When Is a War Not a War? In Iraq

Today is the 5th anniversary of the Bush misadventure in Iraq. Over 300 blogs are involved in a "blogswarm" against the war. You can review and read what these bloggers have to say here. There is also a link on the sidebar of this blog.

What follows is my contribution to the March 19 Blogswarm.


The so-called war in Iraq is not a war. It never was a war. Our Iraq adventure has been circumscribed by two events: an invasion and an occupation.

Patrick Cockburn of CounterPunch explains the invasion, which began on March 19, 2003: While there was some conflict and some resistance, he says, by and large the reason the allied forces marching to Baghdad "had an easy passage ...[was] because the Iraqi army did not fight. Even the so-called elite Special Republican Guard units, well paid, well equipped and tribally linked to Saddam, went home."

Cockburn says the media coverage was "highly deceptive because it gave the impression of widespread fighting when there was none." In the north, Mosul and Kirkuk "were captured with hardly a shot being fired." In the area around Baghdad, "Burned out tanks littered the roads" which made it seem as though there had been much heavy fighting. Not so. In most instances, the Iraqi crews had left their tanks to go home before they'd been hit.

It was all too easy, says Mr. Cockburn.

It wasn't a war, says I.

And the rest, as they say, is history. A history of an occupation gone horribly wrong. Picture this: Bush, sitting in the Oval Office is informed the invasion was a success. He looks around with that little smirk of his, as if embarrassed, then turns to ask Rumsfeld and Cheney, "Ok, what do we do now?"

None of them have a clue.


So, on the 5th anniversary of this horrific, misguided adventure, 160,000 troops remain mired in the bloody chaos of Iraq. They are not fighting a war, they are trying to keep the peace. Keeping the peace, however, is an impossible task because the Bush administration's inept policies have brought the country to its knees, culminating in a full-blown civil war.

Four thousand Americans are dead. Thousands more have been maimed and crippled, their lives shredded into painful days and hopeless nights. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians have been killed or wounded. Millions of Iraqis have fled the country. As many as 50,000 Iraqi women, some as young as 13, have turned to prostitution in other countries because they have no other way of surviving.

Chevron is making huge profits from Iraq's oil fields. If the oil bill pushed by Bush/Cheney is passed, Chevron not only will continue to make huge profits, but will be protected by the U.S. military. And wouldn't that make Condi Rice happy, seeing as how she was on the Chevron board a few years ago and even has an oil tanker named after her?

Some observers claim that about 40 percent of those who comprise the Iraqi workforce have no income and are jobless.

Doctors such as Ni'man Mohammed in Baghdad, fully expect a cholera outbreak this coming summer.

The infrastructure of the country is devastated. A French paper tells how Baghdad is covered with sewage - "One of three sewage treatment plants is out of commission ... sewage is forming a foul lake so large it can be seen 'as a big black spot on Google Earth.'"

In some neighborhoods, the water pipes are so old that they cannot pump sufficient water to satisfy minimum requirements for life.

Electricity is almost non-existent. Even though those in charge have spent billions of dollars since the invasion, the national grid is only capable of producing enough energy to provide about two hours of continuous power a day. Iraqis have been warned to not expect improvement until 2011.

Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children have been orphaned; perhaps as many as 4 or 5 million.

The government is splintered and splintering as various factions face off against each other. The government functions only in a minimal way.

As Mr. Cockburn says, "Baghdad today is a collection of hostile Sunni and Shia ghettos divided by high concrete walls. Different districts even have different flags. Sunni areas use the the old Iraqi flag with the three stars of the Baath party and the Shia wave a newer version, adopted by the Shia-Kurdish government. The Kurds have their own flag.

Bush and company never understood the depth of the divisions in Iraqi society. They still do not. Or they do not care.

Again, from Patrick Cockburn: "After the Sunni guerrillas blew up the Shia shrine in Samarra on 22 February 2006 sectarian fighting turned into a full blown civil war. Mr Bush and Mr Blair strenuously denied that this was so, but by any standard it was a civil war of extraordinary viciousness. Torture with electric drills and acid became the norm. The Shia Mehdi Army militia took over much of Baghdad and controlled three quarters of it. Some 2.2 million people fled to Jordan and Syria, a high proportion of them Sunni."

Scott Ritter says "Iraq is dying; soon Iraq will be dead. ... "any hope of a resurrected homogeneous Iraqi nation populated by a diverse people capable of coexisting in peace and harmony is soon to be swept away forever."

The so-called "purple finger revolution" of January, 2005, was a joke. It didn't prove Iraq had become a democracy as the Bushites bragged for it was a sham election that "produced a government trusted by no one ..."

And so the war goes on. Not our war, the civil war. And Americans continue to die and be maimed in a futile attempt to keep the peace between enemies whose identities and loyalties are continually shifting and evolving and among people whose most hearty wish is that we would go home!


Into this chaos comes John McCain, not to campaign for the presidency, he says, but on a "fact-finding" trip. He wears a flak jacket (or flack jacket). He meets with the Deputy Prime Minister and with the top U.S. military honcho. Nothing is released as to what they discussed.

McCain, not campaigning (well, except for that photo-op in London and several photo-ops showing him in his flak jacket) says he's worried that "militants in Iraq might try to influence the November general election."

How would they do that? Persuade the voters to choose the Democratic candidate?

Part of the reason for the trip was to get a better picture of the situation in Iraq. He said the Americans were not getting a "full picture" of how things are improving in Baghdad. But as bombs went off in the city, and when reporters asked him about his statement that it was safe to walk some Baghdad streets, he became a bit "testy." He did, finally, admit that when he traveled he was escorted by U.S. military units.

He must have missed some vital pieces of that "better picture." McCain claimed that operatives out of Iran are "taking al-Qaeda into Iran, training them and sending them back" to fight U.S. troops in Iraq. That is not true as Iran is mostly Shiite and al-Qaeda is Sunni.

On several occasions, he said that Iran was supplying al-Qaeda. Again, not true. Evidently Mr. McCain is not aware that Iran, which is mostly Shiite, would not supply or assist al-Qaeda, a Sunni militant group. If anything, Iran may be assisting Shiite extremists in Iraq.

Let's hope he's not elected president as we do not need another leader totally ignorant of the people and the history of the region!

Even worse, McCain really believes, in spite of all the evidence to the contrary, and five years of total failure, that the U.S. can ultimately make things work in Iraq. He's willing to commit troops toward that endeavor for 100 years!

God help us!


But no one exemplifies the arrogance and brutishness that has resulted in the Iraqi disaster more than Dick Cheney. He, too, stopped over briefly in Iraq, meeting with the head honchos, and speaking the same gibberish that he's spoken for the past five years.

Things are coming along swimmingly, he said. The Iraqis have made important advances, he said. There's been a dramatic improvement in security, he said (that just before a bomb exploded nearby!)

Cheney restated "unwavering U.S. support for the Iraqis as they continue down what he called a 'difficult but historic route to democracy.'"

That's all bullshit, of course.


What's the answer? Maybe we could start by impeaching our lying, immoral president and vice president who got us into this mess. As I recall, Bush gave the American people close to three dozen different reasons why we had to invade and occupy Iraq, every single one of them a lie.

But impeachment or not (and with so many spineless Democrats in Congress it looks like impeachment is not going to happen), we must bring the troops home, now!

Josh Holland cites an article from the Washington Post on the findings of U.S. military contractors in five Iraqi cities. You could say we are not the Iraqis favorite people:

"Iraqis of all sectarian and ethnic groups believe that the U.S. military invasion is the primary root of the violent differences among them, and see the departure of 'occupying forces' as the key to national reconciliation."


The answer, then, is not the Bush/Cheney/McCain answer. They didn't even get the question right. One of Cheney's stops on this latest Iraq trip was the office of the Prime Minister where the discussion centered on "negotiations ... to spell out the legal basis for the presence of U.S. troops on Iraqi territory ... the so-called 'status of forces agreement.'"

That's exactly what most Iraqis do not want - the presence of U.S. troops on Iraqi territory.

Scott Ritter, discusses the competing groups within Iraq, and says that the "winner will be the Sunni resistance [opposing the current Shia leadership] ... as it continues to exploit the chaotic death spiral of post-Saddam Iraq for its own long-term plan of a Sunni resurgence in Iraq.

"That the Sunni resistance will continue to fight an American occupation is a guarantee. That it will continue to persevere is highly probable. That the United States will be able to stop it is unlikely.

"And so, the reality that the only policy direction worth of consideration here in the United States concerning Iraq is the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of American forces ..."


And it won't do to say that civil war will erupt if we leave - civil war is underway! In fact, back in 1920, British forces occupied Iraq. David Lloyd George, the British Prime Minister, warned that if the British army was withdrawn from Iraq, there would be civil war. The British presence, thought Lloyd George, was necessary to cool the conflict between the Iraqi factions.

Lloyd George was wrong, just as our King George is wrong. What happened in the 1920s is that the factions quit fighting each other and united in a revolution against the British occupation forces.

Iraq is a no-win situation for the United States. Bush and company do not learn from previous mistakes, and as this is written are planning for a more or less permanent U.S. presence in Iraq. And that, say some folks, could result in a replay of Britain's experience.

The "war" in Iraq, which is not a war but involves an occupation force serving as a police force, could become a real war - the U.S. against a united Iraqi front (sponsored by Iran, Iraq's new "friend" in its fight against the "great Satan!"


The Iraqi people want us gone. Iraq's national security advisor has asked for a timetable as to complete American withdrawal. "The vast majority of Iraq's parliament, religious leaders and political leaders want to know when the U.S.-led coalition troops will leave." (from Erik Leaver and Raed Jarrar, "Iraq's Sectarian Bloodshed 'Made in the USA.'"

The only viable option: Complete. Withdrawal. Now!