Smeagol-Gollum
18-04-2004, 23:02
Taken from an article by Robert Manne, professor of politics at La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia, as published in the Sydney Morning Herald.
SOURCE : http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/04/18/1082226632717.html
We have just seen the most disastrous fortnight in Iraq since the fall of Baghdad.
During April a militant Shia rebellion erupted. Forty foreigners were taken hostage. In the siege of Sunni Falluja more than 80 Americans and 700 Iraqis were killed. In a potent piece of reverse symbolism, the square where the statue of Saddam Hussein was toppled had to be closed to Iraqis by US troops.
Almost everything the Anglo-US leaders told us about the invasion has proven to be false. Iraq was invaded to rid Saddam of his weapons of mass destruction. Almost everyone now concedes such weapons did not exist. Such weapons were especially dangerous, we were told, because of Saddam's links with al-Qaeda. Almost everyone now knows that no such links existed.
We were told the invasion of Iraq would help solve the Arab-Israeli conflict. The prospects of Middle East peace have never been so remote. We were told the invasion would help solve the threat of Islamist terrorism. Nothing has given the ideology of Islamism a greater fillip than the Anglo-American occupation of Iraq. We were told Iraqis would welcome the invading forces as liberators. Iraq is now a tinderbox.
Bush and Blair told the world their intelligence sources had revealed, beyond doubt, that Iraq possessed a vast stockpile of chemical and biological weapons and was close to acquiring a nuclear arsenal. For those without access to this secret knowledge it was impossible to judge the veracity of the claims.
In September 2002 the US unveiled a strategic doctrine, aimed at Iraq, which proclaimed the right of the US to launch pre-emptive strikes against "rogue states" which were thought to possess WMD. This was an extremely dangerous doctrine. If all nations possessed the same right as the US - to wage preventive wars without UN support - the law of the jungle would prevail in international affairs.
If, rather, the US alone possessed the right to go to war in such circumstances, the new doctrine represented an open US claim to global hegemony.
In the build-up to the invasion, Anglo-American leaders repeatedly warned about the terrible danger that Saddam might pass his WMD to an Islamist terrorist group. Given that Saddam had nothing obvious to gain by such a weapons transfer and that, if the transfer were ever to be discovered by the US it would ensure the destruction of his regime, the argument bordered on absurdity.
The media suggested that the creation of a prosperous, stable democracy in Iraq would be relatively easy to achieve. Given that Iraq was a desperately poor country, burdened by a grotesque totalitarian past, and was divided between Shia and Sunni Muslims and between Arabs and Kurds, this was an attractive but a childish dream.
COMMENT.
Every premise on which the war was based now appears to have been false. We are left with a situation that appears to be worsening by the day, and mired in a situation for which we are now responsible.
SOURCE : http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/04/18/1082226632717.html
We have just seen the most disastrous fortnight in Iraq since the fall of Baghdad.
During April a militant Shia rebellion erupted. Forty foreigners were taken hostage. In the siege of Sunni Falluja more than 80 Americans and 700 Iraqis were killed. In a potent piece of reverse symbolism, the square where the statue of Saddam Hussein was toppled had to be closed to Iraqis by US troops.
Almost everything the Anglo-US leaders told us about the invasion has proven to be false. Iraq was invaded to rid Saddam of his weapons of mass destruction. Almost everyone now concedes such weapons did not exist. Such weapons were especially dangerous, we were told, because of Saddam's links with al-Qaeda. Almost everyone now knows that no such links existed.
We were told the invasion of Iraq would help solve the Arab-Israeli conflict. The prospects of Middle East peace have never been so remote. We were told the invasion would help solve the threat of Islamist terrorism. Nothing has given the ideology of Islamism a greater fillip than the Anglo-American occupation of Iraq. We were told Iraqis would welcome the invading forces as liberators. Iraq is now a tinderbox.
Bush and Blair told the world their intelligence sources had revealed, beyond doubt, that Iraq possessed a vast stockpile of chemical and biological weapons and was close to acquiring a nuclear arsenal. For those without access to this secret knowledge it was impossible to judge the veracity of the claims.
In September 2002 the US unveiled a strategic doctrine, aimed at Iraq, which proclaimed the right of the US to launch pre-emptive strikes against "rogue states" which were thought to possess WMD. This was an extremely dangerous doctrine. If all nations possessed the same right as the US - to wage preventive wars without UN support - the law of the jungle would prevail in international affairs.
If, rather, the US alone possessed the right to go to war in such circumstances, the new doctrine represented an open US claim to global hegemony.
In the build-up to the invasion, Anglo-American leaders repeatedly warned about the terrible danger that Saddam might pass his WMD to an Islamist terrorist group. Given that Saddam had nothing obvious to gain by such a weapons transfer and that, if the transfer were ever to be discovered by the US it would ensure the destruction of his regime, the argument bordered on absurdity.
The media suggested that the creation of a prosperous, stable democracy in Iraq would be relatively easy to achieve. Given that Iraq was a desperately poor country, burdened by a grotesque totalitarian past, and was divided between Shia and Sunni Muslims and between Arabs and Kurds, this was an attractive but a childish dream.
COMMENT.
Every premise on which the war was based now appears to have been false. We are left with a situation that appears to be worsening by the day, and mired in a situation for which we are now responsible.