Matania Ginosar was a member of the Stern Gang, the band of freedom fighters that helped establish Israel. (And he's likely to give you a succinct distinction between terrorist and freedom fighter if you ask.) In describing his support of a war on Iraq, he wrote to me that, "unlike most people that oppose war i spent ten years full time with only 10% of my previous income, to fight against wars. I lost three quarter of a million dollar in income to do that. so my hate of war is not small." I still disagree with him, but it's worth clicking on "read more" to get his view... An Iraqi War?

War is hell, I hate it, it is horrible, and I worked many years against it. Most of us can not grasp the extent of the death and suffering caused by wars; most of us are lucky to have been spared that experience. But all over the world, right now, innocent people are continuously suffering the ravage of war. Therefore, when people are eager to go to war they don't know what they are taking about.

But do we have any alternatives in Iraq? Is it a black and white situation? Unfortunately not. We have to select between two bad choices, not between good and bad ones. Saddam will do his outmost to fight us on his soil, and terrorize any one who he considers his enemies, the US, Canada, Australia, our supporters in the Middle East, from Turkey to Kuwait, and Israel.

There is no question in my mind, and of people who followed Saddam for the last twenty-five years, that he has weapons of mass destruction. Iraq started developing its nuclear program a quarter of a century ago, with the help of the French, and approval of the French government. If Israel did not destroy the Iraqi nuclear facility in 1981 the world would have been a much darker place after 1990.

Iraq is twice the size of England! And even if Saddam had used only one tenth of the land of Iraq to hide his weapons of mass destruction, it would be impossible to find any weapon he wants to hide. We can increase the number of inspectors a hundred times, they would not be able to find most if not all his specialized weapons.
He is extremely cunning, he has dictatorial control over his people. [Excluding the north and some of the south of Iraq]. He has very capable people working for him. Any one in Iraq disobeying Saddam will face immediate death, and that of all his family. He murdered one million people already in the Iraqi-Iranian war he initiated in the early 1980's. He also murdered some personally, and directed the killing of his two sons-in-law. He does not care about human lives, not even his own people. He is ruthless. And is megalomaniac, he believes that he is the salvation of Iraq and the Arab world.

Some say wait, he will die one day. His sons are his confidants and have been trained by him.

We have very few alternatives and they all have powerful negative aspects.

If we let him continue in power he will increase his capacity to deliver massive amounts of chemical and biological weapons at longer distances. And he will finish the development or acquisition of nuclear weapons. He does not have to develop any, some nuclear warheads and enriched nuclear material from the former USSR are unaccounted for.

Yes, a war now is likely to cause many innocent casualties, like any war. Waiting is absurd, the risk would multiply. No one can find most, or all of his dangerous weapons.

Should we wait for France and Germany, or others, to agree with us? Only if it does not affect our war effort. Germany is no friend of ours. We defeated them 57 years ago and we erroneously wish they would think of us as friends. We and the Russians, mainly, shattered their national pride, their dreams, destroyed their landscape.

France has been anti American for decades. They dislike us, in part, because their cultural dominance and national glory disappeared with the rise of the English culture. They see their influence declining because of our dominance.

Do we have any choice but stopping Saddam as soon as possible?

I wish there was a better choice then war, but I do not believe there is in this case.