The Failure of the Iraq War

The war on Iraq was begun on March 20, 2003 and “officially” ended December 15, 2011. After the lies by Bush about Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass destruction the government's stated goal about why they entered Iraq (a country that had nothing to do with the September 11th attacks) changed to a rallying cry of goodwill and humanitarianism. The U.S government wanted to bring peace and democracy to Iraq, they said. However, even this looks to be false. Another piece of war propaganda. An article by Glenn Greenwald at Salon.com titled Wes Clark and the neocon dream explains that pure conquest was the true motivations of the Iraq war. Greenwald cited a speech by Gen. Wesley Clark in 2007 at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco in which he explained that the ultimate goal of the Iraq war was to “destroy the governments in 7 countries in five years – we’re going to start with Iraq, and then we’re going to move to Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Iran.” The U.S. government wanted to “destabilize the Middle East, turn it upside down, make it under our control,” said Clark.

Here is a section of video from Clark's speech:



Not only were we lied to about the U.S. government's ultimate goals, (but what else is new...) the alleged democracy, security, and prosperity the U.S. was supposed to deliver to Iraq is as illusory as the weapons of mass destruction that lead to the invasion of Iraq. The Cost of War website notes that the idea that the war brought any form of democracy to Iraq is a pipe dream. In its analysis it writes,

The invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq both resulted in the eviction of two of the world’s most repressive regimes, that of Saddam Hussein and that of the Taliban. While bringing democracy to the two countries was not the initial rationale for either war (v. eliminating safe haven to terrorists and weapons of mass destruction), democracy promotion quickly became a stated goal for each.

Nonetheless, on a widely used evaluation and ranking of the quality of democracy across the world’s states, the “Democracy Index,” Iraq ranks poorly. Of the 167 countries ranked for 2010, Iraq is classified as a “hybrid regime” (between a “flawed democracy” and an “authoritarian regime”) and comes in at #111. [1] According to Transparency International, on a corruption scale from 0 to 10, Iraq ranks 1.5 -- the worst in the Middle East -- in corruption (defined as “abuse of entrusted power for private gain”) in 2010. [2] Freedom House simply says: "Iraq is not an electoral democracy. Although it has conducted meaningful elections, political participation and decision-making in the country remain seriously impaired by sectarian and insurgent violence, widespread corruption, and the influence of foreign powers." [3] Freedom House also notes that hundreds of professors were killed and many fled the country during the height of the sectarian fighting, a blow to academic freedom; the judiciary's independence is threatened by political pressure, and sectarian violence continues to threaten the religious freedom.

Not only were the stated goals a lie, and the supposed success of the war a lie, but the tremendous loss of life for the sake of power and domination is pure evil. In all, 31,741 american people have died fighting these wars with and for the United States. As for the number of Afghan, Iraqi, and Pakistani civilians killed, that number is a whopping total of approximately 176,700.

Even though the war was “officially” ended on December 15, 2011, and the american troops have all come home (but only because the Iraq people refused to grant the troops immunity for any and all crimes committed), thousands of private contractors that will help to secure and run the “largest [U.S.] embassy that it has on the planet” will pour into Iraq after the troops leave. This fact makes many wonder if the war is truly over.

This is yet another pointless war for power and profit, but what else should we expect from powerful governments? This is what they always do and will continue to do so long as governments are allowed to exist.