When we associate a year with a nation, the people of that nation have usually had little to celebrate. Think only of Hungary 1956, Cambodia 1975 and Rwanda 1994. This has been the year of Iraq. Faithfulness to the people of Iraq urges us to look back on the war and its aftermath and come to some judgment.
Controversy continues about whether the war was morally justified. The debate is politically important in the United States and in Europe because it affects the future shape of international relations. It has understandably been marginal in Australia. For it is now clear that Australia assisted the invasion of Iraq only because the United States asked us to. Moral considerations were irrelevant in Australian participation in the invasion of Iraq, and they have been irrelevant in Australia’s withdrawing support from its rebuilding.
The continuing debate about the morality of the war can be summarised under the familiar criteria of just war theory, according to which a war can be just only if it is fought for a just cause, if it is waged with legitimate authority, if that cause cannot be achieved by other means, if the harm caused by war is not
disproportionate to the good achieved, and if the war will achieve its goals.
It’s clear that the real cause of the war was the opportunity offered by concern about terrorism to remove a relatively weak and absolutely odious ruler, in the hope of giving a new political shape to the Middle East. Arguments about weapons of mass destruction were shaped for persuasion and not to reflect reality. Protagonists of the war have consequently based their moral argument on the right to overthrow a murderous regime. The case for waging an aggressive war to overthrow a savage tyrant is arguable, but is morally plausible only if the other criteria of a justifiable war are strictly met.
The legitimacy of the war remains the most contentious area of debate, because it affects the legitimacy of the United States occupation. Most nations have taken the view, strongly represented by church teaching, that to be legitimate, any aggressive military action must be undertaken under the auspices of the international community. The invasion of Iraq failed this test, and was accompanied by the alarming doctrine that the United States may intervene militarily whenever its interests are at stake. This doctrine is morally indefensible, and it has poisoned attempts to