JOHN OSTRANDER: Devil’s Advocate – Iraq
I’ve got something nibbling at my mind and perhaps the only way for me to sort it out is to put it into words. It has to do with our adventure in nation-building, a.k.a. the Iraq debacle.
I’ll start by saying that I was for the invasion of Afghanistan. Then and now, it seemed to me the necessary response to 9/11. Al Quaeda appeared responsible; they had their camps in Afghanistan with the full knowledge and support of the Afghan government, the Taliban. You get hit, you hit back at the ones who hit you. Hard. As Al Capone said, “That’s the Chicago way.”
On the other hand, I was not for the invasion of Iraq from the beginning and I said so. I didn’t buy the “imminent danger” from the “weapons of mass destruction,” especially since there were UN weapons inspection teams on the ground inside the country. The fact that the Bush Administration was so stridently insistent made me ask “What else is going on here?” At first I thought it was about the oil (and now Alan Greenspan says it was); I came to believe that it was a NeoCon vision of transforming the MidEast by creating a functioning democracy in the middle of it. Now I think it’s about the oil, about the NeoCon vision, and certain select Bush-friendly companies making a bucket of money there.
I believe that the NeoCons thought that the Iraqis in exile would just step in, set up a new government, we would be hailed as liberators, and it would all be done in six months. I believe it was on the agenda to do before 9/11 happened; that tragedy just enabled the Bushies to push the plan through without thinking it through. The only plan the current administration seems to have for dealing with the mess is to leave it for the next administration to clean up. Instead of nation building, we seem to have created a geographical area of chaos. It’s a constant drain on both our military and our national finances; Iraq seems like an open wound.
My disgust with all of this is long standing. We had no business going into Iraq in the first place. The WMDs were a lie and the Administration knew it or, at very least, should have known it. The Dems were elected to Congress on the promise to end the war and the low low low approval rating of Congress at the moment stems on their failure to even staunch the flow. Since I didn’t believe we should be there in the first place, it stands to reason that I think we should get out at first opportunity.
BUT. . .
Colin Powell is purported to have said to Bush about Iraq before the invasion that “If you break it, you’ve bought it.” And there’s my problem. I think there’s truth to that. Before we invaded, Iraq was a functioning country: it had electricity, people had jobs. Yes, it also had a murderous dictator in charge; lots of places around the globe do and we don’t seem to have bothered ourselves about them.
So now what have we got? Sect fights sect and sects fight internally and they all hate us. It’s chaos and we brought it. We, the People. This country. You, an individual, may have, like me, been against the whole misbegotten enterprise from the start but I’m talking about the collective We. The We that elected not only the President but the members of Congress that sustained him, as well as the Democratic Party that has no spine.
Iraq is broke, we broke it and my question – my problem – is how do we just walk away from that? How do we just remove our troops? This mess, like it or not, is our collective responsibility. The chaos exists because our country created it. We let it be created in our name. It is our doing – not just Bush’s. It was going to be fast, cheap, and painless for us. Well, it wasn’t and isn’t.
So – what is the answer? Damned if I know. Everywhere I hear the solution is diplomatic rather than military but I don’t know what that means. What is the role of the military in Iraq now? If we can’t define it, maybe we should pull them out. I don’t know. We keep extending the military tours, overextending the personnel, and asking them to do jobs that are not really a military function – such as “winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqis.” The military guards, it defends, it attacks. It functions best when it has clearly described goals and a clearly defined enemy. “Nation building” is not something that should be asked of them.
Is the answer to divide the place up? Some, such as Senator Joe Biden, have offered that there is really three “Iraqs” and that we should recognize that and let each area rule itself, coming together in a Federation for such things as oil revenues. That sounded like sense to me but I’ve also heard that isn’t what the people of Iraq themselves want. It would be another imposed solution by people who don’t live there and know neither the people nor the culture(s).
Nor do I think it would be a lasting solution. Each region would be weaker than a whole and subject to domination by its neighbors. To the North, Turkey has no interest in a (semi)autonomous Kurdish state; it would encourage the Kurds in Turkey to break away and I don’t think the Turks would put up with that. For the central and South – Syria and Iran both have covetous eyes on the Iraqi oil fields; Syria has shown, with Lebanon, that it has a penchant for controlling neighbors and Iran is already appears to have its agents at work in Iraq.
The Iraqis should choose for themselves, but maybe there is no such thing as an “Iraqi.” The country of Iraq was an artificial construct, created by foreigners after World War 1 who jammed different groups of people together and drew arbitrary national boundaries. On the other hand, how much in common did Virginia and New York have when they became part of the formation of the United States?
Perhaps the solution is more along the lines of the Marshall Plan where, after World War II, this country helped those countries shattered by the ravages of war – including enemies such as Germany and Japan – to become functioning modern nations. But instead of the U.S. government doing the rebuilding, a la the Marshall Plan, we’ve tried to “privatize it” – we hired private companies to handle it – because supposedly that is the most “cost effective” way – on paper, anyway. We let the “free market” do its thing. However, perhaps because there is no regulation and no oversight, what we’re getting is massive corruption, overcharging, and theft – and the work isn’t getting done. We’re just getting ripped-off. Gordon Gekko is out of prison and working in Iraq and greed is, indeed, good.
I know we can’t continue the way we’re going; that way – which Bush is determined to follow – produces nothing and shows no viable sign for improvement that I’ve seen. However, I also think we have a moral responsibility for Iraq and cannot simply haul ass back home and say, “Bye, you’re on your own.” Or is that just hopelessly naïve and simplistic? The best I seem to be able to come up with is, “With great power comes great responsibility.” I can’t tell if that means I want Ben Parker for president or Stan Lee.
Bush was elected (though some would argue that) and then re-elected (although some would argue that as well). And the majority of Americans bought what he was saying about Iraq and cheered as we went to war. He’s our bull and we’re responsible for what he did in the Iraqi china shop. It’s our mistake to make right and it won’t be quick and it won’t be cheap.
Make no mistake; I’m not talking about “staying the course” until we achieve “victory.” I’m talking about making right what we did wrong. If we are anything at all like we say we are –as we like to think of ourselves as being – hen I don’t know how we get around it. I don’t know how to fix it but I don’t know how we walk away.
GrimJack: The Manx Cat, by John Ostrander and Timothy Truman, debuts on ComicMix this Tuesday. Munden’s Bar returns on Friday, October 5th right here on ComicMIx – both are free and available to you 24/7. John’s Suicide Squad: Raise The Flag and Star Wars: Legacy are in the comics shops right now.
"The WMDs were a lie and the Administration knew it or, at very least, should have known it."Forgive me for repeating myself, but just about every politician (including both Clintons and John Kerry) all bought the "lie" about Iraq being in possession of weapons for YEARS. There's endless quotes of all of them saying clearly and distinctly that Iraq had ABC weapons (Atomic, Bateria, Chemical; old school Judge Dredd reference) and that he was a definite threat to the region and the world. So either they were all lying, or all deluded? Clinton hit Iraq a couple of times during his presidency; why is he never spoken of as a despotic madman or the like?I've used this analogy before, but I get the feeling Iraq was like the one kid in school that everyone knew it was okay to pick on cause they'd never fight back. But finally one kid actually HITS him, and everybody backs off, saying "aw, man, that ain't cool". Like they ruined the fun. That was Bush's mistake, apparently.All told I do believe that taking down Saddam was a good idea, but I agree that the time chosen to do it was poorly selected. We sorted out Afghanistan in what seemed like a week and a half. We should have spent a lot more time touting that victory. Making it clear to other countries that if you push us, we push back. That would have provided a lot of the leverage we needed to help weed out more terrorists from "friendly" nations. Instead Bush cashed in his political capital and went after Iraq.People still remember the images of Republican Guards surrendering to CNN in the last war in Iraq. We're used to easy wars now. This little sortie took longer than a marathon game of Halo 3, so people started to think we were losing, and wanted to pull out (note eternal correlation to war and interpersonal relationship terminology; no joke actually needed). Add to that the fact that in too many people's eyes, we hadn't actualy succeeded in Afghanistan because we didn't "get Bin Laden". They spent too much time touting him as the mastermind, the Blofeld of the plot. So though we took out his seat of power, the majority of his assistants, and much of his infrastructure, we didn't get The Guy, so to a lot of people, we didn't do anything.Ironically, Bin Laden has now taken Saddam's place. A public face of evil (with very little actual power at the present) that the Americans all know to hate, who pops up occasionally to say rude things and make us look bad and feel nervous about. The bad side is that we can't point to a spot on the map and say "He's here."The "war" was won some time ago (defined as, taking down Saddam). We are now in the cleanup, which often takes far longer than the act of breaking something. How long did it take to get Germany in a state (okay, two states) that it could support itself? We are indeed responsible for the position Iraq is in, and we are similarly responsible to sort it out. It's just that I believe it's quite possible the new situation will be better for both the people of Iraq, the region and the world. We will never leave Iraq. Heck, we STILL have bases in and around Germany. But progress is being made, and I do believe that they'll end up with a more free way to live.
VinnieBefore the war started, we had weapons inspectors ON THE GROUND inside of Iraq who Bush demanded to be racalled as part of his ramping up to war. They weren't finding the WMDs. You can take the stand that either a) Saddam was a genius at hiding them or b) they weren't there. I know which option I'M betting on. The weapons inspectors were thorough, they had people who spoke the language, and they had tips from people who lived inside of the country. We had to RUSH TO WAR because, we were told, the threats were IMMINENT. In reality, we had to rush to war because if people had to take a cold hard look at the facts, the case for war would have collapsed. The Bushies played on the fear that, if we didn't get them WMDs, we would face another 9/11. It was NOT sold on the basis of the oil or of nation building or of saving the Iraquis from Saddam Hussein — it was sold to the US on the basis of the WMDs. The American people were told, over and over, that we would take down Saddam Hussein and be back out in a matter of MONTHS. There was NO talk of an investment of years and billions of dollars and lots of lives because the Bush Administration never considered that possibility going in. They were going to do it quick and cheap.The failure in Afghanistan is not in the failure to capture of kill Ben Laden — although that was Bush's promise and vow — but in diverting resources away from Afghanistan to Iraq. IF we were going to do nation building anywhere, THAT should have been the place. And we COULD have. But, for the Bush Administration, Afghanistan was always just a sideshow — despite it actually HOUSING the people who caused 9/11 — to their real intentions in Iraq.We're in a CLEAN-UP stage in Iraq? No, we're in a MELTDOWN stage in Iraq! The REAL objective in the war was not simply taking down Saddam (which was easy; Luxembourg might have been able to do it) but in replacing that iraq with a functional, stable democracy. and the Bushies have BLOWN that."Never" leaving in Iraq is not a viable option; Iraq isn't Germany (and i'm not certain that the German bases haven't outlived their purposes either) and we can't bleed forever. Germany has a STABLE government and Iraq has. . . chaos. The two aren't comparable.What we need is a new plan since the current ones aren't working. One that has fixed and achievable goals and not merely platitudes. Something this Administration, because it can never admit to being WRONG, is incapable of doing. I'm not an expert so I can't tell you what it is. What it ISN'T is what we're doing NOW.
It's interesting that you use an Al Capone quote to talk about Afghanistan. I've always considered Al Q'aeda more of an international criminal operation than a state-sponsored Afghani thing anyway. The state-sponsored Afghani terror thing would be the Taliban, which is horrid but which did NOT attack us on 9-11. If any state sponsored Al Q'aeda it's Saudi Arabia, some of Bush's best buddies. But I digress. Given the "structure" of Al Q'aeda as a criminal enterprise, it just made more sense to me that we should have hit them hard with our own network of international police and spy organizations, captured bin Laden (still at large after 6+ years!), rounded them up and brought them to justice that way. But that wouldn't have been very profitable for the bomb makers itching to test their weaponry, would it?In terms of "you break it, you bought it," yes, in theory it would be our responsibility to fix Iraq if everything we touched there didn't turn to sh*t. In practicality, since we've already proven our gross incompetence at being able to do anything about– well, about New Orleans' 9th Ward let alone Iraq, we need to get the hell out. I miss the days when Americans had a "can do" attitude about building and repairing; these days we only seem to have that stance when it comes to destruction.
ElayneI think AMERICANS, as citizens, still have a "can do" attitude. The fact that individuals succeeded in New Orfleans where governmental groups failed means that the governmental groups need a swamping out. We need people who think more clearly and realistically and make better plans in the governmental agencies — federal, state and local. we have to start voting people in based on their competence and not whether or not they "share our values" or that they seem like "someone I could have a beer with". Someone who is "just folks". I don't want someone as good as me running the government; I KNOW me. I want someone BETTER, who knows how government runs and can make it work. I think America is still capable of getting the job done, whatever the job is. (Hopelessly optimistic, that's me.) Just need someone more competent in government to organize what government does — and that includes not hiring cronies.
Oh absolutely, cronyism and the disdain the neocons have for the very idea of governing are two of the things that have damned this country quite a bit in this century. And I ought to have said I count the citizenry separate from the government in regards to the "can do" attitude. That to me was the great lesson of 9-11 — contrary to Donald Rumsfeld's assertions, the first impulse of citizens in a crisis is NOT to loot an area's valuables, but to see how they can help one another.
Colin Powell is purported to have said to Bush about Iraq before the invasion that “If you break it, you’ve bought it.” And there’s my problem. I think there’s truth to that.Using a somewhat stretched analogy, think of a marriage. Sometimes, you have perfectly good people who, in the course of a marriage where things don't work, stop being good people– he goes crazy, she gets abusive, things get ugly, you can write the basic arc. Does holding a "you broke it, you bought it" justify staying in the marriage until death? Or should a toxic relationship dissolve so people can get on with their lives?
Better analogy, I think, would be the doctor's oath — "First do no harm." A surgeon, in particular, does invasive procedures with the desired effecft of improving the patient's health or ability to survive. If they screw it up, they are indeed liable. They are expected to "make things right". A marrioage is a contract between two individuals desiring to create a more perfect union. Might be better applied to the American Civil War.BTW, some religions — like the Roamn Catholics — DO think that the commitment is forever and do not permit divorce.
"They are expected to "make things right.'"?? Surgeons? Their idea of making things right is to bitch about their malpractice payments. A bigger batch of overpaid prima donnas doth not exist.I understand the RC does not permit divorce or birth control. Some other faiths permit polygamy and/or use sex as a religious ritual. Some use metaphoric drugs. Others use real drugs. Different strokes. That's why it's all called "faith" — it circumvents reality and practicality for external and abstract reasons that are unfathomable to outsiders.
There was clearly no need to go into Iraq. There were no WMDs. None of the 9/11 hijackers came from Iraq. This was Bush's little adventure. And today, the WashPost says Hussein was willing to go into exile before our attack.Like so many of the little Eastern European countries, Iraq was a mess before we came. We still have a presence in the newly-formed countries, but they are primarily running themselves now. I think that would be appropriate in Iraq.
For an interesting slant on the situation, I recommend the Masters Of Horror Season 1 episode "The Homecoming" directed by Joe Dante.
I agree with John when it comes to Iraq. The U.S. is responsible for the turmoil that exists in Iraq and should do everything possible to help. I don't know what will truly help as the situation is very complex.As for Afghanistan, I agree with Elayne. When the goal is the elimination of one man seems to be the primary goal (as the success in Afghanistan hinges on Bin Ladin), a surgical strike is the best route. Not sending an wave of soldiers and hope you hit the right target in the melee.