A LIBERAL WAR

This piece by Christopher’s high Tory brother, Peter Hitchens, is illuminating for several reasons, not least of which is that it’s quite persuasive. There is an important conservative argument against this war – an argument that it is destroying the status quo, that dictators should be dealt with, not challenged, that the developing world should be written off for democracy, and so on. That’s why so many Tories opposed what they saw at the time as “Churchill’s war” in the 1930s. It’s why Patrick Buchanan is against this war. And the hard left against this war is also, strictly speaking, reactionary – they loathe the disturbing, transformative power of free trade, free markets and American military power. For my part, I think that the threat of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of terrorists make this a war that should be fought for national interests alone. That’s the conservative argument. But it is also a progressive endeavor, fueled by the American hope for progress in the Middle East and for democracy, of all things. Hitchens digs up the Tory roots of the anti-war impulse nicely. No chance it will embarrass the anti-war left, though. They seem, for the most part, unembarrassable.