do politicans spark wars abroad to keep positions at home?--international relations

DO POLITICIANS SPARK WARS ABROAD TO KEEP POSITIONS AT HOME?1

Do Politicians Spark Wars Abroad to Keep Positions at Home?

Abbey Ellis

The University of Northern Iowa


As citizens in countries such as The United States of America, we all have the opportu-

nity to vote on representatives. The purpose of electing these representatives is to have someone

to represent your voice, your thoughts, and your opinions when creating laws and regulations

within society. The job of these representatives is to become honest politicians and make deci-

sions on bills that best represent their district or country’s ideals. But what if these politicians that

citizens put so much trust into, used that trust against them? Some politicians are willing to do

anything and everything to keep the positions they have, even if that means sparking wars abroad

to keep their positions at home.

Politicians in today’s society are crossing an ethical boundary, and they are doing any-

thing in their power to convince their country to go to war in another country in order for them to

keep power at their home country. The first reason that a politician sparks a war is because coun-

tries rarely change leadership in the time of war. This idea is adequately conveyed in the Peace

and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, when they stated, “Put simply, violent groups may

teach that nonviolent tactics don’t work, and that violent tactics benefit the group”. Because

politicians want to stay in power, they convince their country of a threat that can only be met by

violence. They claim that this threat can only be handled by using elements of force and there is

no other way around it. This idea is something that spreads easily within a country or group

when circulated by a leader that the country believes to be trusting and honest. Politicians use

this ideal to push the country into going into war because the citizens believe that there is no

other beneficial option, that it is their only choice. A great example of a leader who uses this

concept is the Chinese political leader, Chairman Mao, when he stated, “Political power grows

out of the barrel of a gun” (Louis, 2014). There is also examples that lie closer home that come

into play. Even leaders in The United States have used this concept to keep power.


At first people believe that it is not possible to see if a leader is using their country to stay

in power, but if you look closely at the decisions they have made with the information they had

and analysis the decision they made, it becomes clear if they started a war abroad to keep their

power at home. This example is in The United States, but the same general concepts would apply

within other countries and to other leaders.

On September 11, 2001 the United States was attacked by terrorists who hijacked several

commercial planes and crashed them into the two world trade centers in New York City and the

Pentagon. This attack killed around three thousand innocent civilians, but more importantly it

sparked fear within the country as a whole. This fear that was invoked within the country had

never been felt before. The United States had only been attacked once before and that was not in

the continental United States, it was in Hawaii. After this attack, it caused the country to greatly

fear terrorism and caused citizens to turn to their leaders in their respected states and President

Bush. Because so many people turned to the President and trust his decisions to lead the country,

this horrific event caused the presidential approval to skyrocket to levels never seen before. It

was as high as ninety percent approval rating which helped make the President and Congress one

of the most influential parings up to date. The reason Congress was so productive is because they

wanted to represent the citizens correctly, and with such a high presidential approval rating they

didn’t want to risk getting in the way of the President’s agenda and going against his plans for the

country. This concept is eloquently explained in 9/11 and Presidential Support in the 107th Con-

gress, when it states, “International crises create position-taking opportunities for members of

Congress. And positions taken during international crises can, in turn, create future credit-claim-

ing opportunities.”(Rocca, 2009) There were a lot of changes that needed to be made to the

country and the Bush Administration did so quickly. For example, they made stricter TSA re-


quirements when flying and also created homeland security. Because of the power given to the

President by Congress, later in his term President Bush believed that Iraq had acquired weapons

of mass destruction. This was a particularly complicated issue. First of all, they did not have an

extensive amount of information, but the threat, if true could end world peace because of how

powerful nuclear missiles can be. Bush also had let time pass after he received this information

and he did not act on this information until his approval rating started to fall and was closer to

the levels of approval rating that most presidents have at that point in his presidency. He used his

authority as commander and chief to ask congress to take troops over to Iraq and “investigate” to

see if the intelligence they received was correct. The president did have the authority to make

this command on his own, but once again because it was election season, he decided to let Con-

gress help make this particular decision. Iraq had nothing to do with the attack that occurred on

September 11, but because Congress had signed a law giving the President the ability to send

troops anywhere for 30 days before asking congress for permission it had a direct correlation.

(Rocca, 2009)

The motivation and timing become questionable in regards to the President and Congress.

The President’s powers include, according to The Power to Threaten War, “beyond the Presi-

dent’s wide latitude to use military force abroad, he can take threatening steps that could provoke

or prevent war and even alter unilaterally the national interests at stake in a crisis by placing

U.S.” (2014). These powers gave President Bush the power to send troops abroad but asked for

Congress’s approval because it was so close to election season. President Bush decided to ask so

late in his term if he could send troops over seas on such little information given to him, makes

his motives also questionable. Then, to give Congress this information and to ask for congress’

permission right before his election and the many elections for congress members. Because they


sent the troops right before the election it could easily be debated that they did this action to help

secure their next term. Not only did the country rally around him after 9/11, they would do the

same thing after sending the troops over seas which ensured his second term as President of the

United States.

There are a few arguments against this idea. First of all, if it was true that they had

weapons of mass distractions they could seriously harm the world by thinking irrationally and

using these weapons. This thought alone is why the Bush Administration asked to send troops

over and why Congress agreed that something needed to be done and sent the troops. They did

not want to take that particular risk and if they could stop it, they wanted to do everything within

their power to do so. The problem with this argument is that there was not an abundance of infor-

mation that Iraq had proving they had weapons of mass destruction. Also, Iraq had stated several

times that they did not or were not trying to create any weapons of mass destruction. They were

using extremely limited information when they made this decision. Also, Congress and the Bush

Administration knew that when they invaded Iraq, the government system had a definite possi-

bility of collapsing. If this happened while the United States troops were on the ground then the

United States would have a “pottery barn” effect on our hand, which means that if you break

something, as in the Iraq government, you buy it, as in you have to fix the country’s government

system. So the United States had to essentially reestablish their government system. What made

all of this worse is that the thousands of soldiers that they sent over seas never found any

weapons of mass destruction. Iraq was telling the truth the entire time , which meant that we

spent millions of dollars invading a country to find out that they were telling the truth the entire

time, destroyed their government system, and wasted valuable resources, money, soldiers and

time.(Bush, 2014)


Another issue is that as the United States turns to post-modernism, they focus on, “chang-

ing the ruling of orthodoxies and influenced each academic field by approving the new post-

modern perspectives and attitudes” (Mikail, 2012). The United States believed that as technol-

ogy improves so does society, but when you compare that thought process to areas such as Iraq,

they do not believe in post modernism. They prefer to live how they believe things should be,

without any change. Neither answer is wrong or right. But where a country chooses to lead itself

should not be the only reason one chooses to go to war. The United States started a war with

someone partial because they did not agree with a non-western culture, and an honest democracy

system. Non of these reasons are adequate to start a war within another country to keep your cur-

rent position.

There is a simple solution to the problem the world faces with politicians starting wars

abroad to keep their positions at home. We can prevent this concept from occurring in the future

by standing up to these particular politicians and calling them out for what they are doing. Citi-

zens can do this in countries like the United States by using their freedom of speech by protest-

ing. This would not only let the politicians know that the citizens know what they are doing but

also make others aware of this issue. By making more citizens aware that this does occur within

their own society, a country has the ability to confront the problem head on. If nobody stands up

for this issue, politicians will continually get away with this concept. Also, if honest govern-

ments find out that corrupt politicians are using this concept within a country, they could try to

step in and let the citizens of the country know by telling a media center such as a newspaper or

television station. There is many ways that citizens and countries can stand up to these corrupt

politicians.


In many countries, like The United States of America, citizens have the opportunity to

vote for the representatives of their districts and for the country. People put all of their trust into

the government and, in turn, that gives them the right to vote for true and fair representatives.

Sometimes the representatives decide to go against ethics and what’s right. In this case, citizens

need to stand up for themselves as individuals and as a country and demand that the politicians

adequately represent the public’s thoughts and opinions, even if that means that they are no

longer representing the country. If representatives go as far as starting wars abroad in order to

ensure their positions at home we need to let them know that we as a country will not stand for it.

For these representatives citizens need to put an end to their horrible desperation to stay within

office. People need to stand up for what is right for them as citizens and what is right for the

country. Even though some politicians are will to do anything and everything to stay within

power, there are some that are there to be honest and to represent the country by what is best for

society. The job as citizens is to find these people in their own respected countries and have hon-

est representatives and politicians and support them, and try and make the most successful and

honest countries possible.

Bibliography

Louis, W. R. (2014). Peace and conflict as group norms. Peace And Conflict: Journal Of

Peace Psychology, 20(2), 180-186. doi:10.1037/pac0000018


Mikail, E. H. (2012). THE THEORY OF POSTMODERNISM AS A CONTEMPORARY

INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS THEORY. International Journal Of Aca-

demic Research, 4(6), 79-82. doi:10.7813/2075-4124.2012/4-6/B.13

Rocca, M. S. (2009). 9/11 and Presidential Support in the 107th Congress. Congress &

The Presidency, 36(3), 272. doi:10.1080/07343460903206305WAXMAN,

M. C.

Bush, George W(alker). (2014). Funk & Wagnalls New World Encyclopedia, 1p. 1

(2014). The Power to Threaten War. The Yale Law Journal, 1231626.

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