Bush's Iraq analsis conveniently sidesteps reality
Three years ago a “coalition” of one big playground bully, a once-powerful puppy dog and a handful of insignificant lackey countries embarked on an invasion that was described as a “liberation”, which would be over (we were told) in a matter of months, and which would end with grinning American marines would be greeted by tearful Iraqis throwing flowers and praising them as heroes.
Three short years, in which that invasion swiftly passed the liberation stage and became an unending occupation; where months have become years, and years could to turn into decades; and where the only things thrown by the less-than-grateful Iraqis at American marines are liable to smell of gunpowder rather than pollen. And yet if you listen to the rhetoric of President George W. Bush, one could be tempted to imagine everything has gone according to plan.
In a press conference of outstanding evasion, he managed to avoid any mention of the chaos that is engulfing most of the country, choosing instead to focus on the fledgling democracy and the elusive prospect of “victory”. Neither the 2000+ American casualties, nor the scores or even hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis, were worth a mention; the mantra of success and progress was adhered to rigidly, never mind the facts. The prospect of civil war – which recent polls suggest 80% of the American people think likely – apparently did not even cross the President’s mind.
With his boss’s approval rating at an all-time low for a second term president, plummeting beneath even Watergate-era Nixon levels, Donald Rumsfeld entered the fray in a Washington Post article, speaking of “resolve” and “commitment” and other similarly bullish phrases that have become essentially meaningless in the Defence Secretary’s garbled language. His article spoke of “gain” and used the tired old trope of claiming that people who criticise the war, who dare to mention that troop morale may be low or that the country is going from bad to worse, are naturally supporting the terrorists.
Yet dissenting views are coming now not from certain sections of the press, or “old Europe” in Rumsfeld’s memorable definition, but from people whom the Bush administration may find closer to home. Former Prime Minister Ayad al-Alawi, handpicked by the Americans to take over as the L. Paul Bremer’s coalition as the country was “handed over”, has suggested that the country is at civil war. The US Special Envoy to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, voiced fears recently that the invasion could well open up a “Pandora’s Box” of terrorism across the wider region and indeed the world, and lead to the establishment of a government that will “make the Taliban look like child’s play”
Rumsfeld has argued that such prognostications are premature and overly cynical; that, historically, the invasion will be judged a success. For an administration that has demonstrated such a blinkered approach to history as the current US one, that is a statement of stunning insincerity. In his recent book, Understanding Iraq, William Polk offers an overview of Iraqi history and argues that the planning, execution and aftermath of the war demonstrates such a huge ignorance of Iraqi geopolitics that it was almost deliberately set up to fail. The parallels with both the 1920 British invasion of Iraq, and the British-imposed kings that followed until the 1958 revolution, are numerous. In its attempts to stifle the overwhelming truth of the scale of the disaster that it has unleashed across Iraq, the American administration is becoming increasingly dismissive of reality, yet the history of the country it chose to invade is quickly catching it up, and the prospects for the region are ominous.
Three short years, in which that invasion swiftly passed the liberation stage and became an unending occupation; where months have become years, and years could to turn into decades; and where the only things thrown by the less-than-grateful Iraqis at American marines are liable to smell of gunpowder rather than pollen. And yet if you listen to the rhetoric of President George W. Bush, one could be tempted to imagine everything has gone according to plan.
In a press conference of outstanding evasion, he managed to avoid any mention of the chaos that is engulfing most of the country, choosing instead to focus on the fledgling democracy and the elusive prospect of “victory”. Neither the 2000+ American casualties, nor the scores or even hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis, were worth a mention; the mantra of success and progress was adhered to rigidly, never mind the facts. The prospect of civil war – which recent polls suggest 80% of the American people think likely – apparently did not even cross the President’s mind.
With his boss’s approval rating at an all-time low for a second term president, plummeting beneath even Watergate-era Nixon levels, Donald Rumsfeld entered the fray in a Washington Post article, speaking of “resolve” and “commitment” and other similarly bullish phrases that have become essentially meaningless in the Defence Secretary’s garbled language. His article spoke of “gain” and used the tired old trope of claiming that people who criticise the war, who dare to mention that troop morale may be low or that the country is going from bad to worse, are naturally supporting the terrorists.
Yet dissenting views are coming now not from certain sections of the press, or “old Europe” in Rumsfeld’s memorable definition, but from people whom the Bush administration may find closer to home. Former Prime Minister Ayad al-Alawi, handpicked by the Americans to take over as the L. Paul Bremer’s coalition as the country was “handed over”, has suggested that the country is at civil war. The US Special Envoy to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, voiced fears recently that the invasion could well open up a “Pandora’s Box” of terrorism across the wider region and indeed the world, and lead to the establishment of a government that will “make the Taliban look like child’s play”
Rumsfeld has argued that such prognostications are premature and overly cynical; that, historically, the invasion will be judged a success. For an administration that has demonstrated such a blinkered approach to history as the current US one, that is a statement of stunning insincerity. In his recent book, Understanding Iraq, William Polk offers an overview of Iraqi history and argues that the planning, execution and aftermath of the war demonstrates such a huge ignorance of Iraqi geopolitics that it was almost deliberately set up to fail. The parallels with both the 1920 British invasion of Iraq, and the British-imposed kings that followed until the 1958 revolution, are numerous. In its attempts to stifle the overwhelming truth of the scale of the disaster that it has unleashed across Iraq, the American administration is becoming increasingly dismissive of reality, yet the history of the country it chose to invade is quickly catching it up, and the prospects for the region are ominous.
posted by DN at 5:43 PM
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