However, I can admit that my intial support of the ass-kicking has been thwarted by the fact that I watched the beginning of the invasion...3 years ago. And it was supposedly over...2.5 years ago. Then things got far, far worse than they started, war-wise. Sure, people weren't suffering from an evil, murdering, dishonest, secretive dictator. Now they're suffering from a complete lack of order. Chaos is killing everybody out there.
What causes the chaos? A shitload of rebellion. We didn't attack Iraq. We attacked terrorism. Terrorism is fuckin' scary in size of support.
I want you to take a second look at what you have said here. You say you originally supported the war. So, if you can remember back to that time, why is it you supported this invasion and subsequent occupation? From the beginning, the Bush administration has had four basic rationales for going to war: 1) take out Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction; 2) punish Saddam for harboring al Qaeda and playing a role in the September 11 attacks; 3) liberate the Iraqi people from Saddam’s brutal rule; and 4) spread democracy across the Middle East in general.
Weapons of mass destruction was the official reason we went to war—the reason that the administration used to sway American public opinion as well as that of the UN, which passed Resolution 1441 in response to the alleged threat by Saddam’s weapons. Condi Rice promised mushroom clouds hanging over American cities, and Colin Powell went before the United Nations with “solid proof” that Iraq had WMDs and meant to use them.
In retrospect, we know these claims to be absolutely false. The Bush administration cherry-picked the intelligence that best fit its policy, rather than letting the policy follow from the intelligence. As a result, we went in expecting to find mobile labs and underground caches, and instead turned up tumbleweeds and dirt. This alone made the war illegal as per the terms of the Congressional resolution authorizing the president to invade Iraq and depose its government. Many Americans were likewise bamboozled; however, those who had supported the war in the first place tended to follow the president as his administration, in the months and years that followed, retroactively devised other principal reasons for invading Iraq.
The other big claim made by the Bush administration prior to and following the invasion was that Saddam harbored al Qaeda and had even played a role in September 11. These allegations were ultimately proved not only to not be true, but to be outright lies. Iraq’s secular Sunni government had no interest in helping his ideological enemies, and no direct links between al Qaeda and Saddam were ever found.
Because you say now that terrorism was your biggest reason for initially supporting the war, I should think you would feel embarrassed and angry at being lied to by our government.
The third reason Bush came up with for having gone to war—after the first two had belly-flopped—was that we needed to depose Saddam and liberate the Iraqi people. We deposed Saddam, all right. But rather than liberating the Iraqi people, we have destroyed their country. Physical infrastructure—water, power, sanitation, roads, etc.—social infrastructure—schools, hospitals, etc.—and economic development—jobs, material wealth, etc.—are all at prewar levels. Stability in Iraq does not exist anymore. Ordinary Iraqis now live under constant fear of many stripes: fear of abuses by Iraqi troops; fear of roving armed militias of every type who abuse, murder, rape, and pillage; fear of unscrupulous American contractor-mercenaries who earn more than our troops do and have none of the ethical scruples about assaulting or killing civilians; fear of large-scale troop actions that shatter neighborhoods and whole towns while bringing the local economy to a complete halt; and fear of abuses by U.S. troops themselves. This word, “liberation,” when coming from the lips of George W. Bush is as Orwellian as anything Big Brother could have ever dreamed. Indeed, where once Iraq was a country with relatively little terrorist apparatus, now Iraq is the terrorist capital of the world. The violence there breeds new terrorists and gives them live combat training. We have not destroyed terrorism; we have built a terrorism factory. Even once we pull our troops out, Iraq will be a net exporter of terror.
The final reason Bush cites as cause for invading Iraq is a general wish to spread democracy across the Middle East. Reading between the lines reveals this to mean that the president wants pro-US allies in this hostile region. A fair enough desire in principle, but this reasoning never appeared prior to the invasion, and for good reason: Had it been our chief argument to go to war, neither the American people nor the United Nations, nor any other country, would have given the Bush administration a mandate of any sort.
However, with his other justifications in peril, Bush finally came out with this “freedom on the march” mantra of spreading democracy, and cited it as the retroactive justification for the war. But, irony of cruel ironies, if you have followed the news you will have seen what Iraq has done with its newfound “democracy.” It elected an Islamic theocracy that will impose strict laws that repress the whole Iraqi people, whilst simultaneously denouncing the West and the U.S. in particular…basically an Iran Jr. That’s Bush’s idea of democracy? Not even he would be so stupid.
No, the war had no good reason to be prosecuted. It has brought nothing but death and misery to the Iraqis, hatred of America all over the world, and massive economic debt to the people of the United States.
Finally, I want you to realize that what you call “the ass-kicking” has led to dozens of thousands of deaths, as well as the social implosion of an entire country. Millions of people there now live worse lives than they did under Saddam Hussein. Americans are dead by the thousands, and a government that went to war to demonstrate the vastness of US power succeeded in revealing only the limits of that power.
That was not such a great idea, now that I think about it…
That really is all you needed to say.
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