The debate o­n peace or war in Iraq has generated strong anti-war sentiments, opinions and activities throughout the world.

Nevertheless, a sense of moral self-restraint, intellectual fairness and political maturity is still advisable o­n the part of some anti-war protesters in democracies like the United States, Britain and Australia.

The issue of peace or war in Iraq must be discoursed and decided o­n its own merit as o­ne concerning the human quest for the fine balance between justice and security, and between freedom and order.

Most of the theoretical and responsibility-free 'yes-but' ("Saddam is absolutely terrible but...") arguments, however, effectively advocate doing nothing in the face of Saddam's atrocities and crimes against humanity.

Seen in this light, Manjit Bhatia's article, Rebuttal to pro-war hubris, must be read positively as commendable and sincere peace-making sentiments, despite his rhetorical, populist and emotional tones.

There are some positive breakthroughs in the mode of reasoning that have served to narrow the range of genuine differences in the debates, although some 'yes-but' remnants can still be found.

Manjit is certainly not an apologist or defender of the Saddam Hussein regime. Far from it, he, like me, publicly acknowledges and detests in no uncertain terms, the atrocities and crimes committed against humanity of the regime in Baghdad.

He even goes further in implicitly suggesting some practical and war-like solutions to bring Saddam and his henchmen to justice and to end the suffering of the Iraqi people, short of a conventional and total war in the form of massive invasion and comprehensive occupation.

By implication, he seems to have agreed with me, in substance, that humanitarian intervention in cases like Iraq under the Saddam regime is allowable and desirable, although he prefers it to be achieved with the form of special operations, which would call into the service of, among others, snipers.

Sniper solution

(For the elaboration of the technical and operational forms of warfare, or "war-forms", see Alvin and Heidi Tofflers, War and anti-war - survival at the dawn of the 21st century, London, Little, Brown & Company, 1993.)

I do not disagree with him o­n this thought-provoking point.

As British political philosopher, Edmund Burke said: All that bad men need to triumph is for the good o­nes to do nothing.

However, assuming that the war-like special operation has been conducted, whether successfully or unsuccessfully, Manjit must stand firmly o­n my side of the divide to defend the almost certain charges that the 'state sovereignty', 'territorial integrity' or 'political independence' of Iraq has been violated by foreign powers.

He must also help me, if the occasion arises, to answer the obstructionist question of why o­nly the special operations unit of the US, Britain or Australia and not South Africa, China, France or Malaysia, is appointed to do the job which Manjit has implicitly suggested.

Otherwise, the reasoning mode becomes static and cyclical again, if not obstructionist. And no dynamic and forward progress could be made to find a timely, practical, actionable and operational solution to end the servitude and oppression under the Saddam regime in Iraq.

But still, to Manjit, the 'sniper solution' is "too nice an end" for Saddam and his henchmen.

According to him, "we want Saddam and members of his regime caught alive and brought before the International Criminal Court where they must be tried for war crimes and crimes against humanity".

But who are the "we"?

Again, for the Anglo-American, pro-Anglo-American Arabic and European foreign forces to go into Iraq's territory to arrest Saddam and his henchmen is not o­nly a technical violation of Iraq's ' sovereignty' and 'territorial integrity', but could be charged as 'imperialistic' by many anti-imperialists unless the forces are constituted solely by countries like South Africa, Indonesia, Malaysia or other non-Western countries.

But would these more 'politically correct' countries in the South, Third and Islamic worlds be willing to provide the required forces to do the job?

Are the armed forces of these countries technically and operationally more superior than the Iraqi armed forces?

Peaceful surrender

If not, o­n what grounds must we expect Saddam and his henchmen to be "caught alive" unless we make the fanciful assumption that Saddam & co (thousands of them!) are ready to surrender voluntarily and peacefully at the nearest police stations o­n the borders o­n Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Jordan or Turkey, or the UN office in Baghdad.

Quite the opposite has happened as there are historical records that show that the Saddam regime continuing to attempt rebuilding its armed forces and developing chemical and biological agents for possible weaponisation up to, at least, 1995.

The last report of the UN arms inspectors has also found that there are still weapons of mass destruction that are "unaccounted for" in the year 2003.

Also, to date, no indication whatsoever has surfaced to show that Saddam and his regime are ready and willing to give up their power without a fight.

In fact, there are credible reports that the Saddam regime has been exploiting Western news reports of the widespread anti-war protests in the West and other parts of the world to strengthen the will to fight among its troops and other armed Iraqis civilians.

"President Saddam Hussein's government, apparently emboldened by anti-war sentiments at the UN Security Council and in worldwide street protests, has not followed through o­n its promises of increased co-operation with UN arms inspectors," said a recent Washington Post report.

The report also quoted the regime-controlled newspapers in Iraq as attributing the anti-war sentiments and protests across the world to the "successes" of the "wise leadership and strategic vision" of the regime.

Anti-war protests in the West and other parts of the world may have been exploited as pro-war motivational propaganda inside Iraq where the mass media is strictly regime-controlled.

Meanwhile, the mass protests, have obviously slowed down the "rush to war" o­n the part of the nemeses of the Saddam regime because democratic governments have to listen, to a degree, to public opinion.

Inside Iraq, there is o­nly o­ne opinion o­n the question of peace and war.

Good intentions exploited

To state this is not to accuse all anti-war protesters of being intentional partisans of the conscious strategy of Saddam's war propaganda, or to call for the suppression of press freedom.

It merely suggests that noble intentions of good men and women could be unwittingly exploited by bad guys for propagandistic effects.

In classical political science as well as practical politics, there are vast gaps not o­nly between appearance and reality, and between form and substance but also between intention and effect (of any actions).

Given these contextual realities and possibilities, the meaning of what I term "unilateral peace" is rather clear: The armed defenders of peace cannot and must not unilaterally lay down their arms unless and until it can be ascertained absolutely that the armed aggressors have given up their aggressive intention or ambition and capabilities.

As to the philosophical question of whether a moral case for war could co-exist with realism, it needs more time and space to explore in the dialectical traditions of, among other, Sun Tzu, Thomas Aquinas and Hugo Grotius.

Meanwhile, public protests should perhaps be organised now all over the world to pressure the Saddam regime to account for its many atrocities, massive violation of human rights and crimes against humanity, and to restore a balanced sense of right and wrong.

JAMES WONG WING o­n is chief analyst of Strategic Analysis Malaysia (SAM). Wong is a former member of parliament (1990-1995) and a former columnist for the Sin Chew Jit Poh Chinese daily (now Sin Chew Daily). He read political science and economics at the Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. While in Sin Chew, he and a team of journalists won the top awards of Malaysian Press Institute (MPI) for 1998 and 1999.