It's Now Too Late to Call It Civil War: Now It's Bush's Genocide.

[David Zephyr]

I was wrong. It's not a civil war. It's George Bush's genocide against the people of Iraq.

I have been clamoring for a long time here to stop referring to the situation in Iraq as "the war" and to call it a civil war. I posted here in August begging people to call it a Civil War. Indeed I launched a thread here in August titled " Not "The War in Iraq". It's "The Civil War in Iraq". Language Matters" making the case as to the importance of calling it that. Here's the referenced link: (http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=1932461).

Now, honestly, I must tell you that it is far beyond a Civil War and here is why:

A Civil War is something that breaks out, for the most part, indigenously, within a geographic area between opposing groups, be they ethnic, religious, cultural, economic or racial. In many cases, if not all, the outcome becomes influenced by outside forces. Such is the case of the American Civil War which broke out on its own only later to be influenced by European interests.

The people in modern day Iraq did not start a civil war "on their on". It came about only as a result of the vacuum created by the catastrophic military failure of the Bush Administration's illegal invasion of that land.

And make no mistake. What George W. Bush has done makes Saddam Hussein's crimes against the Kurds look microscopic in comparison. That's not a statement conceived in bravura, but in cold fact.

George W. Bush alone set up, either by accident or design, the collapse of security throughout Iraq from the largest cities to the most intimate neighborhoods and villages where murder and mayhem now grip the Iraqi families that live there. He pulled the trigger that caused the chaos.

George W. Bush alone is responsible for the lack of clean drinking water, the lack of electricity, the lack of hospitals and emergency rooms, the lack of law and the lack of order that now plagues the entire country.

George W. Bush alone is responsible for the daily deaths of thousands upon thousands of innocent children, women, men and the elderly and the wholesale slaughter of an entire generation of Iraqis.

George W. Bush alone is responsible for what must correctly be called genocide by any honest observer. I was wrong. It is not a "civil war", it is Bush's genocide against the people of Iraq.

For I swear that whether we, as Americans, choose any euphemism to describe Bush's Iraqi holocaust that may soothe our psyches, the world, yes the entire world, will forever look back on the Year of 2003 and call it what it is: Bush's Genocide of Iraq.

[Imalittleteapot]

1. Well said.

George W. Bush alone IS responsible and now he is alone. 31% approval.

[blm]

2. It was Civil War when senate voted on Kerry-Feingold withdrawal plan. They all KNEW IT.

They just didn't want the responsibility of opposing Bush and telling the American people the truth.

It is PAST Civil War - great post, DZ. Sorry that you had to write it.

[David Zephyr]

7. It's tragic, blm.

Today I kept thinking about the term civil war which I'd been pushing and I realized that this "civil war" didn't just pop up from nowhere, but rather it is the sole result of Bush's invasion and that would make it genocide.

The Killing Fields are here.

[Imagevision]

3. So difficult to comprehend Bush will get away with this illegal war!!

[ecstatic]

4. OMG- Imagine if some MSM person had the balls/ovaries to say that

S/he would be fired immediately, of course, but it would still be amazing.

[malaise]

6. They'll get there

It won't be long.

I just want to ask all the fugging christians whatever happened to 'yhou shall not kill', but they're too busy celebrating Xmas in the fugging malls.

[David Zephyr]

9. I think you are right, malaise.

In civil war, women and children are not murdered indiscriminately. In genocide they are.

[malaise]

17. Yep. n/t

[MadMaddie]

5. And Genocide is prosecuted by the Hague....The * cabal

will have it's day in the very World court that it desipes....

[NNN0LHI]

8. But Civil War President sounds so much better than the Genocide President

Say Civil War quick enough and often enough and before long no one even hears the "Civil" part any more. Bush just goes back to being the War President again.

This went from an invasion to an occupation to we just don't know what yet? I am worried what someone is going to find after we leave Iraq.

:scared:

Don

[David Zephyr]

10. Isn't that the sad truth: civil war president sounds better.

News from the future, Don:

Today, Bush and his spokesman, Tony Snow, lashed out at the public and news organizations who have started calling the situation in Iraq "genocide".

Snow, visibly upset snarled, "Listen, it's a civil war, not genocide. Everyone knows that. Stop playing politics with our civil war!"

Vice President Cheney who was reached at a classified hunting lodge commented before he fell off his bar stool in a drunken stupor, "It's full steam ahead with our civil war. We've turned the corner on this civil war and we are in the last throws of our civil war. It is not a god damned genocide....Now go and fuck yourself."

[blm]

11. Oh geez, Don - now you gave the media a way to make it sound OK for Bush

yet again. You know they'll make Civil War president sound just as good as wartime president, or at least try to.

sad to say, isn't it?

[Jcrowley]

12. Well stated with an exception

focusing on George Bush alone lets an entire cadre of criminals and enablers off the hook. Bush is nothing.

The American genocide against the Iraqi people has been in full swing for 16 years now.

[blm]

19. Bush just continued the annexation of a country that had desirable resources.

I'd put that plan back to at least 4 decades.

[David Zephyr]

21. You are right.

I wanted to keep the OP short, but certainly there is a group of criminals in the Executive Branch, the Pentagon, the NSC and the Justice Department who created this genocide. And I also agree that it has been going on for 16 years.

[Name removed]

13. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

15. Then what's spreading bullshit? n/t

[David Zephyr]

22. I missed the deleted post.

I had gone to bed, but I can only imagine.

[OneBlueSky]

14. but they're not REALLY people, don'tcha know . . .

they're just these brown . . . well . . . foreigners, dammit! . . . even if they ARE living in their own country . . . doesn't matter, 'cause it's OUR oil -- dammit! . . .

they ARE foreigners . . . and (just to make matters worse) not white! . . . and non-Christian! . . . and poor! . . . and filthy! . . .

and they speak this jibberish that no civilized person can understand . . . and they're shooting at our boys!!! . . . their liberators, fer chrissake!!! . . .and if they're not, they're thinking about it .

I mean, c'mon! . . .

:sarcasm: self-evident, I trust -- but ya never know . . .

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

16. It's getting pretty close.

I disagree with your characterisation of the current state of the conflict as "genocide" as far as the legal definition of that word is concerned. But there is a very definite possibility that the conflict will degenerate to that level. It's terrible.

[grytpype]

18. Tony Snow, tomorrow: "Its not a civil war because they're not fighting about slavery."

[Jacobin]

20. I think the correct technical name for it is:

Massive Clusterfuck.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

23. No, it isn't. Genocide doesn't just mean "mass killing".

Genocide very, very specifically *doesn't* mean "mass killing". It means "an attempt to wipe out an entire race or ethnic group".

The Americans in Iraq are not wiping out or trying to wipe out any particular race or ethnic group.

Therefore, the Americans in Iraq are not committing genocide. "Mass murder" or arguably "war crimes", yes, but genocide is a very small subset of mass murder.

Usually, when I make this point, I get lots of furious replies along the lines of "how dare you try and excuse/minimise/deny the genocide George Bush is committing" To anyone thinking of posting something along those lines, please consider:

1) Do you agree that the word "genocide" means "trying to wipe out a specific racial or ethnic group"; if not, what basis do you have for denying that?

2): Do you agree that the Americans in Iraq are not trying to wipe out any specific race or ethnic group; if not, which ethnic group, and what evidence do you have?

If you don't disagree with one of those, you have no grounds for claiming it's a genocide. If you disagree with 1), you're simply wrong, and I'll be happy to spout dictionaries at you to prove it. If you disagree with 2), you'll surprise me - there's no evidence of any attempt to wipe out any race or ethnic group that I've seen, at any rate.