Dear FRONTLINE,
President Bush feels morally justified in killing innocent people in order to spread democracy throughout the world. How crazy is that?
He stubbornly refuses to see that the US, in bullying other nations, behaves as a kind of world dictator. The Bush doctrine will lead to more anti-Americanism, more conflict, and more bloodshed.
Patricia Inman
Chepachet, RI
Dear FRONTLINE,
If Mr. Wulfowitz is as smart as the people on the program say he is, why hasn't he realized that the best way to spread the biological and chemical agents we are so afraid of is to knock over the container?
Tom Stewart-Gordon
dallas, TEXAS
Dear FRONTLINE,
I feel that those who have reservations about going to war should offer realistic alternatives to assuring the world that Iraq will disarm. More inspectors? Blix has already informed the UN that he has enough inspectors. More time? Iraq has not changed its mind in twelve years. Containment? With missiles capable of delivering a nuclear or chemical warheads, and terror groups who potentially smuggle weapons freely into and out of Iraq - what's to be contained?
Damon Aldrich
Rancho Palos Verdes, CA
Dear FRONTLINE,
Settled down at about 2055 hours, San Diego time, to watch "Frontline, The War Behind..." scheduled to air at 2100 hours; about 2057 hours, the station went dead--off the air. Also, as of 2130 hours, PRI at 89.5 MHz is dead--off the air. Forty-one minutes into the program, KPBS was back on the air. Funny how Murphy's Law works.
Sure wanted to watch the whole program. You gonna broadcast the program again?
Rudy Cesena
San Diego, California
Dear FRONTLINE,
Frontline has done a real service to American Democracy by analyzing the issue of "pre-emption" or "preventive war." It is obvious that this administration wants the United States to become the ruler of the earth and to install puppet governments in any country that we decide to invade, under the pre-text of prevention of any act the government deems to be terrorist. With this said, who will pay the bills for these military actions? It won't be big corporations who can rent a mail box in a Caribbean country and avoid US income tax. It won't be those with dividend income. It will be by American workers who pay payroll taxes and income taxes.
William Shuford
Vancouver, WA
Dear FRONTLINE,
I found the program enlightening if not disturbing in several ways. It's interesting that this president, who is suppose to represent the people of this nation and do what is necessary to protect it, is disregarding the will of the citizens of this nation in favor of a group of power hungry and delusional "hawks." The doctrine that Wolfowitz has authored opens a Pandora's box of endless conflict---the U.S. versus Islam and the world. Forcing democracy in the Middle East? And expect to succeed at this effort..get real. How can anyone with any sense see this as a means of protection and security? President George W. needs to decide if he's for us or against us.
Diane Ripandelli
Dear FRONTLINE,
I would like to reiterate what Jimmy Carter said as he accepted his Nobel Peace Prize, and that is peaceful solutions to a crisis are always preferable obviously to war. War is a necessary evil at times, however. And it is both; necessary and evil, lest we forget war's qualities, as well. My opinion is Saddam Hussein does NOT desire a peaceful solution; HE will not disarm. A war is never a "good" choice, but sometimes it is the only choice. This issue is not about imperialism, either. Iraq's current goverment is a genuine threat to the world; not just the United States.
Beth Day
Lawrenceville, Georgia
Dear FRONTLINE,
How can we continue to be manipulated by this administration into believing that there is a link between Al Queda and Iraq when our current foreign policy is a holdover from an earlier administration? And what right do we have to force our so-called democracy on dictatorial regimes while our own civil liberties are being taken away? And what about North Korea, Liberia, Libya, Equatorial Guinea, Libya, Burma, Turkmenistan, Belarus, Cuba? Or will we only be concerned with those regimes where our own self-interests are at stake, such as oil? Why can't the world's only super power be an example of peace and not war?
Lorraine Stanceu
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Dear FRONTLINE,
Thank you, FRONTLINE, for bringing the background for our current predicament to the fore. Too few in the media have dared to speak the truth about this administration and the ideology that drives it to such drastic action. I have a daughter, who became five years old this week, and I am frightened of the future our government is preparing for her.
Emily Smith
Reno, Nevada
Dear FRONTLINE,
I thought the Frontline program did a good job of describing the history of the Bush doctrine of premeption. Actually, as indicated in the program, the correct name for the policy is preventive war. But whatever it is called, it is a violation of traditional just war theory, which called for war to be a last rather than a first resort. William Kristol even indicated that Powell's efforts at the U.N. will be nothing more than "tactics" to get premption accomplished. Nothing in the program was said about the main reason we are concerned about the Middle East, oil, and nothing was said about Bush's consideration of casualities, theirs or ours, should we go to war. Furthermore, whatever happened to Osma Bin Laden?
Frank Stallknecht
Houston, Texas
Dear FRONTLINE,
"Let history show that this administration may make the right decision for a just and peaceful world"
Jonathan Stephenson
Greensboro, NC
Dear FRONTLINE,
The Frontline program on the TV tonight presented as a historical documentary is clearly anti-Bush. There are very complex decisions that go into considering war but to imply Bush has had such seemingly hidden and self-motivated agenda sounds too simplistic an argument. "Behind Closed Doors" indicates something beyond the normal secrecy of any administration, but instead this program is attempting to persuade viewers of a supposed misguided decision process.
Under the guise of open dissension, this type of one-sided opinion against the president and the nation's interests would appear to be sedition if we were at war.
http://www.lib.byu.edu/~rdh/wwi/1918/usspy.html
Robert Elder
Dear FRONTLINE,
I find it disturbing that none of the "Hawks" of George W. Bush's administration ever volunteered to put themselves in harms way in Vietnam, and yet they are eager to kill a generation of American's and Iraqi's to accomplish an unreachable goal--that of establishing a democracy in a land torn by tribal and religious conflicts.
I find it disturbing that this administration and this country does not realize that going to war with Iraq will place this country in another quagmire. Nation building has never been successful in a land that does not desire it. The policy of containment worked. The Berlin Wall fell. And it was a policy that proved far less costly than going to a "hot" war. Why not give the policy a chance before we shed blood needlessly?
I fear George Bush has gone too far; to back down now would be political suicide. So we are going to war for two reasons; political survival of a president with a messianic complex and vengence; as George Bush said it himself in a speech, "After all he tried to kill my daddy." I fear and pray for the young men and women who will pay the ultimate price for the political survival of this president.
Paul Kim
Ogden, UT
Dear FRONTLINE,
We could be more in tune with the Hawks if they would put their money where their mouths are. If they were willing to join in the battle without hiding behind their positions. Let me suggest that all of their relatives of the appropriate age, male and female, join the armed forces and be ready, as so many other Americans are, to give their lives to defeat the so called Axis of Evil.
Tom Jensen
Draper, Utah
Dear FRONTLINE,
The Bush doctrine is not new at all, just an updated, weaponized, and in-your-face version of the notion of manifest destiny: the United States is on a divine mission and it should impose its vision on the rest of the world whether that world is willing or not.
Ellen Robbins
Baltimore, MD 
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