Mr. Speaker, I have considerable respect for this member, although I am afraid I disagree strongly with him in some facts. In particular, I would draw his attention to some factual problems in his speech.
First, he suggested that somehow our western allies were being inconsistent by not seeking a military solution to the problem of North Korea's proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Does the member not understand that North Korea is precisely an object lesson in the need to prevent rogue states and dangerous dictators from obtaining these weapons in the first place because once obtained they can hold us hostage and we cannot then respond?
The member suggested that dictators can be removed without the use of war. He cited two examples speciously: Idi Amen who was in fact removed from power, not peacefully by his people, but by a military intervention of the state of Tanzania without UN sanction. Mobutu was removed by a civil war, not by normal, peaceful, democratic means.
Perhaps he could point us to the case of one dictator of that nature who has been removed without resorting to the use of force.
Finally, the member said that Baghdad was being destroyed. Perhaps he could at least give some credit to our allies that are using greater discretion and care in the application of military force to avoid civilian casualties than likely at any other point in the history of warfare. The Iraqis themselves, that propagandistic fascist regime, claims that there have only been 3 civilian deaths in Baghdad and some 250 civilian casualties when there has been a tonnage of bombs dropped there with precision on government installations greater than all of those dropped in Dresden during the second world war which resulted in 150,000 deaths.
Therefore would the member please consider the facts rather than engage in hyperbolic rhetoric which I do not think serves the debate very well?