Revisionist Thoughts on the War on Iraq ...

[cantwealljustgetalong]

Is it too early to adopt a revisionist view of the US war in Iraq and for this column to admit its mistake in having vehemently opposed it from the outset?

At issue here is whether the Iraqi people have benefited from the overthrow of the Baathist regime and whether the American occupation will eventually benefit their country even more. I’m convinced — and berate me here from your patriotic bleachers, if you must — that what we have seen in the land between the Tigris and the Euphrates in recent months may turn out to be the most serendipitous event in its modern history.

One need offer no apology for saying that the supreme virtue of this war is that Saddam Hussein was gotten rid of. Period. The very man who had established arguably the closest approximation of a genuine fascist state in the Arab world, that sustained itself on fear, repression, genocide, cult of personality and wanton murder — a state whose law was that those who rule are the law.

...

Washington may not succeed in turning Iraq into a “beacon of democracy” but it will succeed, after all is said and done, in turning it into a society of laws and institutions where citizens, along with high-school kids, are protected against arbitrary arrest, incarceration, torture and execution.

...

No, I don’t believe that by going to war, America had dark designs on Iraq’s oil or pursued an equally dark conspiracy to “help Israel.” I believe that the US, perhaps willy-nilly, will end up helping Iraqis regain their human sanity, their social composure and the national will to rebuild their devastated nation.

...

http://www.arabnews.com/?page=7§ion=0&article=34682&d=6&m=11&y=2003

[RandomKoolzip]

1. Bullshit.

EOM.

[wtmusic]

2. Bullshit #2.

Saddam Hussein is gone, huh? My money says he's back in power within two years.

[caledesi]

3. Bullshit #3. Saddam Hussein is NOT gone. He is still calling the shots.

Just like OBL. Puhleeze...He is not out of power.

These thugs in the WH want you to think these people are out of power. Hello? They are not.

[Darranar]

4. What about those tens of thousands slaughtered by the attack?

What about the dozens of innocents dying constantly as this war goes on?

Have they, too, been liberated?

How many died from the US Army's use of cluster bombs in Iraq? How humane was that? Don't you think that if they really wanted to liberate the Iraqi people, they'd have avoided the use of such weaponry?

If they wanted to reduce civilian casualties, why did they pound Baghdad with a stupid "shock and awe" campaign?

They are not concerned with human rights. They are not concerned with civilian casualties. They couldn't care lesss about "liberation". The Iraq war was principally about oil; a source of oil that American corporations could use and control for better competition. Another major goal was political gain. Such "short," "decisive" wars often attract considerable popular support, especially if fear is involved. Additionally, this was meant to be a distraction from the state of the economy and other issues which Bush has neglected.

The neo-liberals who went along with this war don't realize a few major things.

Change comes from the people. It cannot be successfully forced on people. Clinton's policy of containing Saddam Hussein made sense, because it weakened his power and weakened his military might. Who knows what might have happened if Bush had continued this policy?

Bush has about as much support for an eventual democracy in Iraq as he does for a democracy here at home. A true democracy would involve denying US corporations unlimited access to the oil. Since that was the basic goal of this war, that would of course be a disaster from Bush's perspective.

The Iraqi people are not better off. All that has happened is that their weakened and contained oppressor has been replaced by another, stronger, oppressor, and in the process of this switch thousands of innocent people died.