LuisTeodoro.com

In one of those increasingly rare moments nowadays, Foreign Affairs Secretary Blas Ople, who fancies himself a world-class diplomat trapped in a Third World country, was right. While his Cabinet colleagues were debating whether the 500-member “humanitarian mission” the Philippines plans to send to Iraq will be under the command of the United States forces there or of the United Nations, Ople declared that the debate was “irrelevant in light of the urgent need to act to prevent a humanitarian disaster in Iraq.”
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The US attack on Iraq and its success has demonstrated the overwhelming military superiority of the United States. It has not demonstrated that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, or that he had links with al-Qaeda. It has so far not demonstrated either that the United States is as expert in the arts of construction and rebuilding as it is in the sullen craft of destruction and killing.
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Filipino opposition to a US invasion of Iraq was never premised on doubts that the United States would not prevail. But that was exactly what President Arroyo was saying the other day in downplaying her minus 14 approval rating for March.
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As expected, the overwhelming military might of the United States and its partners is prevailing over the troops of Saddam Hussein.
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World War IV has begun. Although the war is barely noticed by Filipinos, the Philippines is already part of it. The clearest indication of that involvement is the Philippines’ being part of the “Coalition of the Willing.” The less obvious signs are the bombings in Davao, the Balikatan “exercises” and the return of the U.S. military bases.
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The U.S. justifications for attacking Iraq?which have metamorphosed into just one today, and that is, to “liberate” the Iraqis from Saddam Hussein?have not been convincing except to the converted.
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United States officials from George W. Bush down to the US Army?s first lieutenants justify the attack on Iraq as a mission to bring democracy to that land.

But civil liberties, which, together with free elections, constitute the bedrock of democratic societies, have been under grave threat in the United States since September 11, 2001.

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