The Bush Administration is bent on starting WWIII, with or without any allies. The “axis of evil” that Bush is touting reminds one of WWII, in which Germany, Italy, and Japan were the enemies. Now, without coalition building efforts, we are ready to charge into a war against an axis needing to be attacked -- and conquered.
The problem is that there is no international support for this war. There are many countries who are down right against it, and some fear it is merely an excuse to increase our military budget to close to a half a trillion dollars.
No other country is so adamant that military action is necessary right now. Not one of our allies has come out in support of this newly waged war. Even Britain has been unusually quiet in the past week since Bush’s Declaration of War, posed as the State of the Union Address.
There has been no input by any other country so far. Many countries have expressed fears that we are carrying out this war to avenge the incident that occurred on September 11. Unfortunately, there are many Americans that believe that revenge for those incidents are justified to bring the whole world into a Third World War. I refuse to believe there are eighty percent of Americans that believe we are taking the right precautions for this new war. Those numbers reflect the fear and insecurity that we are feeling, not the support of Bush’s maverick style of waging war.
The Bush administration keeps touting that we are at war, but it doesn’t appear to be true for the rest of the world. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz has threatened our allies that they must participate in this war with us, or become one of our enemies. He said “Those countries that choose to tolerate terrorism and refuse to take action… will face consequences.” This intimidation and pride will hurt our coalition greatly, and will push away many of our tenuous allies. In the ever-increasing need to become more and more secure, we are slowly becoming the world’s enemy.
Many countries have already come out to express their dismay at our President’s war hungry rhetoric. European defense chiefs made it clear that they disagree with Bush’s premise that an expanded war is needed. They were put off by Bush’s “we’ll do it with, or without you” attitude and expressed worry over the disintegrating ties with former enemies. This did not seem to bother the Bush administration which need to learn that building coalitions must still be the number one goal in this war against terrorism. We cannot do it alone. (Perhaps Gore could be called on as a coalition building consultant). It appears to many that the “axis of evil” has been created as an excuse to go to war. There are many reasons that our government might do this including, but not limited to, helping the economy, intimidating every enemy, and helping to pass an outrageous military budget.
The Bush administration is proposing to increase the Pentagon yearly budget by $120 billion over the next five years, to $451 billion in 2025. This is an increase of a quarter of a trillion dollars over the next five years. This outrageous budget, along with a $1.35 trillion tax cut over ten years is the definition of fuzzy math. Most people would not agree with this idea unless they are fearful for the security of our nation, and this is precisely how the Bush administration is trying to make us feel. Bush said in his speech on Tuesday that “Our first priority must always be the security of our nation, and that will be reflected in the budget I send to Congress.” He is already preparing us for what will become the greatest act of fiscal irresponsibility our government has ever made.
Rumsfield is already gearing up his rhetoric to match the certain attack forthcoming, saying “The best…defense is a good offense.” There has been no talk of diplomacy or coalition building, just football-like jargon. Are our leaders looking towards Vince Lombardi half time speeches for their inspiration? There seems to be no doubt in the minds of the Bush War cabinet that war is imminent. The sooner they can convince the nation that war is necessary (they're not concerned with convincing the world) the better Bush’s chances are of winning the military budget and to maintain his approval ratings. Make no mistake about it, we are starting World War III, with or without your support, or the support of the world.
