H 36°, L 23° | Tomorrow: 
H 23°, L 9°As Iraq staggers into the fourth bloody year of occupation, all signs indicate life is getting worse for Iraqis. The March 27 issue of Time magazine exposed a U.S. Marine massacre of 15 Iraqi civilians. Nine-year-old Eman Walid remembers, "First, they went into my father's room, where he was reading the Koran, and we heard shots. I watched them shoot my grandfather, first in the chest, then in the head. Then they killed my granny." This is the real story of Bush's "liberation," and in light of the "Troops Home Now" referendum on the ballot, this story must be told.
Ever since the words "weapons of mass destruction" officially became synonymous with deception, the Bush administration's justification for war has been to bring democracy to Iraq. However, this war that has killed more than 3,000 American soldiers and more than 100,000 Iraqis is not about democracy. It is about controlling an oil-rich region of the world.
This explanation for the war is not a conspiracy theory or wild speculation, but has appeared in neo-conservative strategy documents for more than a decade. As former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz wrote in a classified Pentagon report in 1992, the United States "must now refocus on precluding the emergence of any potential future global competitor. [W]e must maintain the mechanism for deterring potential competitors from even aspiring to a larger regional or global role." Wolfowitz and his colleagues know that if the United States is to maintain its superpower status, it must have access to oil and be able to control the oil supply of rising powers like China and India.
Given the real reasons for the war, ideas of "bringing democracy" become absurd. Even before the phony elections in Iraq, Paul Bremer, head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, had already established laws that would allow for the privatization of Iraq's oil industry and massive foreign investment. To ensure this process, Bremer also established the Transitional Administration Law, making it almost impossible for Iraqis to overturn his decrees.
There is also the fact that it is impossible to establish a democracy under a military occupation. I believe George W. Bush said it best more than a year ago: "All Syrian military forces and intelligence personnel must withdraw before the Lebanese elections for those elections to be free and fair. The Lebanese people have the right to determine their future free from domination by a foreign power." Though Bush's hypocrisy is staggering, he makes the point that democracy by definition must be a movement by the people.
Another claim of the pro-war side is that there could be a civil war between Shi'ites and Sunnis. There is some truth to this, but sectarian tensions have increased not in spite of the U.S. presence but because of the United States using the old imperialist "divide and conquer" tactic. In short, it is easier to control a country that is divided rather than united against you. For those who have seen "Hotel Rwanda," think of how Belgian colonialists pitted Hutu against Tutsi and the horrific result.
The United States created the Sunni/Shi'ite rivalry in a country with no history of sectarian violence. They accomplished this by banning the main secular party in Iraq — the Baath Party — then by reorganizing the government, military and police force along sectarian lines. Iraqi exile and antiwar journalist Sami Ramadini explained in an interview: "Any institution that [the United States] had a hand in forming had to be divided on a sectarian basis. This is completely alien to the country's general traditions over hundreds of years." Although civil war is not inevitable, Iraq may share Rwanda's fate if the United States is allowed to continue stoking these decisions.
The Troops Home Now referendum has also come under fire from those who are sympathetic to the anti-war movement but advocate some variation of Russ Feingold's "Troops Home Someday" plan or John Murtha's redeployment plan. Murtha's Nixon-esque plan would move troops out of Iraq while allowing the United States to continue to meddle in the region. However, both these positions weaken the antiwar movement because when even "anti-war" congressmen accept Bush's lie about the war being for democracy, it gives the lie greater legitimacy. Murtha, Feingold and Bush share a basic belief about the war. One of them simply has more invested in winning it.
The right wing in Madison claims this referendum will not do anything to end the war, which begs the question why they are mobilizing against it. In reality, the right is afraid this referendum will clarify a growing national consensus for withdrawal. A Troops Home Now victory will spark referendums across the country and help usher in a new period in the history of this war. Vote "yes" for Troops Home Now and let us move from the era of debate into the era of resistance.
Paul Pryse is a member of Stop The War!
IP hash: 6abf8188
You are a traitor and a supporter of terror. Even if everything you said is true, how do you explain the existence of terrorist groups? Are they all a conspiracy created by the government? I don’t care if the US government just wants oil. Good. We need that oil. All I know is, every time a muslim is born the world is in more danger, and every time a muslim is killed the world is a little safer.
You traitors have this idea that all of the problems in the middle east are because of the united states. Why do you ignore the fact that islam is the problem? Islam teaches terror. Even in countries without US intervention, the muslims there still promote terror. Just look at Afghanistan. They want to kill anyone who rejects their religion.
It seems you don’t want democracy for Iraq. Even if bringing democracy to Iraq is just a cover, isn’t it still a good idea? And what is the claim that the US caused the civil war between Sunnis and Shiites? Even if the US split them up, they are still the ones that set off the bombs and kill each other. Maybe the US sold weapons to Saddam, but he is the one who used them.
Stop making the muslims look like the innocent victims. Even if these conspiracies are true, that is not enough to explain the fact that muslims are inherently violent.
IP hash: 6fabc93d
There’s nothing wrong with showing our dissatisfaction with the war; the war referendum is healthy for the country. Our political leaders MUST hear the public and respond. We need to see progress if we’re going to keep dumping hundreds of Billions of dollars into a war that probably should have never started.
Hello, Washington! it’s time to quit the partisan bickering and time to get results. Win the war and take care of your people (the sick, the elderly, the poor).
P.S. Oh yeah, a $9 Trillion spending cap isn’t my definition of fiscal conservatism. Clinton was more of a conservative than Bush.
IP hash: 745cf098
Bring the troops home from Germany, Japan and Korea FIRST.
Put them on the border to stop the ongoing invasion from Mexico.
Others in the coalition hope to see a “reconquest” of the American southwest by Mexico. This would not likely take place through military action, they say, but rather through a slow process of migration — both legal and illegal. http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=49482
IP hash: c4a1e057
The way gas prices are heading, I say we quit this “give Iraq democracy” ploy, take over Iraq and start shipping the oil
IP hash: f8db796e
“… life is getting worse for Iraqis.”
How do you know? Have you talked to any Iraqis lately?
IP hash: cb063850
“You are a traitor and a supporter of terror.”
Have you ever seen terrorism up close? I was at the WTC when it was hit. And I supported the president’s decision to attack Afghanistan because of that terrorist attack.
But Iraq had nothing to do with that, and by attacking Iraq, our resources were directed away from a much more important mission in Afghanistan, a mission that has essentially been abandoned in favor of the war in Iraq.
And you call opponents of the war in Iraq traitors? Shame on you!
IP hash: ca8232d6
Islam is not the problem. There is huge class disparity which is being diffused into anti-American sentiments. If you want to continue promoting hyper-conservatism world-wide, expect more of the same, otherwise maybe promoting leftism and the lower classes over the elites for once might change things? And it also doesn’t help that we export weapons of death and destruction to both sides during every war. Instead of ranting about how we need to stop terrorists, maybe we should figure out why there’s terrorists in the first place.
Before you start foaming at the mouth, I don’t think we should capitulate to people who want to kill us. But going into Iraq is comparable to walking into a dark alley where you know someone’s waiting with a gun. Maybe if we stop treating the entire world as our colony, people wouldn’t hate us.