The Bush Doctrine authorized preemptive war against merely potential threats

Evidence

In October 2002, five evangelical leaders sent a letter to President Bush to assure him that a preemptive invasion of Iraq did indeed meet the criteria for just war. Written by Richard Land, president of the SBC’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, and signed by fellow evangelicals Charles Colson, Bill Bright, D. James Kennedy, and Carl Herbster, the “Land letter” expressed appreciation for Bush’s “bold, courageous, and visionary leadership” and reassured him that his plans for military action were “both right and just.” Referencing the appeasement of Hitler, they urged Bush to disarm “the murderous Iraqi dictator” and reminded him that “the legitimate authority to authorize the use of U.S. military force” belonged to the United States government, not the UN. Elsewhere, Land cited Romans 13 to argue that “God ordained the civil magistrate” to punish evildoers. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 421 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

The key element of the Bush Doctrine was that it proclaimed the United States’ unilateral right to wage preventive war—to attack another sovereign nation not because it directly threatened the United States but because it could potentially pose a threat. It gave the president discretion to determine what constituted a threat. Thus, if a nation “harbored terrorists,” developed weapons of mass destruction, or otherwise acted in ways that went against the United States’ interests, it would be subject to attack and invasion. Another key aspect of the Bush Doctrine was the imperative to put down the rise of any rival that might challenge US hegemony. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 417 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

HAVING EMBRACED THE MILITARY, evangelicals would find it difficult to articulate a critique of militarism. If the military was a source of virtue, war, too, attained a moral bearing—even preemptive war. In the 1987 book One Nation Under God, Christian Reconstructionist Rus Walton offered a robust defense of preventive war. Suppose a “thug,” a barbarian, a “depraved maniac,” threatened your wife or daughter. “What would you do? When would you move to protect her? Before the attacker made his advance? … When he began ripping the clothes from her body?” Yes, Jesus might have instructed his followers to love their enemies, but not His enemies. Christians must steel themselves: “Let others seek to remove that great old hymn ‘Onward Christian Soldiers’ from their hymnals. Let us go forth, the Cross of Jesus going on before.” Christians were called to fight the Lord’s battle, at home and abroad, and seek dominion in His name. The paperback edition of Walton’s book boasted 150,000 copies in print, and Walton became a frequent speaker at D. James Kennedy’s annual Reclaiming America for Christ conferences. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 310 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Only overwhelming US military preponderance prevents great power war, neocons held; The Bush Doctrine was a plan to secure US global hegemony through preemptive war. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 485; The Bush Doctrine aimed to prevent any rival power challenge, not just terror — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 497 (+5 more)

Broader Connections

• The Bush Doctrine legitimized unilateral preventive war and rival suppression #corroborates (1.00) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 417
• Evangelicals’ embrace of the military made preemptive war morally defensible. #corroborates (1.00) — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 310
• Evangelical leadership publicly sanctified a preemptive Iraq invasion as just war #corroborates (1.00) — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 421