Antiwar demonstrations

The fact that millions of people worldwide took to the streets to voice their opposition against war on Iraq not only provided the Baghdad regime with a much needed shot in the arm but also raised a number of disturbing questions.

To start with, erstwhile objectives for armed intervention, such as disarmament or ridding a long suffering and oppressed population of a tyrannical and inhuman dictatorship, seem to have been drowned out by an overwhelming outpouring of public antiwar sentiments.

Antiwar protesters also seem to have forgotten that in the 1980s, Iraq had started war on Iran at a cost of well over half a million dead followed by its ill-fated invasion of Kuwait. Likewise, street demonstrations hardly caused any traffic jams when untold thousands of Iraqi Kurds, Shiites and other dissidents were gassed, tortured, imprisoned or executed during Saddam Hussein's two-decade-long brutal dictatorship.

While public opinion cannot be ignored, it is truly ironic and sad that these very same antiwar protesters were nowhere to be seen when other unspeakable horrors were and continue to be inflicted on tens of millions of innocents in Africa and elsewhere in the world.

From an international and political point of view, the question remains whether each state's sovereignty should at all costs remain inviolate or whether outside intervention against failed states or rogue regimes could be sanctioned. In the case of Iraq, the removal of the Saddam Hussein regime rather than the destruction of its dubious offensive weapons arsenal has always been the overriding objective of the U.S.-led coalition.

It should also be noted that in the absence of a credible threat supported by a convincing military build-up, Saddam Hussein would never have allowed the UN arms inspection teams to return or to cooperate to an unprecedented extent as is the case now.

Major public relations blunders and notorious political insensitivities committed by the Bush government are largely responsible for worldwide antiwar sentiments and deepening rifts among NATO member countries.

As the world's second largest custodian of proven oil reserves, Iraq's fate and political future should be everybody's concern and not that of the U.S. alone. With Saddam Hussein remaining in power and in spite of worldwide opposition, war against Iraq would seem inevitable.

All things considered and whether we like it or not, armed outside intervention and the removal of Saddam Hussein may yet turn out to be the lesser evil in an otherwise intolerable situation.

JOSEPH LOUIS SPARTZ, Jakarta