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CounterPunch
March 20,
2003
It's
Not About Terrorism, WMD or Liberation
Myths and facts about the war
by RAHUL MAHAJAN and
ROBERT JENSEN
Last night, our president announced a war to the
nation and the world. Let us be clear about what this war is
and what it is not.
This war is not the result of a failure
of diplomacy.
This war is not a pre-emptive war.
This war is not about weapons of mass
destruction.
This war is not about terrorism.
This war is not about the liberation
of the Iraqi people.
Diplomacy: Nations typically engage in
diplomacy to avoid having to go to war. After Iraq invaded Kuwait
in 1990, numerous attempts at diplomacy were made by France,
the Soviet Union, and the Arab League. They all foundered, primarily
on the intransigence of the first Bush administration.  In this case, the
second Bush administration tried to use "diplomacy"
to create a war out of whole cloth, making no attempt to negotiate
with Iraq. In fact, as Iraq made concession after concession
-- as it became increasingly clear that whatever pitiful arsenal
Iraq had could be found and dismantled if inspections were allowed
to continue -- U.S. attempts to strong-arm other countries into
supporting the war became increasingly crude and coercive. Although
those attempts mostly failed, they were hardly aimed at preventing
the war.
Pre-emption: In order to pre-empt a threat
with war, there must be some credible reason to believe that
the threat exists and that no other strategies will address it.
A threat involves capability and intent. In this case, the Bush
administration was not able to show that Iraq has the capability,
and no attempt was made to show that it had the intent to attack.
Weapons of Mass Destruction: As time
passed, the administration's lies, half-truths, and distortions
became increasingly ridiculous. From scare stories about an "unmanned
aerial vehicle" that turned out to be a glider held together
with spit and baling wire, to forged documents claiming that
Iraq was trying to buy uranium from Niger, nothing has held water.
Claims of mobile biological laboratories were refuted by weapons
inspectors, as were claims that Iraq had or was about to get
nuclear weapons. And, of course, ongoing inspections would have
ensured that no arsenal could be built.
Terrorism: This claim is even more absurd.
The best the Bush administration could come up with was a Jordanian
militant, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a member of Ansar al-Islam whose
ties to either al-Qaeda or the Iraqi government are completely
unsubstantiated. A recent British intelligence assessment concluded
that there is no link between Iraq and al-Qaeda.
Liberation: The United States does not
care about true democracy for Iraq. In 1991, when a popular uprising
after the Gulf War threatened to oust Hussein's government, the
United States intervened to keep Hussein in power. The reason,
as officials explained later, was that the United States wanted
a military coup to preserve what Richard Haas of the National
Security Council called "Saddam's regime without Saddam."
Since 9/11, the Bush administration has funded a coup attempt
in Venezuela, installed a puppet regime in Afghanistan, and cracked
down on basic democratic protections in the United States. It
would be ironic if the administration wanted democracy for Iraqis
but not for Americans. U.S. plans for Iraq clearly involve establishing
yet another puppet regime
So, what is this war? It is an act of
premeditated aggression. It is part of an attempt to put the
tremendous energy reserves of the Middle East more tightly under
American control. It is the key stage in the building of a new
empire. It is part of a long-term attempt to establish more clearly
than ever the rule of force in international affairs and sweep
away any role for international law or institutions beyond those
in service to the empire.
Another fact we must remember: This war
did not begin last night.
March 19, 2003, was simply the start
of a new, more intense phase of the U.S. attack on Iraq that
has been going on since the end of the 1991 Gulf War, through
the harshest economic embargo in modern history and through more
than four years of regular bombing.
Already, hundreds of thousands -- possibly
more than a million -- innocent Iraqis have died in this ongoing
assault. As we count the civilian casualities from this newest
phase, they must be added to this roster of the dead so that
the costs of the U.S. war will not be obscured.
This is crucial to understand, because
when U.S. military forces topple the government of Saddam Hussein,
we shouldn't be surprised if ordinary Iraqis cheer. Their celebrations
will not be about only the demise of a dictator but about the
hoped-for end of a regime of fear and deprivation imposed by
the United States, in which parents have been forced to watch
children die of malnutrition and disease caused by the enforced
poverty created by the embargo.
And, finally: Just as the war against
Iraq did not begin last night, the larger war for empire will
not end with Iraq. Other nations, notably Iran, are already on
the target list. Bush administration officials talk of remaking
the map of the Middle East. Beyond that is the desire to counter
the rising power of China.
The American takeover of Iraq likely
cannot be stopped. But just as there has been a time for war,
there can come a time for justice if we -- the citizens of the
empire -- recognize that this battle may be lost, but there is
still a world to win.
Rahul Mahajan
is a founding member of the Nowar
Collective and serves on the National Board of Peace Action.
This article has been excerpted from his forthcoming book, "The
U.S. War Against Iraq: Myths, Facts, and Lies," published
by Seven Stories. His first book, "The
New Crusade: America's War on Terrorism," has been described
as "mandatory reading for all those who wish to get a handle
on the war on terrorism." His articles can be found at http://www.rahulmahajan.com
He can be contacted at rahul@tao.ca
Robert Jensen
is an associate professor of journalism at the University of
Texas at Austin, a member of the Nowar Collective, and author
of the book Writing
Dissent: Taking Radical Ideas from the Margins to the Mainstream
and the pamphlet "Citizens of the Empire." He can be
reached at rjensen@uts.cc.utexas.edu.
Yesterday's
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