Today marks a black page in history: the three year anniversary of the war in Iraq. Even though Bush knows better, he still tries to paint a picture of success. It is rather insulting: the country has been plunged into a civil war but the Bush administration says it is not. However; former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi says recent sectarian violence is a sure sign of a nation at war with itself. The United States claimed that Iraq illegally possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1441 and had to be disarmed by force. Bush repeatedly claimed that these weapons posed a grave and imminent threat to the United States and its allies. The US began the invasion on March 20, 2003. The Iraqi Military was defeated, and Baghdad fell on April 9th, 2003. On May 1, 2003, U.S. President George W. Bush declared the end of major combat operations, terminating the Ba’ath Party’s rule and removing Iraqi President Saddam Hussein from office. Coalition forces ultimately captured Saddam Hussein on December 13, 2003. The Weapons of Mass Destruction however (the number 1 reason for the US and the UK to start the war), have never been found. In fact they never existed in the first place.
So what has the war brought us and the US so far?
As CNN puts it:
Three years after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, bodies of civilians turn up daily; at least 2,314 U.S. military personnel have died; elections have been held, but a government hasn’t been formed; and officials from Iraq and the United States debate whether the county is in the midst of a civil war. “We are losing each day as an average 50 to 60 people throughout the country, if not more. If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is,” said former Iraq Prime Minister Ayad Allawi. President Bush is offering an optimistic vision for Iraq. “We’re implementing a strategy that will lead to victory in Iraq,” he said Sunday.
The BBC today reports about the cost of the was so far:
- Iraqi civilians killed: 32,600-35,700 on 1 March. Police: 1,900. Source: Iraq Body Count campaign group
- US soldiers killed: More than 2,300
- Other armed forces killed: 205 (103 of whom British)
- US forces now in Iraq: 138,000 (UK: 7,800)
- Iraqi forces: 235,000 Source: UK defence ministry
- Oil production: 2bn barrels a day. Pre-war: 2.5bn
- Iraq funding needed to 2007: $55bn (UN+US estimates). Pledged: $38bn
- Cost of war to US taxpayer: $248bn. Source: National Priorities Project based on congressional appropriations
They also report:
One US newspaper on Friday carried a poll that suggested approval of Mr Bush’s handling of Iraq had plummeted to 29%.
In his assessment of the war, US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld warned that leaving Iraq now would be like returning Germany to Adolf Hitler’s followers after World War II.
“Turning our backs on post-war Iraq today would be the modern equivalent of handing post-war Germany back to the Nazis,” Mr Rumsfeld wrote in the Washington Post.
However, on Sunday Mr Rumsfeld came under fire for his handling of the invasion.
Retired US Army Major General Paul Eaton, who was in charge of training Iraqi military forces from 2003 to 2004, described Mr Rumsfeld as “incompetent” and urged him to resign.
In the New York Times, Gen Eaton said Mr Rumsfeld had “shown himself incompetent strategically, operationally and tactically, and is far more than anyone else responsible for what has happened to our important mission in Iraq.”
Bottomline: after the Vietnam war this is the biggest mess up for the US. They have succeeded in turning virtually every Muslim in the world against them thus turning the post 9/11 terror threath into a self-fulfilling prophecy. Instead of using their power and influence to do good, Bush thinks they can strongarm countries into adopting democracy; thus denying everything that democracy stands for.
All the former dictatorships in Europe have fallen one by one in the late 80’s (1988: Estonia, 1989 Romania, same year Czechoslovakia etc. etc.). Not because the US pressured them or because they invaded them, but because the people finally stood up and took matters in their own hand.
If people do not help themselves like the French did in during the French revolution or the East Germans during the fall of the Berlin Wall, then you can not force revolution upon them.