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No Moral Case Against the War
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Originally posted by sgtclub
I fully agree that we can't always do the moral thing. I was just trying to limit the discussion to the moral issue, to see if anyone could come up with a MORAL argument against the invasion. There are many legitimate practical arguments against invasion.
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It's not always "can't". A realistic -- indeed, conservative -- assessment of the limits of our power would acknowledge that there are very real limits on our ability to change the world. Arguably, Iraq has had a repressive government because of the conditions it finds itself in. A strong government is needed to hold the country together because it coheres so poorly. It appears that Kurds, Shi'ites and Sunnis identify more with those groups than they do with the nation. Moreover, they're in a dangerous neighborhood. As strong as we are, we can't do anything about these facts. Hussein was a bad man, but it's not clear yet that we've brought stability or a more legitimate government. Indeed, at this point, the government is less legitimate (in the Weberian sense) -- at least Hussein was installed in power by Iraqi guns.
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“It was fortunate that so few men acted according to moral principle, because it was so easy to get principles wrong, and a determined person acting on mistaken principles could really do some damage." - Larissa MacFarquhar
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