An Open Letter to the President and Vice-President of the United States

To the President and Vice President of the United States,

George Herbert Walker Bush and Richard Bruce Cheney.

Gentlemen,

I realize that this communication will, in all probability, not find its way to your desks. Nevertheless I would be remiss as a self-respecting individual and one fortunate enough to be born and raised in the United States if I failed to send you this open letter. It has come to my attention that certain individuals and organizations, under the rubric “Win without War,” have chosen to perform the moral equivalent of a denial of service attack on your e-mail addresses tomorrow by means of something that they are pleased to call a “Virtual March on Washington.”

I confess that I fail to see how an epidemic of E-mail spam will effect a rationally-motivated change in your Iraqi policy. It would be far more to the point to protest such abominations as the TIA program, now thankfully gutted, the lack of a rational screening policy for potential Arab terrorists or the highly dubious personal and political relationships that you have with the House of Saud, the prime source of funding for the evil Islamist ideology that now threatens world peace. This, however, is beyond the WWW “coalition.”

Instead, they choose to advocate a ridiculous round-robin of “inspections.” These “inspections” didn’t stop North Korea, a smaller and poorer country than Iraq, from developing its own nuclear weapons programs. How it can be expected to seriously interfere with bio-chemical operations that require far less infrastructure? “Win without War” like the “anti-war left” in general, has no answer. Saddam Hussein is a composite of all the evils that they claim to disdain, yet their nihilistic desire to tear down legitimate universal values of human freedom and dignity for their own hypocritical “(im)moral” self-aggrandizement compels them to throw in with a murderous fascist and racist, an ecocidal and genocidal maniac with no regard for human or animal life.

It is on this last point that the irony of their actions comes to fullest fruition. I happen to be aware of the fact that Pentagon and Executive Branch staff have been briefed on the military problems that have arisen as a consequence of Saddam’s deliberate destruction of the Tigris-Euphrates River Marshes, a wetlands area larger than our Everglades, and the consequent impoverishment and exile of the Marsh Arabs, a traditionally free and environmentally responsible people.

Turning a teeming swamp bigger than Florida's Everglades into a salt-encrusted wasteland in less than a decade was no small feat. Environmentalists are still puzzling over exactly how the Iraqi government, which shrouded the project in secrecy, accomplished it. Bringing back the wetlands -- once home to a half-million people and a crucial stop for migratory birds -- will be considerably more difficult. Marsh destruction

It is a striking fact that the charity responsible for the welfare of the Marsh Arabs agrees with your policy of “regime change” in Iraq. From their perspective, it is the only way to reverse the ecological and social damage that Saddam has wrought. Amarappeal wants change

Isn’t it a pity that the Sierra Club and Greenpeace are so indifferent to it? Sierra Club and Greenpeace do not

Rather than make this letter tedious for anyone who chances to read it, (including those at the WWW coalition that it is being forwarded to) I will conclude thusly. The only thing that Saddam Hussein respects is force. The demonstrations of February 15th and the pathetic one that you’ll not see tomorrow are taken by him to indicate weakness and not strength. As a believer in maximizing liberty to its fullest rational extent, I realize that our example of freedom to the world, lacking in consistency and full implementation though it may be, is the prime source of the defeats that tyrants and demagogues throughout history have suffered at our hands. It was certainly the case for Saddam’s greatest political idols, Hitler and Stalin. They, like Saddam, confused our tolerance of dissent with cowardice. However, this also means that feckless and inconsistent “pacifism“ simple emboldens such psychopaths and encourages them to flout international sanctions that aren‘t backed by the threat of real force. “Win Without War” would do well to keep in mind the example of the Oxford Union in 1933, which voted in favor of the resolution “(That) This House will never again fight for King and Country” A former pacifist explains why totalitarians don't care How many of them later fought and died against Hitler?

With good wishes for the success of any rational and liberty-affirming political efforts on your parts, I remain:

Yours Truly,

Ernest E. Brown II

Copy to: president@whitehouse,gov

vice.president@whitehouse.gov

CC: info@winwithoutwarUS.org