Freedom & Progress

William J. Stuntz has published a brilliant and persuasive article in the latest New Republic. Stuntz compares our present War in Iraq to our own American Civil War. Like the War in Iraq, the American Civil War began with a "purpose" that evolved throughout the years of struggle to a newer (as well as better and nobler) "purpose". From a war to prevent Southern secession, the American Civil War became a war to end the institution of slavery and allow a free democratic nation elevate to an even higher moral existence. Stuntz surmises that the North may not have gone into a war to free black slaves. But the idea that the loss of hundreds of thousands of American boys and men was suffered to protect geographic boundaries would be unacceptable to the next generation looking back. Only the noble cause of freedom would be worth such loss.

In Iraq, many critics complain how the War's original "purpose" (to prevent Iraq from acquiring weapons of mass destruction) has been abandoned for the freedom and democratization of the Iraqi nation. Indeed, Americans may not have been as willing to send their sons and daughters and husbands and wives and risk their sacrifice for the freedom of others (particularly Arab ones). However, future generations looking back will judge whether the loss sustained by the United States would have been worth the War's original purpose (removing weapons that may not have existed) or the purpose it has evolved into: bringing forth freedom and democracy to a land that has never known such concepts.

Should the United States persevere and (together with a new and free Iraqi force) reach victory against the enemy, and achieve this evolved "purpose", the entire community of nations will enjoy a "new birth of freedom". And our nation will have gained an improved measure of freedom and progress.