In the wake of Scott McClellan's scathing indictment of the Bush regime's sprint to war, some administration pundits argue that to continue to debate why and how our country went to war some five years ago is a distraction from the more crucial issues at hand. The details and minutia of the complex decision to invade Iraq is better left to the historians to untangle. Rather, we should concentrate our efforts and attention on how best to capitalize upon the more recent "successes" of the "new" military strategy in Iraq.

    Even were such optimism regarding the surge warranted, however, what these pundits fail to realize, is that military success and improved strategy does not of itself afford a moral and legal basis for continuing the occupation. Understanding how and why we invaded Iraq is relevant not only to ensure the accuracy of the historical record but, more importantly, to decide whether to continue the occupation in the hope or achieving a yet to be defined "victory," or in the words of John McCain, to "surrender," accept defeat and withdraw.

    Civilized nations and individuals accept, at least theoretically, that human beings have inalienable human rights - among them the right to life and to live in a nation that enjoys political sovereignty and territorial integrity (sometimes referred to as national rights). Such rights are the basis of "noncombatancy," and provide a natural immunity from, among other things, being injured and killed unjustifiably and having one's nation invaded and occupied without warrant. To kill an innocent person, a noncombatant, is murder, and "the (unprovoked and unjustified) invasion or attack by the armed forces of a State of the territory of another State, or any military occupation, however temporary, resulting from such invasion or attack" is aggression.

    We believe as well that aggressed individuals and nations have a right of self- and national defense, i.e., to use violence, even deadly force/war, all things being equal, to assert these rights. Morally and legally, we justify such a response with an understanding that the aggressors, by virtue of their violation of the rights of their victims, have forfeited their own immunity and have become liable to be resisted - warred against - in justified self- and national defense.

    In the days following the tragic events of September 11, the Bush administration opportunistically portrayed Saddam Hussein as having ties to al-Qaeda and as "seeking to produce unsafeguarded nuclear material and to acquire nuclear weapons." In speeches utilizing the imagery of the "smoking gun as a mushroom cloud," Bush, Condoleezza Rice and others repeatedly warned a vulnerable and fearful nation that given the Iraqi leader's hatred of America and his willingness to use weapons of mass destruction in the past, it was highly likely that the threat of nuclear conflagration was significant and imminent unless preemptive action were taken sooner rather than later. In his now famous "either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists" speech, President Bush served noticed to the American people and to the world that our response to these heinous attacks would involve "far more than instant retaliation and isolated strikes" against terrorist groups like al-Qaeda. Bush's war against terrorism will be far more encompassing and will pursue "nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism," in order to preempt, and thereby prevent, further attacks on the United States.

    Although preemptive war may be sanctioned under international law in very specific circumstances, the nation contemplating its use bears the onerous burden of proof that rather stringent criteria have been satisfied. Preemptive war may be justified after all diplomatic alternatives have been exhausted (last resort), and then only as a response to a significant threat that is real and imminent.

    Preemption is legally and morally problematic for a couple of reasons.

First, the intelligence and/or evidence that alleges to satisfy these justificatory criteria may easily be mistaken, manipulated or even fabricated in order to wage an aggressive war to further some political, ideological or economic agenda (which, according to Scott McClellan, seems to be the case in the lead-up to the war in Iraq).

Second, preemption sets a dangerous precedent as a major first step on the slippery slope to preventive war, which differs only in the degree of certainty regarding an impending attack. Preemptive war requires a credible and imminent threat. Preventive war requires only fear and paranoia and is little more than aggression rationalized, widely regarded by ethicists and jurists as immoral and criminal under international law. Unlike the Bush administration, which has accepted preemption as integral to its foreign policy and an extension of "diplomacy," most previous administrations, while never ruling it out entirely, did recognize the precarious fine line between preemption and aggression.

    Despite the vitriolic response by pundits to Scott McClellan's allegations, President Bush himself admits that "mistakes" had been made in Iraq. Most importantly, what is beyond dispute is that Iraq neither possessed weapons of mass destruction nor had ties to al-Qaeda. What fails to be acknowledged, however, or at least understood, are the profound consequences of these "mistakes."

    Since Iraq posed no credible threat to the United States, the criteria for preemptive war were not satisfied. Consequently, the invasion and continued occupation of Iraq is unjust, immoral and a crime of aggression.[1] Further, the invading/occupying troops, despite their being misled into believing their cause to be just, are agents of unwarranted, immoral and illegal violence - they violate the rights of the Iraqis. Consequently, they must suffer the sanction of forfeiture of their natural immunity and become liable to be justifiably resisted and warred against by the Iraqis in self- and national defense.

    Given this right of resistance, the vast majority of those forces that currently oppose the aggressors and occupiers (US troops) are neither insurgents nor terrorists, but freedom fighters. Because those who justifiably struggle against foreign domination do not forfeit the very rights they are justifiably and morally struggling to assert, it is not the case that the aggressors, in the face of a fierce "insurgent" resistance, can now claim their actions are morally justified by reasons of self-defense. All combatants are not moral equals.

    Even should we disregard the accusations of Scott McClellan and give the Bush administration the sizable benefit of the doubt that their preemption was an honest mistake, that does not somehow alter the moral and legal value of the invasion and occupation. Nor does it excuse the destruction of the Iraqi state and the deaths or displacement of millions of innocents. Nor does it diminish their culpability for war crimes. Though our debt to the Iraqi people is great, it is the epitome of self-indulgence and narcissism to believe that our use of military force has over the past five years somehow evolved from aggression and foreign domination to humanitarian intervention, whose only purpose is to suppress the insurgency through military means so as to create order out of chaos and provide the time and the opportunity for the fledgling democracy to take hold. The reality is that any aggression can be spun in ways that portray the aggressor as a benevolent patriarch whose motivation is only the well-being and interest of the aggressed.

    Defeating the "insurgency" - those freedom fighters resisting aggression and foreign occupation - and propping up a de facto government at the cost of hundreds of thousands of innocent lives, is not humanitarian intervention. To continue the occupation of Iraq in order to seek victory, i.e., the triumph of the aggressors over the aggressed, indicates an indifference to, and disregard for, the principles of morality and the tenets of international law and numerous agreements and treaties - the very characteristics of a rogue nation that we point to when proposing sanctions and justifying military intervention. Finally, it is to defiantly force our will upon the Iraqi people betraying an arrogance and an hypocrisy that brings our nation neither honor nor prestige, but rather hatred and righteous indignation.

    If we are ever to regain our status in the world as a moral leader and our standing among former friends and allies, we must acknowledge the consequences of our "mistakes" in Iraq and end the aggression and the occupation immediately. Achieving victory is neither a legal nor a moral option. Further, we must elicit the support and assistance of the United Nations, particularly of those neighboring Arab nations, some of which the current administration has attempted to demonize, who may be better capable of restoring order in Iraq and ensuring that a bloodbath of sectarian violence and civil war not ensue. Finally, we must recognize our culpability in undermining the sovereignty of the Iraqi state and the dignity of its people and apologize to them and to the rest of the world for our arrogance, hypocrisy and crimes against humanity.

    ----------

    Camillo "Mac" Bica, Ph.D., is a professor of philosophy at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. His focus is in ethics, particularly as it applies to war and warriors. As a veteran recovering from his experiences as a United States Marine Corps officer during the Vietnam War, he founded, and coordinated for five years, the Veterans Self-Help Initiative, a therapeutic community of veterans suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. He is a long-time activist for peace and justice, a member of Vietnam Veterans Against the War, and a founding member of the Long Island Chapter of Veterans for Peace. Articles by Dr. Bica have appeared in Cyrano's Journal, The Humanist Magazine, Znet, Truthout.org, Common Dreams, AntiWar.com, Monthly Review Zine, Foreign Policy in Focus, OpEdNews.Com, and numerous philosophical journals.

    [1] According to the United Nations General Assembly Resolution 3314 (XXIX), (international law), the unjustifiable and unwarranted "use of armed force by a State against the sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence of another State," is a crime of aggression.