The United Nations has established a committee in order to decide what policy to follow concerning the U.S. and Britain foreign policies towards the Iraqi issue. Some prominent members of this organization, especially China, Russia, Germany, and France, have claimed that these two countries failed to comply with the charter of the United Nations by waging war against Iraq without securing legal authorization from the U.N. Security Council. They argue, "Every state is required to develop and implement her foreign policy in accordance with the international laws that are protected via the cooperation of the most world states. It is the United Nations that should make decisions about what to do when problems come into existence in international politics. No state or nation in any part of the world is entitled to act upon problems between or among countries through the use of military force without first getting authorization from the U.N. However, the U.S. and Britain launched on a war in Iraq, defying and ignoring what roles they are supposed to play in international arena as the members of the U.N. This operation has marked a major departure from the accepted international practice: an attack against a sovereign state, aimed explicitly at removing its internationally recognized government, without specific authorization from the United Nations Security Council, and carried out not by a multilateral organization but by the world's greatest military power, acting alone or with the backing only of a few loyal allies." On the other hand, the U.S. president says that the U.S. practiced the best policy in addressing the issue.
You are appointed as committee members by the U.N. in order to address this dilemma. You will prepare a report on whether the U.S. and Britain played and have been playing an appropriate role as members of the U.N. in dealing with the Iraqi issue or members of the U.N. did not and do not carry out their responsibilities. Your task is to analyze foreign policies of the U.S., Britain, and other nations towards Iraq and then make judgments about the extent to which the battle against Iraq was the only best solution and policy needed in order to handle the issue. You will evaluate whether the military operations of the U.S. and Britain in Iraq are justified and in alignment with the charter of U.N. In order to evaluate and make informed and reasoned judgments about the issue, you need to analyze the issue from different and multiple perspectives and through the use of a variety of resources available on the Internet.
This task can be characterized as challenging and demanding in terms of its scope, nature, and structure. It places dual emphasis on both the cognitive skills (i.e., manipulation of higher-order thinking skills) and social skills (i.e., enhancement and promotion of the ability to cooperate, communicate, and collaborate) on the part of committee members. For these reasons, you will deal with this task not individually but cooperatively through a group work in which each teammate delve into different aspects of the war.
During your investigations, you will pose analytical questions and seek answers to those questions in order to focus your attention on a particular aspect of the issue. As a starting point, you can first investigate the legitimacy and integrity of the reasons given by the U.S. for going to war with Iraq, seizing and then destroying weapons of mass destruction (i.e., nuclear, chemical etc.).
Is the United Nations which represents the international power and authority incapable of carrying out its duties related to elimination of terrorism and weapons of mass destruction that constitute a threat to peace, security, and inalienable human rights? Is the U.S. the only insurmountable power to realize those those ends? Posing and seeking answers to this and similar types of questions through logical and multiple arguments that are to be based on compelling and convincing evidences, you will discover the actual reasons for the war with Iraq, and thus will be in a good position to evaluate and judge the extent to which the war against Iraq can be justified.
This particular war is used by this WebQuest as a means to accomplish several goals and objectives.
In general, the purposes of this web-based learning activity are to help students:
develop their skills in processing information in social sciences from acquiring and integrating to refining, extending, and applying the integrated knowledge in other contexts,
grow as critical, reflective, and independent thinkers,
develop positive disposition towards responsible, caring, active and participatory citizenship,
become aware of huge amount of data on the Internet, building on their skills in how to locate and access resources available on the Internet and became skillful at exploiting that information for the given purpose.
In particular, the purposes of this web-based learning activity are to help students:
put the war with Iraq into context within larger social, political, and economic framework,
critically examine ideas, interests, opinions, perspectives and explanations with respect to Iraq issue at individual and institutional levels,
compare different stories about the Iraq issue and analyze the different portrayals or perspectives they present,
analyze Iraqi issue on such criteria as the accuracy of the event's historical details and sequence of events; and the points of view or interpretations presented by the agents,
become aware of multiple perspectives on the issue by demonstrating how differing motives, beliefs, interests, revealed and hidden goals influenced the crisis in Iraq,
develop the ability to make judgments about the role of the United States in the world today and what course American foreign policy should take towards the Iraq issue,
understand some of the major elements of international relations in conjunction with the Iraq issue and how world affairs affect them,
promote their understanding of the effects of significant international political developments on the United States and Iraq relationship,
analyze the relationship of the U.S. to Iraq and other Middle East countries in the light of historical context and put forward position about what the relationship of the United States should be to the these countries,
expand their knowledge and skills in the analysis of foreign policy issues in the light of American national interests, values, and principles,
take, defend and evaluate positions about how United States foreign policy is made and the means by which it is carried out,
take, defend, and evaluate positions as regards development and implementation of the U.S. foreign policy towards Iraq and other nations,
describe the role of the United States in the United Nations.
The task structured in this WebQuest is capable of enabling students to sharpen their critical and analytical thinking skills and gain closer insight into the concept war in general and the war with Iraq in specific.
