Tony Blair's Supporting Argument For War example essay topic

The Blair-Hitch Project "When people decided not to confront fascism, they were doing the popular thing, they were doing it for good reasons and they were good people... but they made the wrong decision". This is Tony Blair suggesting that Saddam Hussein is as much of a threat to world democracy as Adolf Hitler, but how much of a threat is Saddam Hussein to Britain. It is true that he is a cruel dictator who has a blatant disregard for human rights, but it is unlikely he has yearnings for universal conquest and world domination as Adolf Hitler proved he did. It has not been categorically proven that Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction; Iraq however does possess weapons which could be deemed 'unpleasant', weapons which ironically were 'acquired' from Britain and America. The USA sold Iraq anthrax, West Nile Virus and Botulin iol Toxin in the 1980's. United Nations weapons inspectors have revealed certain weapons but so far, even these reports are not conclusively damning.

Since the last gulf war in 1991 Saddam Hussein's 'progress' as a world dictator has been forcefully controlled by international force. On Friday 28th February 2003 Hans Blix, the UN's chief weapons inspector stated that Iraq had promised to destroy their illegal Sam oud II missiles which he optimistically declared to be "a very significant piece of real disarmament". Even to the most cynical observer, this reveals a certain degree of uncharacteristic co-operation on Saddam's part in a probable effort to avoid war. However amongst these cynics Mr George W Bush and Mr Tony Blair refuse to be accounted for. Tony Blair, the prime minister of the democratic United Kingdom continues to ignore these gestures. Accused of being America's Poodle, Tony Blair attacked this argument by saying "I believe in it (the war).

I am truly committed to dealing with this, irrespective of the position of America, if the Americans were not doing this, I would be pressing for them to do so". For all of Saddam Hussein's in-humanitarian ways towards sectors of his own people, the argument that this is a human rights issue falls historically flat. Britain has refused to intervene against the atrocities committed by the dictatorship in Zimbabwe led by Robert Mugabe and ignores the fact that North Korea is building nuclear missiles, so why is Iraq different? At least 30% of British people said they would not support a war under any circumstances.

There is a fear that it will lead to the deaths of countless thousands of innocent people in Iraq or even a full blown nuclear war, a situation far worse then the atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein. There is also the worry that a pre- emptive attack on Iraq would be seen by the Islamic world as a direct attack on Islam which could seem to justify further terrorist attacks against the West. Many people believe that war should be only a last resort. Certain members of the United Nations including France and Germany do not agree to the war; if the UN were more uniformly decided about the war being a last resort it may have more support from the British public. However, both Bush and Blair are under the impression that Saddam is linked with al-Qaeda, the terrorist organisation who undertook the attacks on the Pentagon in Washington and the World Trade Centre towers in New York on September 11 2002. Understandably, Blair is worried that our own 9/11 may come, however Saddam Hussein was not directly linked with these acts of terrorism, and al-Qaeda appears to operate in a number of countries and would undoubtedly still exist.

Unfortunately Tony Blair's supporting argument for war has changed from day to day. Originally it was Iraq's links with terrorism. Then it was Saddam's possession of 'weapons of mass destruction'. Finally, only a fortnight ago, the Prime Minister was going to war to liberate the downtrodden people of Iraq.

It would seem that the British Prime Minister is resolute in his decision to fight but unfortunately his motives lack this discipline. There are also many who believe that the horrors of the regime in Iraq were insufficient justification for an aggressive war, whose aim, if these considerations were the main objective would be a change of regime. As well as this, America is believed to have other motives which are, shall we say 'questionable'. The Prime Minister suggests he wants a quick end to the conflict "If you act early, you have to do less, fewer people get hurt and you reduce the possibility that it spreads". However, going to war to replace Saddam will not guarantee that he is replaced with someone better. In deed this has lead to claims of imperialism by opponents of the American plan with their intention of de stabilising Iraq, replacing Saddam with some American Puppet.

Tony Blair defended the United States by saying, "The US will not stay in Iraq a day longer than they have to. The idea that this is some kind of American imperialism is completely absurd". Although Downing Street's main hope is that the US-British threat could force president Saddam to disarm without a shot being fired, Blair is still pushing for the war. On Wednesday the 26th of February, one hundred and twenty one MP's rebelled against Blair's policies on the war, this was the largest revolt against a prime minister in over one hundred years, you would think that this and the thirty percent of the British public completely against any war, would ring alarm bells.

Perhaps it is time for Tony Blair to step back from the brink and follow such nations as China, France, Germany, Russia and Syria in thinking that inspection time should be extended and the weapons inspectors' and surveillance equipment added to before responding to the call to arms.