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October 2,
2002
Good afternoon. Let me begin by saying that although
this has been billed as an anti-war rally, I stand before you as
someone who is not opposed to war in all circumstances. The Civil
War was one of the bloodiest in history, and yet it was only
through the crucible of the sword, the sacrifice of multitudes,
that we could begin to perfect this union, and drive the scourge
of slavery from our soil. I don't oppose all wars.
My
grandfather signed up for a war the day after Pearl Harbor was
bombed, fought in Patton's army. He saw the dead and dying across
the fields of Europe; he heard the stories of fellow troops who
first entered Auschwitz and Treblinka. He fought in the name of a
larger freedom, part of that arsenal of democracy that triumphed
over evil, and he did not fight in vain. I don't oppose all
wars.
After September 11th, after witnessing the carnage
and destruction, the dust and the tears, I supported this
administration's pledge to hunt down and root out those who would
slaughter innocents in the name of intolerance, and I would
willingly take up arms myself to prevent such tragedy from
happening again. I don't oppose all wars. And I know that in this
crowd today, there is no shortage of patriots, or of
patriotism.
What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am
opposed to is a rash war. What I am opposed to is the cynical
attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz and other armchair,
weekend warriors in this administration to shove their own
ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in
lives lost and in hardships borne.
What I am opposed to is
the attempt by political hacks like Karl Rove to distract us from
a rise in the uninsured, a rise in the poverty rate, a drop in the
median income - to distract us from corporate scandals and a stock
market that has just gone through the worst month since the Great
Depression. That's what I'm opposed to. A dumb war. A rash war. A
war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on
politics. Now let me be clear - I suffer no illusions about Saddam
Hussein. He is a brutal man. A ruthless man. A man who butchers
his own people to secure his own power. He has repeatedly defied
UN resolutions, thwarted UN inspection teams, developed chemical
and biological weapons, and coveted nuclear capacity. He's a bad
guy. The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without
him.
But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and
direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the
Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction
of its former strength, and that in concert with the international
community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty
dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history. I know that
even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of
undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined
consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear
rationale and without strong international support will only fan
the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather
than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the
recruitment arm of Al Qaeda. I am not opposed to all wars. I'm
opposed to dumb wars.
So for those of us who seek a more
just and secure world for our children, let us send a clear
message to the President today. You want a fight, President Bush?
Let's finish the fight with Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, through
effective, coordinated intelligence, and a shutting down of the
financial networks that support terrorism, and a homeland security
program that involves more than color-coded warnings. You want a
fight, President Bush?
Let's fight to make sure that the
UN inspectors can do their work, and that we vigorously enforce a
non-proliferation treaty, and that former enemies and current
allies like Russia safeguard and ultimately eliminate their stores
of nuclear material, and that nations like Pakistan and India
never use the terrible weapons already in their possession, and
that the arms merchants in our own country stop feeding the
countless wars that rage across the globe. You want a fight,
President Bush?
Let's fight to make sure our so-called
allies in the Middle East, the Saudis and the Egyptians, stop
oppressing their own people, and suppressing dissent, and
tolerating corruption and inequality, and mismanaging their
economies so that their youth grow up without education, without
prospects, without hope, the ready recruits of terrorist cells.
You want a fight, President Bush? Let's fight to wean ourselves
off Middle East oil, through an energy policy that doesn't simply
serve the interests of Exxon and Mobil. Those are the battles that
we need to fight. Those are the battles that we willingly join.
The battles against ignorance and intolerance. Corruption and
greed. Poverty and despair.
The consequences of war are
dire, the sacrifices immeasurable. We may have occasion in our
lifetime to once again rise up in defense of our freedom, and pay
the wages of war. But we ought not -- we will not -- travel down
that hellish path blindly. Nor should we allow those who would
march off and pay the ultimate sacrifice, who would prove the full
measure of devotion with their blood, to make such an awful
sacrifice in vain.
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