Faculty panel split on Iraq war issue

www.printz.usm.edu By  Whitney Dennis Staff Writer

Community members, USM students, faculty and staff crowded a Joseph Greene Hall auditorium  to voice opinions on  the possible war with Iraq.

 The USM Department of History sponsored its second public forum on the issue,  which featured six panelists from the USM faculty.

One panelist, Paula Smithka, assistant professor of philosophy and religion, discussed Christian ideas of just warfare and questioned the ability of the U.S. to justify war with Iraq. Smithka said that the U.N. charter of 1945 says the only justifiable war is self-defense.

Smithka challenged the motive behind the pending war. "Our president and vice-president are both oil people," Smithka said.     Frank Glamser, professor of sociology, said that oil would not be the reason for war with Iraq.

"It is not blood for oil," Glamser said. He said the U.S. could get oil from Venezuela if the need for oil were the problem.

Glamser said Saddam Hussein is responsible for the rapes and murders of thousands of civilians, citing a need for a regime change. Hussein has also used poison gas on 5,000 in northern Iraq and set fire to 700 oil wells, Glamser said.

Dia Ali, a USM computer science professor said, "There is a lot of reason to go to war everywhere." Ali, who received a phone call from the USM Department of Human Resources confirming his U.S. citizenship recently, said, "Saddam Hussein does not care about anybody."

Elizabeth Drummond, USM history professor, explained European reactions to the President Bush's policy toward Iraq. She said European countries have been some of the closest allies to the U.S. in the fight against terrorism. France and Germany, however, support weapons inspections before declaring war on Iraq, Drummond said.

 Joseph Parker, USM political science professor, said Bush wants to show other Middle Eastern countries how to build democracies. War would be the easiest part of this process, Parker said. "The talk now is of a decade, at least, of American involvement." Projected costs for involvement in Iraq reach as high as $2 trillion, Parker said.

War in Iraq would result in anywhere from 48,000 to 200,000 deaths, many of which would be civilian deaths, Parker said. War in Iraq would also result in the destruction of transportation, electric grids and food and water supplies. The U.S. would have to feed 60 percent of Iraqis. While civilian opinion on the conflict with Iraq is split, civilians control the actions of the military, Lt. Col. Kevin Dougherty said.  "One of the founding principles of our country is civilian control of the military," Dougherty, professor of military science and chair of the department of military science, said.

One member of the audience voiced ambivalent opinions about the war. Bon Suarez, a 2002 graduate of USM and a lance corporal in the United States Marine Corps, said, "The last thing we want is war." Suarez, however,  said American civilians do not know results of biological weapons and other atrocities servicemen have seen.