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The Good News in Iraq (Don't Count on It)
On March 19, 2003, as his shock-and-awe campaign against Iraq was being launched, George W. Bush addressed the nation. "My fellow citizens," he began, "at this hour, American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq, to free its people and to defend the world from grave danger." We were entering Iraq, he insisted, "with respect for its citizens, for their great civilization and for the religious faiths they practice. We have no ambition in Iraq, except to remove a threat and restore control of that country to its own people."
Within weeks, of course, that "great civilization" was being looted, pillaged, and shipped abroad. Saddam Hussein's Baathist dictatorship was no more and, soon enough, the Iraqi Army of 400,000 had been officially disbanded by L. Paul Bremer, the head of the occupying Coalition Provisional Authority and the President's viceroy in Baghdad. By then, ministry buildings -- except for the oil and interior ministries -- were just looted shells. Schools, hospitals, museums, libraries, just about everything that was national or meaningful, had been stripped bare. Meanwhile, in their new offices in Saddam's former palaces, America's neoconservative occupiers were already bringing in the administration's crony corporations -- Halliburton and its subsidiary KBR, Bechtel, and others -- to finish off the job of looting the country under the rubric of "reconstruction." Somehow, these "administrators" managed to "spend" $20 billion of Iraq's oil money, already in the "Development Fund for Iraq," even before the first year of occupation was over -- and to no effect whatsoever. They also managed to create what Ed Harriman in the London Review of Books labeled "the least accountable and least transparent regime in the Middle East." (No small trick given the competition.)
Before the Sunni insurgency even had a chance to ramp up in 2003, they were already pouring billions of U.S. tax dollars into what would become their massive military mega-bases meant to last a millennium, and, of course, they were dreaming about opening Iraq's oil industry to the major oil multinationals and to a privatized future as an oil spigot for the West.
On May 1, 2003, six weeks after he had announced his war to the nation and the world, the President landed on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln, an aircraft carrier returning from the Persian Gulf where its planes had just launched 16,500 missions and dropped 1.6 million pounds of ordnance on Iraq. From its flight deck, he spoke triumphantly, against the backdrop of a "Mission Accomplished" banner, assuring Americans that we had "prevailed." "Today," he said, "we have the greater power to free a nation by breaking a dangerous and aggressive regime. With new tactics and precision weapons, we can achieve military objectives without directing violence against civilians." In fact, according to Human Rights Watch, the initial shock-and-awe strikes he had ordered killed only civilians, possibly hundreds of them, without touching a single official of Saddam Hussein's "regime."
Who's Counting Now?
Since that first day of "liberation," Iraqis have never stopped dying in prodigious numbers. Now, more than five years after the U.S. "prevailed" with such "precision," a more modest version of the same success story has once again taken the beaches of the mainstream media, if not by storm, then by siege. When it comes to Iraq, the good news is unavoidable. It's in the air. Not victory exactly, but a slow-motion movement toward a "stable" Iraq, a country with which we might be moderately content.
The President's surge -- those extra 30,000 ground troops sent into Iraq in the first half of 2007 -- has, it is claimed, proven the negativity of all the doubters and critics unwarranted. Indeed, it is now agreed, security conditions have improved significantly and in ways "that few thought likely a year ago."
You already know the story well enough. It turns out that, as in Vietnam many decades ago, the U.S. military is counting like mad. So, for instance, according to the Pentagon, attacks on American and Iraqi troops are down 70% compared to June 2007; IED (roadside bomb) attacks have dropped almost 90% over the same period; in May, for the first time, fewer Americans died in Iraq than in Afghanistan (where the President's other war, some seven-plus years later, is going poorly indeed); and, above all else, "violence" is down. ("All major indicators of violence in Iraq have dropped by between 40 and 80 percent since February 2007, when President Bush committed an additional 30,000 troops to the war there, the Pentagon reported.")
Think of this as the equivalent of Vietnam's infamous "body count," but in reverse. In a country where the U.S. generally occupies only the land its troops are on, the normal measures of military victory long ago went out the window, so bodies have to stand in. In Vietnam, the question was: How many enemy dead could you tote up? The greater the slaughter, the closer you assumedly were to obliterating the other side (or, at least, its will). As it turned out, by what the grunts dubbed "the Mere Gook Rule" -- "If it's dead and it's Vietnamese, it's VC [Vietcong]... " -- any body would do in a pinch when it came to the metrics of victory.
In Iraq today, the counting being most widely publicized runs in the opposite direction. Success now can be measured in less deaths; and, by all usual counts, Iraqi deaths have indeed been falling since the height of sectarian violence and ethnic cleansing in the early months of 2007. In part, this has occurred because millions of people have already been driven out of their homes and many neighborhoods, especially in the capital, "cleansed." At the same time, in Sunni areas, significant numbers of insurgents have joined the Awakening Movement. They have been paid off by the U.S. military to fight al-Qaeda in Iraq, while, assumedly, biding their time until the American presence ebbs to take on "the Persians" -- that is, the Shiite (and Kurdish) government embedded in Baghdad's fortified, American-controlled Green Zone.
As a result, cratered Iraq -- a land with at least 50% unemployment, still lacking decent electricity, potable water, hospitals with drugs (or even doctors, so many having fled), or courts with judges (40 of them having been assassinated and many more injured since 2003) or lawyers, many of whom joined the more than two million Iraqis who have gone into exile -- is, today, modestly quieter. But don't be fooled. So many years later, Iraqis are still dying in prodigious numbers, and significant numbers of those dying are doing so at the hands of Americans.
It's not just the family, including possibly four children under the age of 12, who died last week when a U.S. jet blasted their house in Tikrit (after their father, evidently believing thieves were about, fired shots in the air with a U.S. patrol nearby); or the manager and two female employees of a bank at Baghdad International Airport ("three criminals," according to a U.S. military statement) killed when their car was shot up by soldiers from a U.S. convoy; or the unarmed civilian, a relative of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who died in an early morning American raid in the southern town of Janaja; or the men, woman, and child in a car "which failed to stop at a [U.S.] checkpoint on the outskirts of Mosul because, according to a U.S. military statement, the two men were armed and one man inside the car made 'threatening movements'"; or, according to the U.N., the estimated 1,000 dead in Baghdad's vast, heavily populated Shiite slum of Sadr City, mostly civilians, 60% women and children, in fighting in April and May in which U.S. troops and air power played a significant role.
In fact, one great difference between the "liberation" moment of 2003 and the "stabilization" moment of 2008 is simply that what began as "regime change" -- missiles and bombs theoretically meant for that Saddamist deck of 55 leadership cards -- then developed into a war against a Sunni insurgency, and is now functionally a war against Shiites as well. Particularly targeted of late has been the movement headed by cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, a fierce opponent of the American occupation, who is especially popular among the impoverished Shiite masses in Baghdad and southern Iraq. In Shiite areas, his party, according to a U.S. intelligence estimate, would probably win upwards of 60% of the votes in the upcoming provincial elections, if they were fairly conducted. In recent months, the U.S. military in "support" of its Iraqi allies in the Maliki government has fought fierce battles in both the southern oil city of Basra and Sadr City against Sadr's militia, with the usual sizeable numbers of civilian casualties.
In other words, despite all the talk about onrushing "stability," looked at another way, the U.S. faces an ever more complicated and spreading, if intermittent, war. With it has gone another, somewhat less publicized kind of body count. Consider, for instance, a small passage from a recent piece by New York Times correspondent Thom Shanker on inter-service rivalries in Iraq. The U.S. Army, he reports, is now ramping up its own air arm (just as it did in the Vietnam era). In the last year, it has launched Task Force ODIN, the name being an acronym for "observe, detect, identify and neutralize," but also the über-god of Norse mythology (and perhaps a reminder of the godlike attitudes those in the air can develop towards those being "neutralized" on the ground).
With its headquarters at a base near Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's old hometown, the unit consists of only "about 300 people and 25 aircraft." Shanker calls it "a Rube Goldberg collection of surveillance and communications and attack systems, a mash-up of manned and remotely piloted vehicles, commercial aircraft with high-tech infrared sensors strapped to the fuselage, along with attack helicopters and infantry."
Here's the money paragraph of his piece with its triumphalist body count:
"The work of the new aviation battalion was initially kept secret, but Army officials involved in its planning say it has been exceptionally active, using remotely piloted surveillance aircraft to call in Apache helicopter strikes with missiles and heavy machine gun fire that have killed more than 3,000 adversaries in the last year and led to the capture of almost 150 insurgent leaders."
We have no idea how that figure of more than 3,000 dead Iraqis was gathered (given that we're talking about an air unit), or what percentage of those dead were actually civilians, but certainly some among them died in the recent fighting in heavily populated Sadr City. In any case, consider that number for a moment: One modest-sized Army air unit/one year = 3,000+ dead Iraqis.
Now, consider that the Air Force in Iraq in that same year, according to Shanker, "quadrupled its number of sorties and increased its bombing tenfold." Consider that significant numbers of those sorties have been over heavily populated cities, or that, according to the Washington Post, between late March and late May, more than 200 powerful Hellfire missiles were fired into Baghdad (mainly, undoubtedly, into the Sadr City area); or that the unmanned aerial vehicles, the Predator (armed with two Hellfire missiles) and the larger, far more deadly Reaper (armed with up to 14 of those missiles), carried out, according to Shanker, 64 and 32 attacks, respectively, in Iraq and Afghanistan between the beginning of March and June.
And we're not even considering here U.S. military operations on the ground in Basra earlier in the year (special forces units were sent into the city when the Iraqi military and police seemed to be buckling), or in campaigns in Sunni or mixed areas to the north of Baghdad, or simply in ongoing everyday operations. Although individual body counts are now regularly announced for specific operations (not the case in the early years in Iraq), who knows what the overall carnage amounts to. One thing can be said however: The pacification campaign in Iraq really hasn't flagged since the Sunni insurgency gained strength in late 2003. Reformulated by General David Petraeus in 2007, it's just the sort of effort that occupying Great Powers have long been known to apply to rebellious possessions.
Iraq as a Surge-athon
To fully assess just what lurks beneath the "good news" from Iraq, including those 3,000 "adversaries" that Task Force ODIN "neutralized," we would have to do a different kind of counting of which we're incapable, not because no one's doing it, but because we have minimal access to the numbers. Let me try, however, to outline briefly some of what can be known -- and then you can judge the good news for yourself.
American troop strength in Iraq now stands at about 146,000. That's perhaps 16,000 more than in January 2007 just before the surge began. It's also about 16,000 more than in April 2003 when Baghdad was taken. According to Lolita Baldor of the Associated Press, the latest Pentagon plans are to order about 30,000 U.S. troops into Iraq in 2009, which would keep troop levels at or above that 140,000 mark.
In addition, a vast force of private contractors, armed and unarmed, is in the country. There is no way to know how many of these hired hands and hired guns are actually there, but it's a reasonable guess that they add up to more -- possibly substantially more -- than the troops on hand.
Since February 2007 in the U.S., only one "surge" has been discussed, almost nonstop -- those 30,000 ground troops the President ordered largely into the Baghdad area. A surprising number of other surges have, however, been underway, even if barely noted in the U.S. These add up to a remarkable Bush administration urge to surge that puts American policy in Iraq in quite a different light.
Among these surges, for instance, has been a political surge of U.S. "advisors" and "mentors" to the Iraqi government, police, and military. In another of his superb reports for the New York Review of Books, "Embedded in Iraq," Michael Massing says that the main elements of this "little known political surge... were spelled out in a classified 'Joint Campaign Plan' completed in May 2007." It represented, he writes, a "sharp expansion."
"Specialists from Treasury and Justice, Commerce and Agriculture were assigned to government ministries to help draw up budgets and weed out sectarian elements. The Agency for International Development and the Army Corps of Engineers set up projects to boost nutrition and reinforce dams. Provincial Reconstruction Teams were stationed in Baghdad and elsewhere to help repair infrastructure, improve water and electrical systems, and stimulate the economy."
We know as well that American advisers are now deeply involved with local government bodies in contested areas; that American advisers, evidently hired from private contractors, are embedded in the key interior, defense, and oil ministries; that advisers, also hired from private contractors, are helping the Iraqi police and that a new multiyear contract with DynCorp International, which already has 700 civilian police advisers in the country, will raise that number above 800. Their mission: "to advise, train and mentor the Iraqi Police Service, Ministry of Interior, and Department of Border Enforcement."
In this period, even academics have surged into Iraq as the military has embedded anthropologists, political scientists, and sociologists from the "Human Terrain System" in military units to advise on local customs and "cultural understanding." One of them, a political scientist completing her Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins University, was recently killed in a bombing in Sadr City.
We know that more than 20,000 Iraqis are now in two U.S. prisons, Camp Bucca in the south of the country and state-of-the-art Camp Cropper on the outskirts of Baghdad. Both of these have been continually upgraded. In this period, though, it seems that a surge in prison building (and assumedly prisoners) has also been underway. The Washington Post's Walter Pincus reports that a new "Theater Internment Facility Reconciliation Center" -- i.e. prison -- is being built near Camp Taji, 12 miles north of Baghdad. A "new contract calls for providing food for 'up to 5,000 detainees' [there] and will also cover 150 Iraqi nationals, who apparently will work at the facility." Another "reconciliation center" is to be opened at Ramadi in al-Anbar Province.
All of this is, again, being done through private contractors, including a contract for some company to "guard" the "property" of up to 60,000 Iraqi detainees. ("The contracted personnel will be responsible for the accountability, inventory, and storage of all property.") This, reports Sharon Weinberger of Wired's Danger Room blog, is evidently in anticipation of a "surge of approximately 15,000 detainees in the upcoming six months."
In addition, the Iraqi military, with its embedded American advisors, remains almost totally dependent on the U.S. military. According to a recent Government Accountability Office report, based on "a classified study of Iraqi Army battalions," just 10% of them "are capable of operating independently in counterinsurgency operations and... even then they rely on American support." For logistics, planning, supplies -- almost everything that makes a military function -- the Iraqi military relies on the U.S. military and would be helpless without it.
More than five years after Baghdad fell, there still is no real Iraqi air force. The Iraqi military now depends ever more on the quick and constant application of American air power -- and U.S. air power in the region has surged in the last year and a half. The use of drones like the Predator and Reaper, whose pilots are stationed at Nellis Air Force Base outside Las Vegas and other distant spots, has also surged, doubling since the beginning of 2007. Meanwhile, new machines, including a "platoon" of 30 of the Army's experimental Micro Air Vehicles, which can hover "in one place [and]... stare down with 'electro-optical and infrared cameras,'" are being rushed into action in Iraq, which is increasingly a laboratory for the testing of the latest U.S. weaponry.
In addition, for unknown billions of dollars, the upgrading of American bases in that country, especially the mega-bases, continues, while possibly the largest embassy on the planet, a vast citadel inside Baghdad's fortified Green Zone meant to house 1,000 "diplomats" (and large numbers of guards and support staff of every sort), is nearly finished.
Finally, among the various surges of these last 18 months, there has been a surge in Bush administration demands for an American future in Iraq. In ongoing negotiations for a Status of Forces Agreement, U.S. negotiators have demanded access to nearly 60 bases, control of Iraqi air space to 29,000 feet, the right to arrest Iraqis without explanation or permission, the right to bring troops into and out of the country without permission or notification, the right to launch military operations on the same basis, and immunity from prosecution in Iraqi courts for troops and private contractors.
In other words, wherever you might have looked over the last year or more, a surge-athon was under way. It was meant to solidify the American position in Iraq for the long term as an occupying power. Not withdrawing or drawing down, but ramping up has been the order of the day, no matter what was being debated, discussed, or written about in the United States.
That ramping up makes some sense of the "good news" and "stability" of this moment. Among other things, it's hardly surprising that weakly armed guerrilla forces (whether Shiite or Sunni), when faced with such a display of power have no desire to take it on frontally.
Given the situation of Iraq more than five years after the invasion, to speak of this urge to surge and its results as "success" or as "good news" is essentially obscene. Think of Iraq instead as a cocked gun. It's loaded, it's held to your head, and things are improving only to the extent that, recently, it hasn't gone off.
Iraq itself is wreckage beyond anything that could have been imagined back in March 2003; liberation is, by now, a black joke; the Bush administration's "benchmarks" for Iraqi success remain largely unmet, and still we keep "liberating" that land, still we keep killing Iraqis in prodigious numbers. A Vietnam-style body count, once banished by an administration that wanted no reminders of the last disastrous American counterinsurgency war, is now back with a vengeance, even if violence is down. These days, in its statements, the U.S. military is counting scalps almost everywhere there's fighting in Iraq.
A Great Lie of History
"We have no ambition in Iraq, except to remove a threat and restore control of that country to its own people." This was one of the great lies of history. And all the while, the price of oil -- the one product Iraq has and, in present conditions, can't get at adequately -- continues to soar. There is no "good news" in any of this, unless you happen to be an undertaker, nor is there any end to it in sight.
Of the political surge in Iraq -- all those advisers and Provincial Reconstruction Teams pouring into the country -- Michael Massing has written bluntly: "[I]t has been an utter failure. 'Dysfunctional' is how one visiting adviser described it, citing bitter inter-agency battles, micromanagement from Washington, and an acute mismatch between the skills of the advisers and the needs of the Iraqi government."
The same could be said -- and someday undoubtedly will be -- of the rest of the U.S. effort, including the much lauded recent counterinsurgency part of it.
So let me offer this bit of advice. When you read the news, skip the "good" part. The figures demonstrating "improvement" may (or may not) be perfectly real, but they also represent an effort to dominate (as well as divide and conquer) in an essentially colonial fashion; worse yet, it's an effort barely held together by baling wire and reliant on the destruction of ever more Iraqi neighborhoods.
If you want a prediction, here it is and it couldn't be simpler: This cannot end well. Not for Washington. Not for the U.S. military. Not for Americans. And, above all, not for Iraqis.
Tom Engelhardt, co-founder of the American Empire Project, runs the Nation Institute's TomDispatch.com. His latest book, co-authored with Nick Turse, is Terminator Planet: The First History of Drone Warfare, 2001-2050. His other most recent book is The United States of Fear (Haymarket Books). Previous books include: The End of Victory Culture: a History of the Cold War and Beyond, The American Way of War: How Bush's Wars Became Obama's, as well as of a novel, The Last Days of Publishing. To stay on top of important articles like these, sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.com here.
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40 Comments so far
Show AllThe Third Reich was supposed to endure for a thousand years and only lasted twelve. The Thud Reich of George Wanker Bush may last a little longer but its fate (and all of ours) is already sealed.
Whoever wins the election in '08 the need for an independent antiwar movement remains.
There will be coordinated demonstrations this fall and next spring calling to bring all the troops home now. They deserve all our support.
How about forgetting about the label Anti-War and calling it a War on War.
The Empire has come to depend on the enrollment of barbarians, dismantle the US Military today, or Iran will be promoted as the new shining force for "Democracy".
Why not a peace movement? Or a peace coup?
What stopped the third reich? The Roman Empire? The USSR? Napolean's France? The British Empire?
Peace movements? Elections? Revolutions?
Uh, no. Empires are not controlled by their people. Empires allow a select sociopathic few to remain at the controls until the curtain comes down.
What stops empires? Bankruptcy.
Can you still get by, should the Empire you inhabit go bankrupt? Historically, lots of people have. But no empire has escaped this fate. So far.
The whole thing is so sad, far beyond terrible, a disgrace to the nation and a shame to all life on earth
It is so hard to be a US citizen, to continue, largely out of fear, to pay taxes to this government, knowing what the money is doing.
That this situation first of all arose and has not changed is entirely in the hands of US national consciousness. Unless national consciousness moves to a higher level of intelligence and peace, there is little hope for a better world.
www.uspeacegovernment.org
To lay the optimistic spin on your comment, Russ, through the lens of mine above, look at the level of culture in countries that were once the wellspring of a now failed empire. How's Italy done? France? Pretty cultured places, now, could you count them as having a "higher level of intelligence and peace"?
would anybody care if Bush and his fellow criminals were exiled to Iraq??
Would anybody care if these homocidal looting liars were slowly twisting in the wind before their disemboweled issue?
Big Money, you are absolutely right. It is unfortunate that those of us who saw the writing on the wall way back when have to suffer the fate of our country getting what it deserves thanks to the neocon lunatic fringe and the mindless flock that has supported them for various reasons over the years.
But I am hopeful in the notion that it is a time of cleansing, learning some valuable lessons about our place in a global society, and maybe actually once again becoming a nation that I - or more likely my kids - can be proud of.
Big_Money—
I think Italy and France have matured somewhat, though they are not without their troubles.
The thing is, the world needs better knowledge, more enlightened people. The basis of national consciousness is the consciousness of all of its people. It's the same with the world.
That is why I finished with a link to the US Peace Government.
Maybe you'd like to have a look at it?
www.uspeacegovernment.org
Very good article. Tom provides good coverage. However, I'd really like him and other writers for TomDispatch to carefully read and consider what the references I'll provide further below [additionally] provide and which is of an order yet unreported in the Western media, msm as well as alternative.
"Clifford June 30th, 2008 12:31 pm
Whoever wins the election in '08 the need for an independent antiwar movement remains.
There will be coordinated demonstrations this fall and next spring calling to bring all the troops home now. They deserve all our support."
That's been going on for years already and has made NO real difference, so far; therefore, I won't be holding my breath over what's planned for so-called protest actions in any near future in the West. Hopefully, however, they'll start to make some [real] difference; instead of only being momentarily symbolic.
AS FOR THE REFERENCES I mentioned at the start of this post, there's one specifically about Afghanistan, the war there, the purpose of this, while the rest are with respect to Iraq and what's been really going on there behind-the-scenes, not apparent.
"Afghanistan: A pipeline through a troubled land",
by John Foster, CCPA, June 22 2008,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9416
CCPA is the Cdn Centre for Policy Alternatives, and the GR article, if I am recalling correctly, for I have to log on, post, and disconnect quickly, given others need the phone line today, so I won't double-check what the GR copy provides, now; well, it only provides a link to the original article, or page. That page provides a short excerpt of the full press release, which is linked and short, as well as a link for a 17-page PDF.
"State-Sponsored Terror: British and American Black Ops in Iraq
by Andrew G. Marshall
Global Research, June 25, 2008″
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9447
The additional and important references are that the 'Salvador Option Exposed' index page at the 'Brussels Tribunal' (no space, followed by the .org suffix or whatever it's Web-called) and which is immediately found with a simple web search combining these keywords, the title of the index and the domain name of the website. I have been withholding providing the link, for WordPress rejected it multiple times last week when I tried posting with the link. So just search on 'Salvador Option Exposed' at the Brussels Tribunal website.
Once there, the whole page, the copies of articles (with original copy links) are of value to read, even if a few years old, and then I refer to articles in indexes of Max Fuller and Sarah Meyer, linked at the top of the aforementioned BT index page.
There's Max Fuller's 'Ghosts of Jadiriyah" ...', as well as his 'Proof of US orchestration of Death Squads Killings in Iraq: ...'. These are two I have read over the past two days and they may be dated 2006, but they'll remain current for a long time, evidently.
I haven't read the following yet, but have read very good articles by Sarah Meyer on Afghanistan, so I'll just highlight some articles linked in her BT index.
" * The Battle For Basra Timeline: Footsteps to U.S. War in Iran? (Sarah Meyer, 08 April 2008)
...
* Security Company Death Squads Timeline (Dirk Adriaensens & Sarah Meyer, 25 September 2007)
* Iraq Oil Reality vs the NY Times (Sarah Meyer, 15 September 2007)
...
* Iraq Oil: The Vultures are Waiting (Sarah Meyer, 03 September 2007) (updated recently)
...
* Index on Iraq: a journey in hell (Sarah Meyer, 17April 2007)"
The indexes of both of those writers or analysts, and Sarah is a member of the BT Advisory Committee, btw, are linked at the top of the 'Salvador Options Exposed' page. Also linked at the top are links to PDFs and I downloaded and checked these for what they contain. They provide copies of many articles, some or all of which are provided online at BT; and the sources are many, many everyone or nearly everyone will immediately recognise, including Symour Hersh, but also many others you'll recognise.
Following the many links at the top of the SOE index page at BT, you'll find, again, copies of many articles of specific relevance with respect to the real "workings" in Iraq.
Combining all of that information along with articles like this one by Tom Engelhardt tells us a combinatorially much MORE. Tom doesn't seem to realise what happened with some, if not many, of the former military and intell. people in Saddam Hussein's forces, many enough having become complicit in the war on Iraq, working with the U.S. Tom also doesn't seem to realise who really runs the US Interior Ministry in Iraq, i.e., the (puppet) Iraqi Interior Ministry, and all of the so-called counter-insurgency operations that this so-called ministry is [responsible] for.
And we learn, if we are not blind with respect to what we read, that this is NOT new. Max Fuller brings this aspect out front and center, too; but there's of course more to the not so new when it comes to the present GWoT wars. Today, we have 'Salvador Option (in Iraq) Exposed', but it's an also and seriously "enhanced" Salvador Option, for the U.S. is now front and center in this war, only there still remains much that [is] hidden.
F.e., the US Interior Ministry in Iraq is acceptably called this, for the U.S. really does occupy the top ranks of the ministry; just that it's not reported, or is extremely underreported.
Surprised? I don't see why anyone should or would be, except for being NAIVE. In El Salvador, the U.S. was hellishly guilty, but it was even more hidden than it is in Iraq, for the U.S. was not conducting actual, open war there. But much about the situation in Iraq has been awfully hidden and extremely underreported, so far.
I'd really like for people like Tom Engelhardt to carefully consider what these above resources provide for information. So far, he, they, and like most of the rest of us, we see that there's real schmuckery in all of this, but none of us seem to have reached into the [depths] of this damn abyss, and it needs to be focused on by ever more analysts of what's really going on.
I don't know what the 'Awakening ...' forces in Iraq are really about. From the superficial reporting we get in the West, these Iraqis are supposedly in true belief of being against the [so-called] Al'Qa'ida in Iraq, only that most surely is just another covert U.S. operation, and bs.
Old Glory Survives on the Dark Side of the Moon
Old Glory shame should know the story
Old stories add new glories
on or off the mark
Honor is the mark
Honor yah you the mark
Put glory in park
Fame is matter after dark
Dark don't matter
Dark matter
Dark matter
Don't matter
Don't matter
The story waves on
Story on
Matter off
Like glory waving in the dark
Caravan of Love
Are you ready for the time of your life
It's time to stand up and fight
It's alright It's alright
It's alright It's alright
Hand in hand we'll take a caravan
To the motherland
One by one we're gonna stand with the pride
One that can't be denied
Stand up, stand up, stand up, stand up
From the highest mountain, and valley low
We'll join together, with hearts of gold
Now the children of the world can see
There's a better way for us to be
The place where mankind was born
Is so neglected and torn... torn apart
Every woman, every man
Join the caravan of love
Stand up, stand up, stand up
Everybody take a stand
Join the caravan of love
I'm your brother
I'm your brother, don't you know
I'm your brother
I'm your brother, don't you know
We'll be living in a world of peace
In a day when everyone is free
We'll bring the young and the old
Won't you let your love flow from your heart
Every woman, every man
Join the caravan of love
Stand up, stand up, stand up
Everybody take a stand
Join the caravan of love
I'm your brother
I'm your brother, don't you know
Isley Brothers
We're bankrupt both financially and morally. And I thought we could somehow survive the administration of this bozo. Not the case. We will suffer the consequences of neocon mismanagement both here and abroad for many decades. Tell your grandchildren. These fascist nut cases pretty well destroyed the greatest country on earth.
divine, it was not the current bozos who made it true that all Empires decline. There was a whole mess o trouble before the current administration, can we ever possibly know whether a) the current administration hastened or delayed said bankruptcy, or b) would everyone be better off if it came sooner, or later? Unless of course you're thinking that c) maybe finally there was a decline-proof Empire, and it somehow lost all hope in only a few years?
Now the children of the world can see
There's a better way for us to be
The place where mankind was born
Is so neglected and torn… torn apart
Every woman, every man
Join the caravan of love
Stand up, stand up, stand up
Everybody take a stand
Join the caravan of love
Are you ready for the time of your life
Are you ready, are you ready?
Are you ready for the time of your life
Are you ready, are you ready?
Come go with me
Are you ready, are you ready?
Come go with me
Are you ready, are you ready?
Every woman, every man
Join the caravan of love
Stand up, stand up, stand up
Everybody take a stand
Join the caravan of love
Are you ready, are you ready?
Every woman, every man
Join the caravan of love
You have a point, Big Money. But, like Captain Ahab, this bozo is in charge of the ship when it's sinking. Agreed that we can point fingers way down the line, but the current administration must assume primary responsibility. In eight years they've done a lot of damage.
Tom E. (-in his brilliant article above) writes:
"...against the backdrop of a "Mission Accomplished" banner, assuring Americans that we had "prevailed."
~ Actually, that word has been misreported.
Bush actually meant his demonic operation was "pre-VEILED" – referencing the fact that the Bush coven had covertly planned bringing this satanic abomination to the human race long, long ago.
Tom also writes:
"If you want a prediction, here it is and it couldn't be simpler: This cannot end well. Not for Washington. Not for the U.S. military. Not for Americans. And, above all, not for Iraqis." ...
I would like to add, "and not for the human race" to that phrase.
xx
Big_Money
"What stopped the third reich?"
Personally I think it was the Red Army stomping the crap out of Berlin. There was a fairly decent assist from the Western powers but the Soviets pretty much bore the brunt of the fighting.
"citizenblog June 30th, 2008 12:38 pm
How about forgetting about the label Anti-War and calling it a War on War."
Why? What's the difference?
Okay, there is a difference, and it is that the anti-war is not fighting war, only dreaming that some meagre protests can stop the ruling elites; instead of fighting in [real] terms. The anti-war movement has been AWFULLY WEAK throughout, and most leaders of most so-called anti-war movement organisations have been little more than pointy-headed bosses who refuse to LISTEN to sound critique of constructive kind. It's been going on for minimally three years and the leaders still refuse to listen up to sound critique. That's NOT war against war; it's pure ego bs!
They believe that they can hold one or two hour protests now and then, sparse, will be at all meaningful, and it has NOT been of any real meaning throughout.
Feb. 15, 2003, however, now that was not a bad day of protest. Yet even then people say that we're only considering tens of millions of protesters [worldwide]; of a population of over 6 BILLION. Some writers referred to that day in terms I far prefer, a 'human earthquake', worldwide; but it could not have been that if we only had tens of millions out of over 6 billion, protesting! So, who's right about the significance of Feb 15 2003? I know where my heart and mind were in this respect, but don't know about the rest of humanity.
Rev. MLK Jr and Louis Farrakhan, perhaps also Malcolm X, massed up far more numerous protesters, proportionally speaking.
Joan of Arc did well too (a little bloody situation was it, sure, but deserved), yet she also lost; again due to schmuck politicians!
Where's your war on war?
Psy-Ops for the Peace movement
The 'GOOD NEWS FROM IRAQ' is just like the 'Glorious Victories' that Japan had later in WW2. The people soon noticed the victories were getting ever closer to the shores of Japan.
In other words, TOXIC BULLSHIT, differing from regular bullshit in that it is dangerous to millions or billions of people instead of embarrassing to a few.
"Meanwhile, new machines, including a "platoon" of 30 of the Army's experimental Micro Air Vehicles, which can hover "in one place [and]… stare down with 'electro-optical and infrared cameras,'" Orwell nailed it a long time before it was invented (see George Orwell's "1984").
Speaking of Orwell, watch or read "Animal Farm" and you may well feel that somehow, it describes North American life.
America (USA), "the greatest country on earth!" NOT. America, "the greatest purveyors of illegal war and violence" more like it.
Tom writes that 'this cannot end well'... um... what end?
People worry ...will there be an attack on Iran?
It has always seemed that that was the original intent in going into Iraq. Six months of open arms and welcoming flowers and once we built the staging areas then we are good to go into Iran, simple as that.
Simple ... so there was no plan for the aftermath of combat in Iraq because we were supposed to be welcomed in the little 'I' for Iraq war and would be busy with setting up for the big 'I' for Iran war.
Yeah well... five years of death and destruction later... Cheney/Bush hold to their diehard extremism and would see America thrust into another ruinous conflict.
At any cost.
So things are improving eh? Well that would seem to be a necessary thing to say before you could invade a better armed, wealthier, more populous country which has had five years of threats from Bush to prepare for. Even spin can't really hide the military necessity of securing your base of attack.
Things are improving huh? Yeah... they always have been improving from day one we have been told and told year in and year out. We are always told that there is light at the end of the tunnel.
But this tunnel (Iraq) was to have no discernable END did it? We do not seem to intend to leave. No end in sight there. The light at the end of this tunnel can't be seen because the tunnel turns... which effectively blocks even the last glimmer of light of an end.
We turn from an end in Iraq ...to head into darkness again... another and more dire war with Iran.
So yeah things are improving in Iraq we are again told. Everything's great. No problemos. How about we attack Iran since we have nothing to do and have done so well as it is?
Hey look at that...by some coincidence amidst all this unreconstructed destruction, the death brought to the Iraqi people whom Bush assurred that the war was not against them but against Saddam...and all the ensuing turmoil that our invasion caused ... we just happen to have 60 bases and major staging areas handy.
Gee how'd that happen? And you thought they couldn't build and get things to work just because electricty, water, hospitals etc are disasters?
We did build something in Iraq. A war with Iran actually. That's what we built for.
Extremists only see their viewpoint and their goals ...at any cost...
to others.
RUSS said, "The thing is, the world needs better knowledge, more enlightened people. The basis of national consciousness is the consciousness of all of its people." I think there are LOTS of people who have awakened and recognize it's easier (not to mention cost-effective) to learn to tolerate differences, get along with others who come from different backgrounds, then to watch so much money BLOWN on killing fields with ever reverberating radioactive (or other) debris. The problem is that the elites who make such bloated profit FROM war and its accoutrements SILENCE this voice, a probable consensus!
A VOICE APART: Your post (good one) brought up the sentiment this article raised in me. It reminds me of how I felt reading C.S. Lewis's "The Screwtape Letters," as these speak with such an intimate knowledge of the workings/strategy of pure evil. What gives a mind an intimacy with such thought processes? In any case, I bring that up as analogy to the TYPES of mind who commit to warfare as their lifetime CAREER. It seems to me, given the billions and billions that go to the war machine and weapons' developers (with so little, if any oversight) almost like a cold logic-based science experiment to them: that they WANT to see how their weapons fare on LIVING targets. To a lot of these people there is absolutely NO sense of other HUMAN BEINGS on the receiving ends of these expensive KILLER toys! That's where CS Lewis comes in... minds that devote their thought process to evil, even if they see themselves as the enemy of evil become what they focus upon.
Earth is a spiritual experiment in evolution's capacity to progress, and thereby free will was granted to persons along with intelligence. However, when the CHANNELS of true intelligence, that which represents a welding together of spirituality WITH logic are blocked, and instead music/smoke/mirrors are used to only replay (and maintain) the old traditional jingoistic tunes, mankind is left in a seeming endless feedback loop that leads to the same painfully redundant outcomes.
The consciousness exists... the overlords do not want to acknowledge that truth or provide through media a bases wherein awakened souls can recognize each other and through a shared sense of empowerment call for manifestations of things not yet OF this world (at least since Atlantis).
"{They deserve all our support".To Clifford : You are so naive . Nobody twisted their arms;they chose to go and kill Iraqis . They deserve to die there or at home by suicide . The sooner the American military is permanently crippled by overstretch , the better for the rest of the world.
Ronald White June 30th, 2008 9:10 pm
You are beneath contempt and anyone else here that agrees with you, nows the tiome to speak up.
Ronald White June 30th, 2008 9:10 pm
"They deserve to die there or at home by suicide."
-If you are a child then your comment is forgivable, if not then it's not.
A lot if not most of the soldiers in Iraq neither believe in the war nor want to be there. Many are there because they joined for economic reasons and were "stop-lossed" or pevented from leaving the military when their enlistments were up. They most certainly do not deserve to die.
If anybody deserves to be there it is GWB and Dick Cheny and all the Democratic-Republicans that voted for the war and continue funding it to this very day.
I would include Obama because he votes to fund the war no matter how much he is "against" it. If you don't believe in a war then the only thing you fund is an airline ticket home.
Thanks Tom Engelhardt well said. When someone speaks the truth like Tom I get so pissed off. I get pissed off at the Democrats because having taken over Congress in 2006 they have refused to end the needless killing. Isn't there a easier way to make money than killing people and looting their country?
Are the Democrats so hopeless immoral, cruel and pathetic they cannot oppose it? All it takes is 41 resolute Senators to say, "ENOUGH!" Apparently they can't be found.
What if they had a war and no one came.
Ronald White has a good point about the military. Now I'm not saying they all deserve to die but the Iraqi people don't deserve to die either. It's to much of any easy cop out to say they needed a job and that's why they are willing to follow orders. Frankly, I don't support the troops or honor them. Perhaps the reason there is so many private armies (Blackwater, ect.) is because in general many people would rather not become soldiers.
Siouxrose: I really enjoyed your 8:53pm post sister,
~ thankyou.
Re: " ...the billions and billions that go to the war machine and weapons' developers..."
Yes, what an ugly, counterproductive quagmire of *INSANITY* that is!
Even a toddler can perceive that human beings enjoy happiness, and a young (healthy, open) mind can likewise see that maiming other human beings doesn't actually bring JOY to either the perpetrator or the victim, (-unless either are deranged!)
And yet... somehow... our demented 'leaders' focus so many of their waking hours squandering OUR money on devising ever more diabolical ways to hurt, harm, torture, kill and maim others of the same species as themselves, - and for no sane reason at all. In their supreme ignorance, -[breaking every *actual* holy credo]- they somehow pretend that they can get away with doing all this slaughtering stuff and imagine that they will be 'victorious' in some ludicrous way.
Huh! ~How is hacking at one's own leg ever considered a cheery 'triumph'?
The only 'Mission Accomplished' is a cancerous one, wherein a malignant little part of our racial body has invaded and harmed a relatively healthier part, and thus caused a wholly avoidable dis-ease to the WHOLE of the human body.
The human FAMILY is just that, -an aggregate of biological cells, all with the same roots, the same scarlet blood, and the same 'Maker', (call it Allah, God, JoeBlow, or Nature, it matters not). ~ I think that truth is worth restating, because somehow we often seem to forget this thing!
We are race of beings who *could* (-when we finally choose to emerge from the neo-Atlantean dark ages) get along with each other a lot more cooperatively, cohesively and happily if we opt for an improved way of life here on this *miniscule cosmic particle* called planet Earth.
The 'grains of wheat' among we Homosapiens have wisely chosen to work towards this healthy end, to a greater or lesser degree; [vide: many here at C-D, et al]
~ but the ostensible 'chaff' among our race still dream of bloodletting and vainglorious (pyrrhic**) victories and gains which are as dangerous as their perverted ethics, their vacuous, anti-life minds, and their tragically ossified hearts.
The malevolent reprobates among our race, -these 'slow learners'- are so often those who are most eager to squirm to the top of the pile and visit the effluent of their sick minds and stony hearts upon the rest of us.
____________________________
Our race is certainly in a moment of great flux.
So many of the old institutions and structures are breaking down, and this is a wholly necessary prerequisite, - prior to a newer and much brighter epoch becoming an actuality.
All this was forecast long ago [by teachers few here would ever have heard of, but Siouxrose likely knows of whom I speak] and so I am not surprised that our 'adolescent growing pains' in this present tumultuous period are often inelegant or maladroit.
But oh...
How I wish that those who are at present holding back the human race from it's brighter future might be able to change that little bit faster!!
signed,
"Un-Jeremiah" ;)
(who thought to maybe add a tiny jot of 'Good News' hereabouts?)
________________________
** [Footnote]
It was the ancient King Pyrrhus who once declared, "one more such victory, and we are lost."
~ Would that 'George W Pyrrhus' could glean that same degree of insight!
tailcap July 1st, 2008 12:55 am
You get it!
Nanoo July 1st, 2008 2:08 am
I don't support the troops or honor them.
That is your privilage. That is why they do it, so you will have the privilage. I just ask that you remember it was purchased for you by the men you don't support or honor. My Dad paid for it as did many others. I just wonder why you blame the men that are misused rather than the ones that are responsible.
"is because in general many people would rather not become soldiers."
Not true. Many people join for various reasons. Not now of course. I'd advise anyone not to support this war or join now.
People forget the military is not a monolithic structure. Its composed of many different opinions, views, etc.
"It was the ancient King Pyrrhus who once declared, "one more such victory, and we are lost."
~ Would that 'George W Pyrrhus' could glean that same degree of insight!"
GREAT footnote!
To make all troops out to be crusaders for just causes and protectors of our liberties is disingenuous. Don't forget about the ones at Abu Ghraib.
Thomas More July 1st, 2008 11:03 am
I respect and admire people like your father who gave their lives for a cause. Unfortunately the troops today are not fighting to protect our freedoms or way of life. Our greedy government put them there to profit from the rape and plunder of Iraq and to dominate the region.
Some are outright criminals as in the case of Abu Ghraib and those that kill unarmed civilians for the flimsiest of reasons.
If you are against the war you need to loudly condemn the Democrats that fund it, including Obama.
"To make all troops out to be crusaders for just causes and protectors of our liberties is disingenuous. Don't forget about the ones at Abu Ghraib."
Shoot, don't misunderstand me. I'd never go for a blanket statement like that. Most are our neighbors and good people. The military is a microcosm of us. But there are plenty of jerks to go around.
I don't blame the soldiers (as soldiers) at Abu Ghraib ( as humans they are dirt, because no decent human being would act like that) but as soldiers they were put in a position they weren't trained for, had garbage for officers and who knows what else was going on im there. Thats why you have discipline, command structure and training. The fault lay with the Army and with GWB/Rumsfield that put them in the position to disgrace themselves and our country.
My single point has always been to blame the people responsible and not to blame our soldiers and Marines that have no choice but to be there.
Left up to them, I'd say 80% would come home tomorrow. 15% would stay to help, because they don't want to leave the Iraqi in the lurch, but they would be home for Christmas. I'd say about 5% probably believe the BS.
Its our fault they were given the mission they have, not theirs, thats why I get a bit perturbed if someone insults them or says they don't deserve our support.
To those that say they volunteered, yes they did, to defend our country and for their own purposes. Is it their fault they are deployed in a madman's war? Is it their fault they can't choose when and where they fight? ( and no, they can't desert or refuse to go in hindsight)It is not.
All I'm sure of is that when these veteran's come home or while they are serving I'll do anything I can to see that they aren't spit on either literally or figuratively like we were.
"Those that kill unarmed civilians for the flimsiest of reasons."
I believe that is mostly propaganda. Sure there are instances, but not that many. Returnees have told me that its mostly BS, but some things have happened. A Lt. told me his men opened fire on a car because they refused to stop as ordered. Couple and two children, the wife was killed. He said they found out that none of them spoke English, ity was as simple as that, but they had to open fire. If you could have seen the young man's face and heard his voice, I think you'd be less convinced of the view of many here. God help the kid, he has to live with it. Damn GWB and Cheney. Damn them to hell.
I don't have any trouble condemning anyone that was in favor of this attack and occupation or anyone thats wants to continue it long term. No trouble at all. But I'm well aware we are there for at least two more years even if we could start drawing down now.
I know, I'm full of it, but this is something that I believe is important and that I feel strongly about and will defend as a point anytime.
There are people that think to be antimilitary is the same as pro-peace or antiwar. It isn't. Some think we should disband the military, if we did there would be some folks that would show them quickly that we are not even close to the Utopia of world citizenship or living peacefully with each other.
As I said, I do get carried away sometime, but I learn a lot here. I just found out that there were indeed some rulings by the SCOTUS about the shameful Internment of the Japanese Americans in WW2 from another thread. Something I wasn't aware of.
Thanks for your thoughts.
Pax
Again, many good and passionate comments on Tom's article. I'll add my one cent worth.
Kenpotter: 5:44PM You're correct on the defeat of the Third Reich. Many German troops feared being sent to the eastern front knowing the chances of returning to the "Homeland" were not so great. And we double-crossed the Soviets shortly thereafter.
Big_Money: Good comments all around.
Thomas More: Like tailcap, I honor what your father did and you have my sympathy. I replied to you on the suicide article awhile ago. No hard feelings, please.
Ron White: I understand how you feel (I think?) and I sometimes have similar feelings, but I sincerely believe you are as compassionate as the rest of us on CD and possibly release your frustrations this way. At least you are concerned about the world and what the American Bully has been doing, so I humbly defend your position. It was my point on John Carroll's suicide article.
Siouxrose: You are a wise woman and I admire your comments on CD. You represent the positive nature of the female while we males, negative by our gender, squabble amongst ourselves.
ALL YOUNG MEN and WOMEN around the globe MUST cease and desist the "call to combat" from the crooks and liars in government. "HELL NO, WE WON'T GO" needs to be the new battle cry for the "new world order" of peace and brotherhood around the world.
Pax also
If you do not understand the difference between the National Guard,the Reserves, the Regular Army, Government Inductees and the Chain of Command how can you stand in judgement of what those in battle do to carry out orders. You can't really believe that those mentioned just wantonly wander around killing women and children. The first rule of combat is to identify the enemy and then destroy them. If they all look alike and are dressed the same then it is not difficult. If they are not identifiable, what then??
I am not a militant as I have said before but I refuse to pass judgement in any area where I have no education or understanding.
S I O U X R O S E,
Excellent observation :"The consciousness exists… the overlords do not want to acknowledge that truth or provide through media a bases wherein awakened souls can recognize each other and through a shared sense of empowerment call for manifestations of things not yet OF this world"
The lordiness are quite overlorded, and are "terrified" of the
_E M E R G E N T__ Power of
_C O N S C I O U S N E S S _
They have _ n o __ d e f e n s e s __ to __ c o m b a t __ a
_____ non-physical attack, _____
so their most powerful weapon is denial and ridicule of its existence and effectiveness.
This is the new equivalent, David's SPIRITUAL
__ s l i n g _ s h o t_ to
__ f e l l __ the wicked _ G o l i a t h
__ of ☠_MIC_☠married
__ neoCON-sters
¿ Remember your mythology ?
__ when Ulysses told the Cyclops
__ his name was "no-man"
… he not only defeated the menacing giant, but started one of the 1st misinformation war campaigns, to deflect revenging counterattacks.
__ Our spiritual "no-Man" along with
__ non-physical "no-thing"
… will prove invaluable to wreck havoc upon their C3 ( command, control comm ) massive nervous system of core vulnerability:
We poke its eyes out, blindedly
We burn its tongue, tastelessly
We clamor its ears, deftly
We babelize its voice, speechlessly
We've more ☮_REAL_Power_☮ than Alexander ever dreamed existed in his empiric global hegemony - right out past our existencial finger tips.
Namaste « Presence »
« We must be the change we wish to see in the world » — Gandhi
« There is a sufficiency in the world for man's need but not for man's greed » — Gandhi
« We adopt the means of nonviolence because our end is a community at peace with itself » — ML King
I think somehow I gave the perception my father was killed in the war. He wasn't. He was one of 7 men from his company that survived Iwo Jima, 64 from his regiment.....so it was close.
He landed on Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, Bougainville, Guam and came in 2nd week on Saipan.
Just wanted to make sure I was clear. He passed away this February. He had a great life. He and my mother visited 72 countries after he retired and 2 years ago finally found a cruise that visited all the Islands he served on. They couldn't visit Iwo Jima, the Japanese wouldn't allow it.