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Why is
America Still in Iraq? The Answer is: Pride
By Gwen Richardson
Gwen Richardson
Houston, TX
(BlackNews.com) - Last week, General David Petraeus and Ryan C.
Crocker, the American envoy to Baghdad, testified before the Senate
Armed Services and Foreign Relations Committees to provide an update
on the status of the U.S. military presence in Iraq. The news was
not encouraging.
Petraeus called
American progress in Iraq "fragile and reversible," implying
that the presence of our 140,000 troops is the only factor keeping
the country from collapsing into complete chaos. He and the Bush
administration seem to be mystified as to why the puppet government
we installed, headed by Iraqi Prime Minister Malaki, cannot take
command of the bureaucracy and the situation on the ground.
The fact is
that if Malaki and his allies had the cojones to run the Iraqi government,
Saddam Hussein and the Sunnis would not have dominated it in the
first place. No indigenous people will respect a puppet government
installed by an occupying force, nor should they, and the Iraqis
are no exception. The Bushites clearly need to read their history
books or simply use common sense.
Yet, if Bush
and his advisors had used common sense, they wouldn't have invaded
Iraq to begin with. After 9/11, they were clearly dubious about
any leader who might have the potential to be a terrorist threat,
but the seeds were sown for an Iraqi invasion long before September
2001.
Neoconservatives
like William Kristol and Robert Kagan had been advocating for the
overthrow of Hussein's regime for years. In a New York Times commentary
in January 1998, Kristol and Kagan wrote: "Saddam Hussein must
go," chiding the Clinton administration for not being aggressive
enough with the Iraqi leader. The only way to achieve the objective
of ensuring that Hussein never again used weapons of mass destruction
-- which we now know that Hussein did not possess at the time of
the U.S. invasion -- argued the two neocons, was to "remove
Mr. Hussein and his regime from power."
Although unsuccessful
in getting Clinton to do their bidding, Kristol, Hagan and other
neocons continued to beat the drums for unilateral intervention
after George W. Bush was elected in 2000. Then came 9/11 and the
horror of a terrorist attack on U.S. soil killing thousands of innocent
Americans.
With the American
people still frightened about the potential for more terrorist attacks
and the short-sightedness of Bush and his comrade Dick Cheney, who
believes it's okay to go to war as long as he can be granted deferments
to avoid wearing the uniform himself, neocons now had their opening.
They knew there was no evidence whatsoever linking Hussein to the
9/11 attacks, but they apparently didn't care. Bush and Cheney orchestrated
something that had previously been antithetical to U.S. foreign
policy -- they invaded a country which presented no threat to the
U.S. and overthrew the leader of a sovereign nation.
That's why Bush
and his cronies have continued to sing a different tune every few
months as to the reasons why we are in Iraq: Freedom and democracy
for the Iraqi people; to create stability in the region (which,
by the way, we destabilized with our occupation); to rid the region
of Al Qaeda and its radical Islamic extremist terrorist sympathizers
(which, by the way, were also not present in Iraq until we invaded);
and, now, to keep Iran from having a more powerful role in Iraq
(again, a result of our invasion). Five years, 4,000+ American military
lives and nearly $1 trillion later, we are now stuck in a quagmire
in Iraq because our political and military leaders are too proud
to admit a mistake. There is no shame or dishonor in erring, but
refusing to admit that a mistake has been made and then telling
repeated falsehoods to continue this fraudulent war only compounds
the original sin. In the Bushites' warped minds, to withdraw will
admit defeat so we have to figure out how to win an unwinnable war
that should have never been waged. And anyone who deigns to criticize
our government's military malfeasance is quickly labeled "unpatriotic."
Meanwhile, the
American body count continues to rise; our debt to the Chinese,
who are financing this war, continues to mount; and America's image
around the world continues to deteriorate. To make matters worse,
now Bush, Sen. John McCain and Sen. Joseph Lieberman are rattling
their sabers and threatening a pre-emptive strike against Iran.
The Bible says:
"Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before
a fall." Bush, who confesses to have had a religious conversion
years ago, and America's next president might do well to study the
book of Proverbs before continuing on this ill-advised course of
military aggression against countries that are not threatening the
United States.
Gwen Richardson is an entrepreneur and author based in Houston,
Texas. Her new book is titled Why African Americans Can't Get
Ahead: And How We Can Solve It With Group Economics. Richardson
is currently writing a book about the 2008 presidential election.
NOTE: Permission is granted for all U.S. domestic
and international media outlets to print this commentary in its
entirety, as long as credit is given to the above author and author's
info citation is included.
CONTACT:
Gwen
Richardson
grichardson@cushcity.com
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