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CounterPunch
March 31,
2003
Contradictions
and Absurdities
Iraq War as Game Show
By JOHN CHUCKMAN
The title could be the name of a television quiz
show, although I doubt the subject matter would attract a large
audience, especially in that key market of the United States.
Even on progressive and liberal Internet
sites in the United States, one finds ritualized deference to
"our brave boys." Well, this just makes me wonder whose
boys aren't brave? Like most human qualities, I imagine bravery
is pretty evenly distributed across the human population. In
other words, the expression can only be propaganda or uttered
out of fear.
Further, I have to say that professional
American soldiers, exceedingly well paid and rewarded by world
standards, are in fact doing their jobs.
Lastly, I fail to see even a normal display
of bravery in the vast, richly-equipped armed forces of the world's
wealthiest country attacking the smaller, far more poorly-equipped
forces of a nation with less than a tenth the population and
maybe a hundredth the wealth. If this is bravery, then Italians
dive-bombing Abyssinia or Germans using tanks on Polish cavalry
were brave.
The dreariest, most uninformed words
used over and over are those comparing Hussein to Hitler and
diplomacy to appeasement. There is no comparison, except in the
minds of those who know little history but insist on repeating
phrases like "history repeats itself," having very
little idea as to what they are saying.
Germany, despite severe defeat and reparations
from the First World War and a terrible depression, in the 1930s
remained a major industrial, intellectual, and military power,
potentially a great world power. It was re-arming at a furious
pace soon after Hitler's rise to Chancellor. There was no guess
work in knowing this; everybody in Europe understood it. There
was even a considerable degree of sympathy with the idea that
Germany should recover her place in Europe, although few wanted
the re-asserted militarism that Hitler brought.
Germany was surrounded, and thereby posed
a threat to the stability of, several other major powers, including
France and Italy. Moreover, going clear back to the mid-1920s,
Hitler had laid out, for anyone to read, his intention of invading
the Slavic states east of Germany. This, too, was no secret,
and there was even some sympathy with the idea since few Western
statesmen liked the Soviet Union.
Hitler made it clear from about 1919
that he detested Jews, Slavs, and Communists, and that, given
the means, he would treat them ruthlessly.
Iraq is a small country, with a population
less than Canada's. While it is fairly advanced by the standards
of Arab states, it cannot meaningfully be called an advanced
country. Apart from the state of its economy and the general
level of its development, Iraq is not even in a geographical
position to threaten a major power. Iraq has had two wars, both
of them with the connivance or at least encouragement, of the
United States.
Hussein is a nasty dictator, but he is
no different from dozens of others the U.S. has put into place
or formed friendly relations with when it suited them. There
is no evidence that he has ever had the same visceral hatreds
of whole groups and races that Hitler had. He doesn't like Israel,
but then neither do many other people in the Middle East. He
has suppressed the Kurds because they seek independence, not
because they are Kurds, and in doing so, he is in the company
of countries like Turkey and the United States. He is brutal,
just as Mr. Sharon is brutal, but unless you want to use the
distorted language carelessly flung around in the United States,
he has not committed, nor does he have any interest in committing,
genocide.
A fundamental point cannot be made too
strongly. Iraq is not, nor has it ever been, any threat to the
United States. It posses neither the will nor the ability to
attack the United States. Iraq did once have a nuclear-weapons
program. That program was not aimed at the United States, but
at two rival or enemy states, Israel which already has a nuclear
arsenal and Iran which shows significant signs of developing
one, Iran being of course a country with whom Iraq fought a vicious
war during the 1980s. Every genuine expert, from previous and
current weapons inspectors to refugee Iraqi scientists, agrees
that Iraq's nuclear program no longer exists.
An annoyingly-ignorant expression is
"weapons of mass destruction" (WMD), something first
mouthed by the Pentagon under President Clinton. It cannot be
too strongly stated that there is only one genuine weapon of
mass destruction, and that is a nuclear (or thermonuclear) weapon.
It also cannot be stressed too strongly that only one nation
has actually used such a weapon.
Recently I heard an American colonel
in a brief interview confirm what is widely understood, that
if Hussein were to use poison gas, assuming he has some, it would
have very little effect on the battle field. Indeed.
As for biological weapons, we all saw
what military-grade anthrax, without the high-tech means for
its distribution, can do just a couple of years ago in the United
States when one of the country's many home-grown terrorists started
sending samples through the mail to prominent public figures
(never caught, by the way, just like a number of others including
the weirdo who added poison to Tylenol bottles years ago). It
was all very nasty, rather scary, but it killed only a few people.
Hardly a strategic threat.
Of course, you have to ask yourself that
if, indeed, Hussein has some stockpile of these materials, what
will be the effect of America's horrific bombardment on their
release and spread? Is this a more intelligent approach than
inspection and proper disposal?
Despite Bush's incoherent blubbering,
Iraq has never had dealings with al Qaeda. There is no evidence
for this notion whatsoever. Of course, now that the U.S. has
invaded the country, and it is fighting for its life, anything
becomes possible. Besides, if relations with al Qaeda were a
sound cause for war, there were far better candidates.
Al Qaeda was in good part a creation
of Pakistan's intelligence service wishing to manipulate affairs
in Afghanistan. But, no, Pakistan is not expected to be attacked
any time soon. Instead, it is America's ally in fighting terror,
having been granted numerous bounties and forgiveness of past
behavior.
You could make a crude case for attacking
Saudi Arabia, certainly no cruder than some of the actual arguments
we hear from Washington. Fourteen of the 9/11 desperados were
Saudis. But, no, while Saudi Arabia has been called some names
in Washington and intimidated into changing some of its practices
in making charitable donations, it is under no threat.
The best case for invasion based strictly
on al Qaeda dealings, of course, could be made against a giant,
secretive organization headquartered in Langley, Virginia, but
no threats of any kind have been made against the CIA. Indeed,
one expects the organization's feeding trough has been filled
to overflowing with Bush's astronomical increases in military
spending. Yet we know for sure that the good gentlemen of 9/11
entered the United States with valid visas, and we know for sure
that the CIA had been in the business for years of arranging
just such things as part of its secret nasty work in Afghanistan
and other places.
So that leaves Iraq - a country whose
ruler has personal animosity towards bin Laden at least as great
as that displayed by Mr. Bush towards Yasser Arafat - as the
place to attack. Does that make sense to you? No, and it doesn't
to anyone else in the world, outside Washington and those dependent
on its bounty or afraid of its wrath.
We have had an entire list of false claims
and downright lies from an administration desperate to make a
case. Bush has claimed, time and time again, intelligence information
he simply never had. If, in fact, he ever had anything decisive,
he refused to share it with U.N. weapons inspectors. Instead,
on several occasions, U.S.-supplied information sent inspectors
on pointless expeditions. Would you call that kind of action
supporting or deliberately hurting the U.N.?
Colin Powell's presentation to the U.N.
was de facto proof that the U.S. had no case. Had there been
proof, there would not even have been such a presentation. The
case would have been made in private to the members of the Security
Council. That's how things are normally done in world affairs.
No, what we got was a show-boat performance
intended to sway public emotions, not to supply anyone with facts
they did not already have. Powell uttered the same assertions
and guesses already heard many times. If that, truly, was the
best the CIA could do in coming up with facts for such a seemingly-dire
matter, they are seriously wasting American taxpayers' money.
We have the much-repeated assertion that
people like Canada or France or Germany should be supporting
their friend. No sensible person can make friendship an argument
for supporting a war that most people in the world agree is without
legitimate purpose. Should I assist my neighbor who decides to
beat members of his family or throw rocks at the windows of the
house of another neighbor he happens to hate? Anyway, Canada
has always supported legitimate international actions, and it
has always paid its dues, but the U.N. did not authorize the
violence in which America is now engaged.
The American ambassador to Canada, Mr.
Cellucci, has been going around making inappropriate public comments
about disappointment in not being supported by friends. An ambassador
making such statements, directly interfering in the internal
affairs of the country to which he is accredited, would normally
be asked to leave. But Mr. Cellucci feels safe continuing to
act the diplomatic cretin, because he knows that if Canada were
to request his departure, it would be viewed as a hostile act
in an already-aggrieved Washington.
There has been much bellowing to the
south over a couple of foolish remarks made in Canada concerning
Mr. Bush's mental capacity and character. But such personal comments
pale compared to the words of an ambassador, speaking with the
full force of his government's approval, interfering in the internal,
democratically-determined affairs of a country like Canada.
In a sense, the ambassador's willingness
to do this over such a sensitive issue only proves again how
right Canada's government has been in following the policy it
has. Canada always supports UN-mandated action. It cannot support
the dangerous, arbitrary whims of an administration whose poor
attitudes and lack of civility are reflected directly in Mr.
Cellucci's remarks.
John Chuckman
lives in Canada. He can be reached at: chuckman@counterpunch.org
Yesterday's
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Scott Handleman
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Vanessa Jones
Paint
Them Red
Brian J. Foley
Patriotic
Protest for Professors
Zoltan Grossman
After Saddam, a War on Iraqi Rebels?
Philip S. Golub
Inventing Demons
Richard Lichtman
On the Current Experience of Terror
Milan Rai
Blitz-Coup
Pepe Escobar
A Cheap Family Farce
Floyd Rudmin
The Nightmare at the Back Door: Nuclear Plant's as Terror Targets
Chris Floyd
See Rome (poem)
Website of the War
Iraq
Body Count
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