The Whole Iraq
Press Action
Friday, March 26, 2004
http://www.pressaction.com/news/weblog/full_article/holmquist03262004/
By Micah Holmquist
Supporters of Operation Iraqi Freedom didn’t do much to hide their glee when marking the one-year anniversary of that mission, and neither did they bother with facts that don’t go along with what they want to believe.
“One year ago, military forces of a strong coalition entered Iraq to enforce United Nations demands, to defend our security, and to liberate that country from the rule of a tyrant. For Iraq, it was a day of deliverance. For the nations of our coalition, it was the moment when years of demands and pledges turned to decisive action. Today, as Iraqis join the free peoples of the world, we mark a turning point for the Middle East, and a crucial advance for human liberty,” U.S. President George W. Bush said.
“Let’s examine ... what really happened. While fellow Arabs did little or nothing to free the Iraqi people — but apparently both cheated on and profited from the U.N. embargoes — Americans set up a consensual government,” wrote Victor Davis Hanson of The National Review.
"The truth is that as wars go, this is one that Americans and all freedom-loving people can be proud of,” writes David Horowitz of frontpagemag.com. “Three weeks for a war that liberates 25 million people, closes down prisons for 4-12 year olds, shuts down the plastic shredders for human beings, takes down the regime whose victims are buried in mass graves, kills thousands of terrorists and deprives their survivors of a friendly weapons-supplying regime, is as good as it gets.”
“[On Saturday] I attended an anti-war protest,” said military veteran Citizen Smash, a blogger so witty he has been able to paraphrase one of America’s Greatest Racist Slogans. “I have no regrets about the war,” Smash continued, “or my participation in it. Although our work in Iraq is not yet complete, I feel that we have come a long way in just one year, with Saddam behind bars, a new Bill of Rights for Iraq, and the Iraqi people expressing optimism about their own future for the first time in decades ... I decided to go to the protest because I wanted to learn what this anti-war movement is all about. Why were these people so vehemently opposed to the overthrow of a brutal dictator, and the liberation of 25 million people from under the yoke of tyranny?”
These statements are technically accurate, but leave out some important information. It would be just as accurate to write, “one year later, thousands of Iraqis and people from other countries, both civilains and combatants, have lost their lives in the invasion and occupation. Many more have been wounded.
“After an illegal war where coalition forces used napalm and depleted uranium weapons, Iraq’s economic future doesn’t look bright, although they might pick up some sweatshops, and the country is on the verge of civil war.
“Human rights abuses remain, kidnappers abduct children in Baghdad and ’Iraqi women have little to celebrate.‘
“The United States is detaining more 10,000 Iraqis. Some U.S. troops have been charged with abusing Iraqi prisoners.
“Iraqis appear angry about the occupation and insurgents continue to mount attacks in a war that’s ’likely to last a generation.’
“Baghdad is anything but safe and the country faces the ‘rule of the death squads’ of those appointed to govern Iraq. ‘The security threat to all American citizens in Iraq remains extremely high,’ says the United States Department of State.
"The occupation harms Iraqi agriculture and hospitals are on ’
“The country has a constitution but it is ’drenched in blood‘ and faces serious opposition.
“This adventure has already cost over $100 billion and the U.S. is set to have 14 ‘enduring bases’ in Iraq. These bases might be used for upcoming wars with Iran and/or Syria, even though the current conflict ’stretches U.S. military to the limit.’
“If Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is to be believed, military action does not appear to have made the U.S. safer. Rumsfeld has said he still thinks weapons of mass destruction could be in Iraq. If that’s the case, and prior to the invasion the risk of anti-American militants getting their hands on these weapons was a threat, then this threat remains, especially since the invasion of Iraq and continued occupation may have increased the threat of terrorism.”
The previous paragraphs are hardly a complete picture of Iraq and the invasion/occupation, but they are no less fair than the glossy panegyrics I quoted earlier. If only for the sake of intellectual honesty, it is necessary to look at the whole picture and, when making judgments, weigh the good against the bad.
Even when this is done, however, there can still be disagreements over what is to be considered. Many supporters of the “war on terror” have no qualms about the U.S. military being used to advance “democracy” and “human rights” in other countries or in order to give the U.S. greater military advantages. While many readers of Press Action, like myself, no doubt see this as a critical oversight, this piece will ignore them because doing so opens up the possibility of observing something very interesting about hawkish arguments, as well as their dovish counterparts.
Like many others, Deroy Murdock of The National Review has argued that the invasion of Iraq was justified solely on humanitarian grounds. Murdock, like most if not all who take this position, does not grapple with the damage done by coalition forces, particularly the U.S., in Iraq. He doesn’t engage the question of “how many Iraqis would have to be killed or injured by the invasion and occupation before the ‘cure’ of ‘liberation’ was worse than the ‘disease’?”
Answers to this question certainly vary depending on the individual, in part because there is great disagreement on how to define the “cure” and the “disease,” but to not ask the question is to suggest that any number of Iraqis killed would be worth it. And genocide for “liberation” is not a defensible position.
(Truth be told, I doubt most supporters of the invasion who have justified it in humanitarian terms actually care about Iraqis or anyone else not in the U.S. or at least the Anglosphere. I suspect that the lack of outrage over the warming of relations with Libya as well as this explicit endorsement of torture by “non-Western” countries against those deemed to be The Enemy stems from the absence of concern. If a government does what the United States tells them to do, most hawks are willing to overlook just about anything in the same manner that they overlook details about contemporary Iraq that do not correspond with their ideology.)
Opponents of U.S. military actions in Iraq also make a mistake when they merely point to the damage done to Iraq without pointing out any of the areas where life in Iraq has improved. (Again, for the sake of the argument, I am ignoring questions about how the invasion and occupation of Iraq impacts the imperialist power of the U.S. and the right to “self-determination.") One needn’t be a supporter of these actions to recognize that, at least on some level, some good has been done.
Viewing the Iraqi intervention, including what happened before the invasion, in its totality has the added benefit of showing the need for an alternative to choosing between “war” or “allowing brutal dictators to continue their reigns.” By any standard, the price paid by Iraqis for their “liberation” was, is and will continue to be higher than it should be. I certainly don’t know what the complete answer is at this juncture, but the price of not finding one — the continuation of the status quo — is too great to give up the search.
Micah Holmquist, editor of Irregular Thoughts and Links, is a Cadillac, Mich.-based writer.