Liberty Minute August 12 2014

The bombing campaign against the terrorist group calling itself the Islamic State has inaugurated what will likely become the third Iraq war. The first was waged to compel Saddam Hussein?s regime to withdraw its troops from Kuwait, following an invasion that had the oblique approval of the first Bush administration. Recall that presidential envoy April Glaspie pointedly demurred when asked by Hussein about U.S. objections to a prospective Iraqi military move against Kuwait.

The second Iraq war resulted in the removal of Saddam, who had originally been installed in Baghdad with Washington?s aid and who received military and financial support during the 1980s. Saddam was replaced by a Shi?ite government that persecuted the country?s Sunni minority, precipitating a backlash that has facilitated the growth of the movement calling itself the Islamic State.

That movement coalesced out of radical elements of what is commonly called al-Qaeda. This includes factions that have received direct U.S. aid in Libya, Syria, and elsewhere. Now Barack Obama ? acting, as usual, without congressional authorization ? has ordered a bombing campaign in what he says may be a very long conflict.

Rather than heeding the Founding Fathers? warnings against going abroad in search of monsters to destroy, our present rulers insist on building the monsters.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.