McGovern critical of war in Iraq, South Dakota abortion decision

Appearing hale and hardy at age 83, McGovern spoke and answered questions for about 90 minutes, then autographed copies of several of the 10 books he has written for another 30 minutes or so.

Speaking on “A Time for War, a Time for Peace” at the opening session of the Mari Sandoz Heritage Society’s annual conference, McGovern said he is proud to have served as a bomber pilot in World War II, noting that it was “absolutely essential” that Hitler was stopped.

“Hitler was an inhumane monster who killed six million Jews, most of them his own citizens, and was gobbling up one country after another,” said McGovern, who was the pilot on 35 bombing missions. “I believed in that effort. We had no alternative.”

But he said he’s not been enthusiastic about any of the wars since World War II and, in particular, spoke out against the Vietnam War and the current war in Iraq.

McGovern said he gets tears in his eyes every time he visits the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C., that bears the names of 58,000 American troops who were killed in the war.

He called the war in Iraq “an irrational use of the resources of this great country and is a conflict we never should have entered.”

He said Iraq was not involved in the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States, had no weapons of mass destruction, and if it had, would have used them against Iran and not the United States.

“Saddam Hussein was a big enough SOB without blaming him for something he had absolutely nothing to do with,” McGovern said. “It was that wealthy Saudi Arabian religious fanatic Osama Bin Laden who organized the terrorist attacks.”

McGovern called the Bush Administration “the most dangerous and incompetent in the history of the United States” and said several times he’d rather have Richard Nixon in the White House than George W. Bush.

“This administration is so much more incompetent than the Nixon administration that there’s no comparison,” he stated.

McGovern, who lost the 1972 presidential election to Nixon, added that his statement about the current president is somewhat painful to make because he is friends of Bush’s father.

“It is an unfortunate and misguided war that does not serve the best interests of America,” McGovern said. He added that it may be impossible to bring democracy to Iraq because it is filled with internal civil strife.

“Iraq has been there 6,000 years and will be there another 6,000 years whether we lose 3,000 soldiers like we have now or 300,000. But it will be very difficult for even a great power like the United States to make it a democracy. The Sunnis hate the Shiites, the Shiites hate the Sunnis and they both hate the Kurds. I wish the leaders who are trying to make it a democracy good luck.”

Speaking on the abortion issue in South Dakota, McGovern said he has about the same disrespect for “a male-dominated legislature that passes a law banning abortions as he does for a congress dominated by old men who dream up wars in which young men do the dying.”

He noted that the legislators who passed the anti-abortion law in South Dakota seem to have little compassion for those who are put to death for their crimes or the fact that a human being dies of starvation every 3.5 seconds in the world.

Since 2001, McGovern has been the United Nations’ global ambassador for world hunger.

On other issues McGovern said:

--It was a crushing blow to lose the presidential race in 1972 after winning the Democratic nomination that at one time had 17 contenders. “It was especially painful to lose in my home state, where I thought they would support me as a favorite son. But I made it to the ‘Super Bowl’.” He added that he believes the 30 million votes that he received helped Congress realize that the Vietnam War was a mistake and shortly after the election voted to withdraw from the conflict.

--Many people don’t seem too interested in the political process, possibly because they don’t see much difference between the two major political parties.

--He was recently told by former U.S. Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas, who lost the presidential election to Bill Clinton, that the Republican party has moved so far to the right that none of the GOP nominees for president the past 75 years could now be nominated. “It’s too bad when either party moves so far to either the right or the left.”

--He regretted that John Kerry, the 2004 Democratic presidential candidate, said he would send more troops to Iraq if he were elected. “That would have just made more targets for the insurgents.”

--The war in Iraq has not aroused as much dissent at the war in Vietnam because there is no draft.

--He has never seen himself as “a far-out, off-the-wall radical.” He added, “After all, I was elected for a quarter of a century by the people of South Dakota who aren’t a whole lot different than the people of Nebraska.”

--How is he different now than he was in 1972? “I try to state my own ideas more clearly and sharply now so they aren’t distorted like they were then.”

--After studying the work of Mari Sandoz, he believes many of her ideas, particularly on war, would be similar to hers. “She was one of the truly great women every produced by Nebraska and this country.”