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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
There are always atrocities committed in the course of battle. That's what war does to people, which is why we're not supposed to fight wars of choice. When Tim Russert asked Bush on "Meet the Press" -- "Do you believe the war in Iraq is a war of choice or a war of necessity?" -- the president's initial response was, "I think that's an interesting question. Please elaborate on that a little bit."
So no matter how many "good causes" he tried to string together -- WMD, yellowcake, Saddam's phantom ties to al-Qaida and 9/11, Saddam's torture chambers, Saddam's mass graves, an outpost of democracy in the Middle East -- in the end, this was ultimately a war of choice.
The dying Henry IV had told his son to engage in foreign wars to distract the people from domestic crises: "busy giddy minds with foreign quarrels." The invasion of France is supposed to turn frivolous Hal into a strong leader -- his youthful indiscretions a thing of the past.
Both men surrounded themselves with those in favor of going to war: Bush with his neocons, and Henry with the churchmen my fellow debater David Brooks dubbed the "theocons."
And both the president and the king were motivated by personal animus toward their enemy. Henry becomes enraged when the Dauphin sends him a gift of tennis balls: "This mock of his/ Hath turned his balls to gun-stones." For his part, Bush was clearly furious that Saddam had once tried to have Bush's daddy assassinated. It was so personal, he now keeps the gun Saddam was captured with in a study next to the Oval Office as a souvenir. But responding to perceived personal slights or settling old family scores is no justification for sending young soldiers to die.
Contemplating the invasion of France, Henry V says, "France being ours, we'll bend it to our awe/ Or break it all to pieces." Iraq gave us shock and awe, and Powell's Pottery Barn rule: "You break it, you own it." We did -- and now we do. And we'll be paying it off for years and years and years.
In Henry V's time, history was much slower to cast its verdict. It took 30 years for England to lose control of France and dissolve into civil war. In the end, Henry "lost France and made his England bleed." The verdict on Iraq is already in: George II has lost the war, emboldened our enemies, and made America bleed.
