If you loved Iraq, you should be seriously gung-ho about Liberia. You have hundreds of thousands of dead civilians. You have a brutal head of state. You have a nation longing for peace and true democracy – and a region that could benefit from the establishment of one.

These, after all, were among the many concocted justifications that the Bush administration offered for its unprovoked invasion of Iraq. Of course, Liberia doesn’t have weapons of mass destruction posing a serious threat to the United States – then again, based on what has been uncovered in the wake of America’s first true war of aggression, neither did Iraq.

And no clear links have been established between Liberian leader Charles Taylor and al-Qaeda. But none were established between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda, either. So all we have left to argue that America was right to invade Iraq are reasons that apply equally well to Liberia.

Some 200,000 people died in Liberia and more than a half million were displaced, during the seven-year civil war that carried Taylor to power. Taylor may not have WMDs, but he knows about terrorism – he supported the Sierra Leone rebels that became notorious two years ago for hacking off the limbs of civilians.

The argument for intervention in Liberia could be considered stronger than Iraq in two respects: The Liberian people almost assuredly would welcome American troops – both the embattled leader and the two primary rebel groups have asked for U.S. intervention. And they’re only asking for 2,000 American troops, not the 150,000 currently posted in turbulent Iraq.

“The reception would be warmer than in Iraq,” said Mark Schneider, vice president of the Brussels-based International Crisis Group, which monitors resolution of conflicts worldwide. “You have the Liberians urging the United States to take a leading role in a multinational force to help stabilize the situation and oversee a transition” to democratic government.

Yet one doesn’t hear any fiery presidential speeches about the need to deliver freedom to the Liberian people. No declarations about the need to rid the world of an evil man who kills his own people and commits unspeakable atrocities. No rhetoric about how establishing a working democracy in Liberia could help spread democracy throughout West Africa.

Why not? Liberia isn’t sitting on an ocean of oil and it isn’t in a geopolitically strategic location – the real reasons Bush invaded Iraq. Maybe Bush really believed that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction ready to deploy, or maybe he misled us. But it was never about the Iraqi people.

Yet, with no pressing strategic or economic cherries to pick, the only reason for getting involved would be the people of Liberia – a nation founded by freed American slaves who first arrived in 1821. The American connection in Liberia is not insignificant; respect for the United States far exceeds what America deserves for its historically tepid support of the West African nation. But it’s more of a foundation for involvement than we had in Iraq.

Nevertheless, President Bush has dragged his feet about intervening – and as cease-fire violations increase, civilians continue to die. On an African tour that won’t include Liberia, Bush has conditioned intervention on Taylor’s resignation – and he might get his way. Word out of Liberia is that Taylor said he would be willing to step down to visiting Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo this weekend.

If true, the spotlight will shift back to Bush to demonstrate that Iraq was not just a massive exercise in cynicism. It would be a chance to deploy U.S. diplomatic and military force properly: with restraint, a deliberate strategy for peace and the cooperation of sympathetic nations.

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ABOUT THE WRITER

Robert Steinback is a columnist for The Miami Herald. Readers may write to him at: One Herald Plaza, Miami, Fla. 33132, or via e-mail at rsteinbackherald.com.

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(c) 2003, The Miami Herald.

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PHOTO of Robert Steinback available from KRT Direct.

ARCHIVE GRAPHIC on KRT Direct: Liberia

AP-NY-07-08-03 1021EDT