Josh Marshall, who has in many ways been the best of the war liberals in terms of arguing in favor of a military solution to the Iraq problem, has changed his mind. His reasons are worth reading. Like Marshall and many other liberals, I have felt that we may not have a choice other than to go to war with Iraq at some point. My problem with the pure anti-war argument is that our current relationship with Iraq is incredibly unstable. There’s no doubting that the sanctions regime has resulted in cruel circumstances for the Iraqi people, regardless of whose fault that is. There’s also no doubt that enforcing the no fly zones is the only thing that has kept Saddam Hussein from crushing the life out of the very encouraging political development in Northern Iraq among the Kurds. We also know for sure that if Iraq becomes a nuclear power, they will instantly become a far more dangerous version of North Korea. Just as war has consequences, so too does continuing the status quo, or unilaterally disengaging. I don’t know that the right answer is at this point, but I believe that given the Bush administration’s aims, they’ve worked toward achieving those aims in the least effective way imaginable.