Preliminary remark: I think that when someone tries to apply something Heidegger said to a contemporary political story, they have taken Heidegger out of context. I think Heidegger did that himself in the 1930s, and 70 years later, doing so is even more problematic.

My own context: I disagree with Bush on many issues, I dislike Kerry, and I'm not an American. So my vote doesn't count, in any case.

Onwards to the substance of Alain's comment.

Manipulating your audience is the purpose of political rhetoric; politicians are fishing for votes. You are either for "Life" or "Choice", pro-hunting or anti-gun, and so on. Both sides use fear as a rhetorical tool: if you vote for my opponent, well, you won't have health care when you get old, or there will be criminals with assault rifles on every corner, or the terrorists will attack again.

Does Bush take adavantage of people's fear in his rhetoric? Yes. But so does Kerry. I'm not sure if I'm merely cyncical here, or that's just the way things work.

Bush didn't invent this fear. It would be a despicable act to invent an enemy, but in this case the fear was palpable on 9/11, and has been to a certain degree ever since.

Kerry has tried to win the election on his record in a war 30 years ago, and when that didn't work, on Bush's record then. Bush has chosen his message, "It's the 9/11, stupid", and stuck with it. That's politics.

If I have an issue with the quote above, besides decontextualizing Heidegger, it is the notion of America "bombing Iraq" out of fear. A few weeks ago mobs in Katmandu burned down a mosque. That was "grabbing wildly at solutions". I think America took down Hussein in a sober and calculated manner. Was that the right battle at the right time in the war? I don't know, and leave that to future historians to decide. Is Bush an honorable man? I'm too cynical, to believe that of a politician.
 

I don't agree that Bush has been entirely distorting his intentions in the war. Yes, some of the sub-texts can be challenged. The evidence for a link between Bin Laden and Hussein is tenuous, at best, and they've pussy-footed around the what appears to be the main source of funding for terrorist, their Saudi pals.

Bush has however said explicitly that the war is not only about 9/11. The Axis of Evil is the notion that appears to be guiding the war. It is not about going after every evil doer, but going after America's enemies before they strike.

Before 9/11 America (or its government or Bush) did not much care what other nations said. They could rant and rave about the Great Satan all they wanted for their audiences. Now, America is going to be more proactive about those threats before its enemies crater its cities.

Will Bush and gang get that proactive policy right? The experience in Iraq indicates they will make mistakes. Is that what Americans want? Presumably the upcoming election will be an indication.

Should the election campaign address the questions you raise? Certainly. Sadly those questions are overshadowed by the current what-did-you-do-in-Vietnam silliness.
 

Was Iraq worth the trouble? I don't know today. I'm certainly glad that Hussein is gone and that Iraqis can now access the internet and print newspapers. Beyond that I feel that I'm merely an observer. I haven't donated funds to any political group pro or anti war recently, nor do I feel have any influence in current events. The current situation appears grim, but I'm willingly to reserve judgement until events have played out and the principal actors written their memoirs.

Military strategy is not my speciality (read Belmont Club for more incisive analysis), but I'm willing to take a stab at explaining my overall view. Allow me to bracket moral ideas of just wars, Kofi Annan type legalisms, neo-con plans to democratize the middle east, and examine the war pragmatically.

I'm principally hesitant to pass judgement because I don't know what the plan, if any, is. There's spectacular video of explosions from parts of Iraq, but every week the military improves their bases in the center of the Middle East. America now has Iran surrounded: Afghanistan from the east, Iraq in the west, Turkey is a NATO ally, the Persian Gulf is controlled by the US Navy, and they are now "assisting" the coast guards of Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan on the northern flank. I don't know what they are planning militarily, but they have the initiative and effectively control the chess board. We're regularly reminded that this is an assymetrical war, so I don't know how important geography will prove in the long run.

Despite the handwringing, in historical terms the cost of the war to America has been cheap to date. In three weeks it executed a stunning victory. The thousand plus casualties since are relatively cheap for a nation of the USA's size. In the same time period, approximately 75 times as many Americans have died on America's highways.

The local population has now felt what terrorism is. It's no longer something reported on the government news wherein so many Jews or westerners have been
destroyed. It's their neighborhoods and countrymen suffering the consequences of nihilistic ideology. I expect that will add a new perspective and change some attitudes through out the region.

Back to your question. Was invading Iraq the right move? It would appear so if the immediate need was to rid Iraq of dangerous weapons. The WMD story turned out to be Hussein's deception to keep his neighbors at bay, and to keep his military in line. Most Iraqi generals thought that even though Hussein didn't trust them with WMD, the other divisions had them and would use them if the they got out of line. What I don't know is if Bush and his military were motivated by a genuine fear of Hussein's WMD or whether Iraq was the next move in the war, irrespective of his actual military capability.

If Iraq was the next move in the grand strategy then additonal scrutiny of the rationale presented to different audiences (security council and so on)
is an acandemic exercise. If Hussein had convinced friend and foe (Hans Blix being the exception here) that he had the WMD, I don't know what additonal scrutiny by the Democrats would have achieved. I went to a talk by Hillary Clinton last summer and she admitted that her husband's administration was convinced
Hussein had the weapons.

So, to recap, I don't know what the grand plan for the war is, but Bush's moves to date appear to me to be driven by military calculation, rather than an irrational "grabbing wildly at solutions".
 

The Chess Match analysis is far more sophisticated than anything I would attribute to Bush and his people. But fair enough, it may be so.

The only point I would disagree with is what most people thought of Hussein's weapons program. Sometime last year, I saw an interview with a gentleman who was the UN Weapons inspector in Iraq before Hans Blix. He lead the effort back in 1998, before Hussein threw them out. The final report that resulted from his teams efforts largely confirmed that he did not have stockpiles, but retained the intellectual resources and equipment to restart one at a future date. He went on to say that the British dossier that got much attention before the invasion was largely the same as the 1998 UN report. In fact, the only difference was some testimony from expatriates like Chalabi and company. Given their dubious credibility to anyone outside of the Bush administration, the British intelligence did not ndicate an immediate threat.

So while the Chess Match theory has much to be said for it, I am not so convinced that everybody thought Hussein had stockpiles of WMD. And I certainly do not think the Chess Match would be enough to convince the American people to support a conflict. In the history of warfare, it is true a thousand lives is not very much. But when one out of every two soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan are National Guard and Army Reservists, that death toll is completely unacceptable to me. These are people who are part-time soldiers or folks that help out when a natural disaster hits. I know you indicated you are not an American, and not invested in this conflict, but certainly you could understand why some Americans do not accept the clandestine reasons for the war. If the Chess Match is one of the principal reasons for the invasion, God help us if Iran does not back down and continues to develop its nuclear capability, peaceful or otherwise.