America also removed Iraq from its’ list of “terrorist-sponsoring nations” during the Iraq-Iran war. This is so ironic when America has embarked upon a war with Iraq after specifically citing its’ links with international terrorism and for its’ development of WMD’s. Let it not be forgotten that Britain and America completely supported Iraq throughout the twentieth century to such a degree that when the regime used a deadly mixture of chemical weapons on its’ own Kurdish towns due to their occupation by Iranian forces, America was prepared to look the other way. They even supplied the Iraqi regime with arms to ensure the defeat of the Iranians. As one journalist for The Times put it, “Bush is so sure that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction because the White House still has the receipts.”

Ever since the dropping of the two atomic bombs by the United States of America on two Japanese cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, on the other side of the world in 1945, no country i

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