These are the questions people ask me when I express my belief that war in Iraq is not only justified, but necessary. Let's get the disclaimers out of the way. Yes, I believe peace is a superior state to war. No, I don't think of all Arabs as "rag heads" who need to be eliminated. Yes, I have relatives in the military that are facing very real danger in the Middle East. And I consider myself a liberal-leaning moderate.

Let's look at why war. Surely, one ponders, if war is always an atrocity -- and it can certainly always be seen as such -- then why do we do it? One might as well ask why human history seems to be shaped by war, and human civilization shaped by a desire for peace. We go to war, each time we do so, so that we do not have to go to war again. Each war, not just the war nicknamed as such, is the war to end all wars. Human nature, not remaining static, leads us back to war. We hate ourselves for doing it, but we eventually have to -- for the greater good.

And so, is a war in Iraq for the greater good? There are few in the world today who think that Saddam remaining in power is for the better. He has a history spanning more than 20 years in which he has attempted to build nuclear weapons -- lucky for us, it remains a hard nut to crack. He has a history of more than 10 years of defying any sort of international law and condemnation -- he has failed to live up to any surrender agreement from Desert Storm as the primary example. He has a history throughout his entire reign of using the most vicious weapons at his command on his enemies (Iran, for example) and his own people (the Kurds, for example) -- including, frighteningly enough, weapons that can be classified as weapons of mass destruction -- chemical and biological weapons. Would he use a nuke? It's not that great a leap to assume he would -- nuclear weapons are, like chemical and biological weapons -- classified as weapons of mass destruction. Given that he would likely use them, it is surely in our best interest to keep him from acquiring them.

So why now? As I stated in another forum, we go to war now for one simple reason -- now is when we can go to war with the least risk. I'm assuming no one wants our soldiers to be put in unduly dangerous situations. Once Iraq has a nuclear weapon, all the rules change. Nuclear weapons, on the world stage, equal respect. And they equal respect because they equal danger. If it is no great leap to assume that Saddam would use a nuke, then our troops are in terrible, terrible danger of being not just hurt, not just killed, but atomized the moment Saddam has nuclear weapons. While many of our men and women in uniform may be injured or killed in a conventional war with Iraq, that number is minuscule compared to the military and civilian causalities of a nuclear conflict.

Saddam has a long record of seeking nuclear weapons. He has a history of willingness to use similar weapons. Pretty much everyone in the world agrees it would be monumentally dangerous for him to have these weapons. So we need to act now, when it will be least risky for us to do so. It is only logical; wait too long, and it is suddenly too late.

So let us ask one more question: why us? Why is America doing this? Why are our men and women risking their lives? Well -- at the risk of sounding glib -- someone has to. I don't mean to be flip about it. War is a dangerous, dirty business and what good comes from it is bought at a terrible price. A price that, in the late 20th century, was often America's to shoulder. When people opposed the 1991 Gulf War -- fewer people than oppose war now, I admit -- many said America should not be the world's police force. That was na•ve. As events over the last few years have shown us, the world needs a police force. We may hate the fact that it does, but if America had been knocking down more doors and breaking up more cells of dangerous people in the late 90s, we may not have had the national tragedy we endured in 2001.

The connections between Saddam and al Qaeda's brand of terrorism are tenuous; I acknowledge that. But there are reasons cited above to consider him dangerous, and we shouldn't pick and choose what kind of dangers we choose to police. Indeed, our military takes an oath to defend us against all enemies foreign and domestic -- all enemies. We should continue to fight terrorism. We should also fight dangerous madmen who may not be terrorists but who do have the resources of a nation behind them.

But still, why us? I'm afraid that is the burden of being the most powerful nation in the world. To call ourselves that isn't quite hubris; we are the most powerful nation in the world by almost any measure. To call ourselves the world's only superpower is a bit more iffy, but again, not completely inaccurate. We have the power to take the battle to any enemy, anywhere in the world. No other nation can boast that. Russia can send warheads across the world but not more conventional troops. China can send warheads as far as the west coast, but nothing more. Only we can put a ground force anywhere in the world in a matter of weeks or even days. And if it is in the best interests of the common good to stop Saddam, then as I said before, someone has to stand up and do it. The only option for "someone" in the world is the United States of America.

There is another possible answer to who could do this, actually. Another someone. The UN. Except that the UN's military commitments are almost completely American anyway. We sign on to a "joint operation" and then it is one or two units from some small nations, some Canadian and British troops, and then the US. In the end, UN approval is just something we get to feel a bit better about ourselves, to feel a bit more justified. So when war with Iraq is justified, even if the UN feels queasy about it, we shouldn't have any qualms about just doing it.

Oh, and one more piece of food for thought. We are not going to war. We are re-escalating a conflict. Some would say this is a semantic word game, but it's actually somewhat important. It's important psychologically -- remember that we've been at war for over a decade now. We patrol the no-fly zone every day to protect, at least in part, the Iraqi people. Every day we take fire. We're lucky that the Iraqis lack the equipment or talent to take us down. But that does not change the fact they want to kill our troops for nothing more than trying to keep their own people alive and free from death at the hands of chemical weapons. Why keep up the stalemate? Let's move on to checkmate and move to the next game. It is also important for international law -- Iraq has never fully honored its commitments to end the war, and no matter what the UN has said since then, no matter which nations have lost their nerve or decided they have their own secrets to hide -- if the war in 1991 was justified, we are still justified in finishing the job now. The question that could have been asked at the beginning of this paragraph is "Why alone?" It is essentially always America alone, and we were given the right to over a decade ago. Sometimes the wheels of justice turn slowly.

Why war? For the common good. Why now? Now is the safest time. Why us? We're the only ones who can. Strike fast, strike hard, so that maybe -- just maybe -- we won't have to strike again.