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Argument: Spreading democracy and "peace" is often used as a pretext for war
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James Bovard. "The Democratic-Peace Fraud". The Future of Freedom Foundation. 23 May 2008 - The theory of democratic peace provides a pretext for war. When he was asked on April 4, 2005, why the United States should continue suffering most of the casualties and paying most of the costs in Iraq, Bush replied, “The action is worth it to make sure that democracy exists, and because democracies will yield peace, and that’s what we want.” In a late 2004 press conference, he declared, “The only way to achieve peace is for there to be democracies living side by side. Democracies don’t fight each other.”
Supposedly, any government that is not a democracy is now simply a war waiting to happen. Because democracies never attack other democracies, they are entitled to launch unprovoked attacks on nondemocracies to force them to become democracies — and thereby ensure peace. Because democracy is the same as peace, warring to spread democracy is the same as working for peace. The Bush administration is apparently confident that few Americans remember Orwell’s “war is peace” slogan from 1984.
And after all enemies and potential enemies of democracy have been exterminated (or incarcerated for life without trial), bliss and tranquility will reign forever and ever. There will be no more wars after “democracy” conquers the world. But the notion that there will be lasting, transcendent benefits from the next war(s) is a common canard of politicians and warmongers. The result is “perpetual war for perpetual peace,” in historian Charles Beard’s apt phrase.
James Ostrowski. "The Myth of Democratic Peace: Why Democracy Cannot Deliver Peace in the 21st Century". LewRockwell. Spring 2002 - Messianic goals. Democracies are vulnerable to messianic crusades. Democratic politicians have a sense of moral superiority which impels them to reform other nations just as they seek to reform their own citizens and societies. Woodrow Wilson is the foremost example of this spirit: "America is henceforth to stand for the assertion of the right of one nation to serve the other nations of the world."40 The temptation to add, ". . . whether they like it or not," is irresistible. Thus, the messianic impulse (rationalization?) would launch America into the disastrous World War I, and later wars such as Viet Nam, the Gulf War, and the bombing of Serbia.
"Democratic Jihad? Military Intervention and Democracy." 2 April 2004 - Democracies rarely if ever fight one another, but they participate in wars as frequently as autocracies. They tend to win the wars that they participate in. Democracies frequently build large alliances in wartime, but not only with other democracies. From time to time democracies intervene militarily in on-going conflicts. The democratic peace may contribute to a normative justification for such interventions, for the purpose of promoting democracy and eventually for the
promotion of peace. This is reinforced by an emerging norm of humanitarian intervention. Democracies may have a motivation to intervene in non-democracies, even in the absence of on-going conflict, for the purpose of regime change. The recent Iraq War may be interpreted in this perspective. A strong version of this type of foreign policy may be interpreted as a democratic crusade.