The United States has declared war on Iraq.” How long will it be before we hear this?

A church in Ames where I semi-regularly attend services sends out a weekly e-mail to many of the students in the congregation and this week’s version ended with something to this effect: “In the event of a war starting with Iraq, there will be a 5:30 p.m. prayer service for peace on the first day. If the fighting with Iraq starts after 5:30 p.m., a prayer service for peace will be held the following day at 5:30 a.m.” Quite an ominous ending to an otherwise upbeat e-mail. I certainly don’t see it as a positive sign when the church, an institution that theoretically is very pro-peace and anti-violence, is anticipating American involvement in any type of war.

But is this type of attitude warranted? Technically, as I understand it, if Saddam Hussein and the country of Iraq comply with U.N. arms inspections, our gracious country will not attack them and bomb their cities to dust. Oh yeah, and the inspectors also have to find that Iraq isn’t stockpiling chemical and/or biological weapons. But as long as they’re not, then the United States and Iraq are still “cool.” So, the way we should view this situation is that there is an amazingly, massively unlikely, minuscule chance that we will engage in war against Iraq.

And, man, I firmly believe that statement.

Honestly, how many Americans really think there’s even the possibility of avoiding war, short of some type of political coup in Iraq or a tragic accident involving Saddam and a bus? Now there’s a poll I wouldn’t mind seeing. Not another poll on how many foreigners kind of like the United States but at the same time think we are amazingly dishonest, selfish and simply making yet another play for increased world power; but a poll on how many Americans don’t believe our involvement in Iraq has any possible conclusion other than combat. The bottom line is when our country’s leaders want a war, they can get a war.

We know it’s only a matter of time before the United States starts adding more outrageous demands on Iraq, giving Hussein the old “comply-or-else” ultimatum that we are all too familiar with. That’s always a good way to provide “justification” for attack. First, it will be arms inspections and the like. Next, we’ll demand that Iraq stop charging us for oil. Or perhaps we’ll order a nationwide curfew and if even one rebellious Iraqi teenager stays out too late with his girlfriend, the whole country’s toast.

Or we’ll try to make Hussein read a public statement prepared by the U.S. government where he denounces himself as “the worst world leader ever, even worse than Adolf Hitler because at least he didn’t have the audacity to try and control the oil located in his own country” and praises the United States for our “non-corrupting media, amazing democratic ideals, staunch morals, and clear cable television.” The U.S. leaders can just keep making these up until they hit the one that crosses the line with Iraq.

Or they can take these inspections to the absolute extreme. “It says here that in 1996, we counted 12 spoons and 6 forks in this drawer. Now, there are only 8 spoons and 5 forks. Where is the other silverware? Have you utilized them in some type of super-bomb that could possibly destroy all of the United States? Have you sold them to a terrorist cell to be used against America? God help us if you did!” Again, we can be as specific as we need to be to have charges against Iraq for not complying somehow. So if Bush in his war address gives “previously charted weapon material that is currently unaccounted for” as one of the reasons for bombing Saddam, it probably involves silverware.

The reality is that we will go to war with Iraq. And it won’t be the “bloodless battle” that I am hearing about. Anyone who believes that American forces can waltz into Iraq and, through one means or another, remove Hussein from power with few casualties is mistaken. I know we have all this technology and some amazingly well-trained killing machines, uh, soldiers. Nor are they going to just give Saddam to us. There will be resistance.

Of course, in the proud American way, we will crush this resistance mercilessly by bombing the nation to rubble.

And the real question is whether the Iraqis like America any more than Saddam because we seem to forget about the way much of the world views us, as evidenced in the aforementioned poll. And when people talk of the few casualties, they are always referring to the number of Americans who could possibly lose their lives. What about the Iraqis or, as we like to so eloquently refer to them, the collateral damage?

How many innocent people will again lose their lives because one of our missiles is a couple of miles off or our intelligence is not entirely up to speed? There are never any bloodless wars, certainly not even with the United States and all its “amazing” technology.

But what are the chances we’ll even go to war?

Dustin Kass

is a junior in journalism

and mass communication from Dubuque.