Gulf Comments
“No to war in the Gulf,” proclaims another poster …
As Christians, we might feel that such sentiments are central to our faith. Or are they? Should we as Christians be objecting on “humane” moralistic principles to the Gulf War?
In Jeremiah 15, v2, it says, some people: “are doomed to die in war — that’s where they will go!”
It is true that this could be a reference to the non-altruistic nature of human beings and of their misuse of their capacity for free-will — but it could also be a reference to the fact that it will be always necessary for us to use our “free will” to protect the human rights of our fellow humans (and even wider to protect animals from exploitation … but that is another contentious issue!). This would surely still be in accordance with the doctrines of Christians (in fact of any non-amoral people)?!
The human liberties which we all hold dear, need to be defended against flagrant abuse by any dictatorship. Iraq is guilty (as a nation, since I am not in the buisness of conducting an individual witch-hunt here!) of enforcing it’s dictatorial regime on the people of Kuwait. So, Iraq, like Tyre (in Zechariah 9 vs 3, 4): “has built fortifications for herself … but the Lord will take everything she has”.
Yet, God needs humans to act his will for him upon earth. We are here to do his will — that is if we listen to what he wants! Is it too ridiculous therefore to suggest that God wants us to protect Human Rights and restore the rightful government to Kuwait? If this is the case then the Peace Protests are, surely, therefore directly contrary to the will of God, in this instant!
I am not advocating every state of war as just, since I am sure that any combatants would claim to be fighting for “just reasons” if not “for the will of God”, the so called “holy war”! Again I disassociate myself from the view of the Gulf War as being a great Holy Crusade — we are NOT there to crush some “pagans” or another “blaspheming religion”, as the infamous Crusades were historically entered into to achieve. I merely suggest that it is not too unlikely a scenario that God wants us to protect our fellow man (after all we are all God’s children) from a dictatorial regime intent merely upon inflicting pain and suffering upon any innocent Nations that get in their way (eg The Iranian War, the Israeli Scud Attacks, the Turkish Threats, the threats against the Arab members of the Allied Forces and even down to the threatened use of Chemical Weapons on Civilian Targets).
Iraq seems to wreak its vengeance upon the innocent civilian populace (eg Israeli and Saudi Scud attacks on centres with no military significance). This flagrant abuse by Iraq of Civil Liberties, on the Basic facets of Human Rights is well documented. If Iraq will attack a section of it’s own populace with Chemical weapons then, surely it is a sin to abandon the Kuwaitis to the rule of such a tyranical dictatorship?
Much has been made of the fact that the West is only interested in upholding the rights of Kuwait as a nation to exist because Kuwait has vast oil reserves. This is probably one factor in the West’s decision to liberate Kuwait. However, should we be that critical of this stance? Kuwait and Iraq (if united), would be the worlds largest producer of oil. Should a power-hungry dictaorship be allowed to hold the world to ransom forever, because, be under no illusion, if Iraq were to control ALL the Gulf Oil, by a series of well planned attacks on its neighbours, then it would be able to bring the entire Western World to a near standstill.
Should they be allowed to take over the Middle East and thus in essence control the entire Western World? I have just heard that Iraq has dumped millions of barrels of crude oil into the Gulf. This is an environmental catastrophe, indeed the war itself will have a profound impact on the ecosystems in the Gulf.
Do we, honestly, want to give all the worlds major oil reserves on a plate to a country which is quite happy to misuse and WASTE them in such ways? Such environmental terrorism is awful and must be avoided at all costs. Iraq has threatened to burn all the Kuwaiti oil fields before it leaves Kuwait. Environmental damage seems to be a minimal concern for Iraq.
Can we abandon Kuwait to such an amoral dictatorship, with a clear conscience? It is very easy for us to be all “anti-war” opinionated, when we are sitting safe and sound many miles from danger, when OUR friends and family are not being tortured and when OUR country isn’t being pillaged by an occupying force.
What would your reaction be if I was to say that London had just been hit by a Nuclear Weapon by Iraq? Horror? Disgust? Would you want everyone to sit around and say “hard luck!”? Perhaps the Nuclear Weapon scenario is a little extreme — or is it? A small nuclear device in London could do the same (concentrated) damage as Iraq will have done to Kuwait.
There will be people who will suffer for the rest of their lives as a result of the Iraqi occupation, some people will have suffered pain and eventual death. In short their ARE parallels between the two scenarios, that aren’t too unreasonable.
The reality, therefore is that the remoteness of the conflict enables us to close our eyes to the wider moral concerns and focus on only the tragedy of War. We are able to object to the Government’s policy on the Gulf Situation and with “Moral Guns ablazing” savage the Government’s position (it would be a different matter if Britain was being invaded …).
Yet, Jesus told us to surrender to the will of our Government. It is the Governments considered decision that our troops should be committed to the liberation of Kuwait. They have tried to step out of the “emotionally coloured” areas to make their decision. No sane individuals want war, but sometimes it is necessary to fight (what would the world have been like if we had not fought the Germans?).
Robert Runcie has said that the Gulf War was indeed a just War and that if that was the only way to remove the occupying Iraqi Forces out of Kuwait, then that was what must be done. The Government considers that War is the only way to achieve such aims, hence it is engaged in the Gulf War.
If it had felt that sanctions or UN Resolutions would work it would not have commited our forces (such measures were given 5 months to work and did absolutely NO good whatsoever). The cost of this conflict to Britain is going to be immense. Even if you ignore the obvious human suffering, resulting from the war, the Government would not have engaged in the war unless it felt the expense was justifiably necessary — in short the considered opinion of our Government was that it was necessary to fight the Iraqis, even considering the economic and human suffering ramifications of such a war.
We must all hope and pray for peace, sice war is inevitably a string of personal tragedies. However to continue opposition to the War is a misconceived loyalty to a single moral ideal, without any consideration of the wider, perhaps more profound, moral concerns!
To continue with home-objection, could result in as high incidence of post-war pschological problems, such as were incurred by Vietnam Veterans — undoubtably partially caused by the poor image of the war in America. Indeed the lack of a heroic reception for the young fighters must have been an overwhelming disappointment after having been under hostile fire nigh on constantly during every tour of duty.
The Military say they have learnt from the experiences of the Vietnam War — have we? Whilst I do not condone unwarranted jingoism, some thought must be extended to the troops and their morale! Surely therefore reticence, whether we agree or not with the conflict is desirable. I wonder what the effect is to the Morale of the Kuwaiti’s suffering occupation of their homeland? I think some idea can be gained by the news that Free-Kuwaitis WEPT on television when they were talking about the “liberation” of a small, insignificant piece of sandbank (claiming to be an island!) … how then must they feel about the occupation of the mainland?!
The war is not going to go away just due to complaints. Indeed if it did, then a further hidden problem would occur — namely the exploitation of a nation and its people. What signal would such a condonement of flagrant aggression give to other potential dictators round the world? Surely it would tacitly condone the actions and leave the world’s human rights open to being ignored by dictators.
To conclude therfore, opposition to the War is misdirected — we all should hope for a swift outcome (a peaceful outcome would have been desirable but, alas, not possible!), even if this means pummelling the Iraqi Military Might into the ground. The Allies are behaving “impeccably” during the war (“All’s fair in love and war” is a sentiment not shared by the Allied Commanders). Our troops are surgically striking at Iraqs Military Capabilities and have sucessfully avoided large numbers of Iraqi civilian casualties (something that is not true about the way the Iraqis are fighting!).
War should not be glorified but at least we are trying to limit this “necessary” conflict to the armed forces present in the Gulf. Jesus said (Luke 22 v36): “whoever has no sword must sell his coat and buy one” but let these swords be quickly beaten into ploughshares and peace return to earth.
In the process of this conflict do not alienate our troops who are, after all fighting for us, for the UN, for democracy and for basic human rights, something that we all hold dear.