Why War May Be Necessary

Indeed, what is fascinating, is the disarmament of all nuclear weapons would more likely increase than reduce the risk of war. This is due to the principle of ‘mutually assured destruction’, in which the threat of a nuclear war deters any military activity. It is apparent that not only is the ‘removal’ of all military presence impractical, but also counter-productive to the attempt at preventing war.

It is also a common argument that we should not interfere with the politics of other countries, as this compromises democracy. But what should be done when the extreme politics of other countries presents a risk of compromising our democracy? Hitler’s ever increasing influence in Western Europe could have been immediately halted if Britain and France had taken a firmer approach, and not followed the spineless policy of appeasement. Not only did they allow him to unite Germany with Austria, but they also allowed him to conquer Czechoslovakia, even allowing Italy to invade Abyssinia, a defenceless African country (which should have been under protection of the League of Nations) and Japan to invade the Chinese province of Manchuria. It is clearly the case that it is our responsibility to take action, and stand against corrupt, power-hungry governments, and the only feasible way of doing this appears to be via military retribution. Trade sanctions have never significantly caused enough threat to a country’s wellbeing that they have been forced to fulfil demands. Mugabe rests easy, claiming that “God chose me to rule Zimbabwe, and only God can remove me”. And its true. The EU has done nothing to depose the hated dictator, and likely never will.

Yet it is also important to remember that military action must only be taken for good reason. The invasion of Iraq, ordered by the American leader well-known for being the son of an oil baron, is a highly controversial subject. The war on Iraq was declared even though little, if no evidence was found for an Iraqi nuclear missile scheme, and America then took extensive control of oil exports from Iraq as compensation for ‘liberating’ the country. It is interesting to note that all of the countries labelled as the most significant ‘threats to peace’ under George W Bush were oil-producing countries who had recently introduced caps on oil trade to America.