The Emperor's New Clothes : Pretending that War is Noble

By Everett Griffiths
Feb. 20th,2005
Ran in the Johnstown Breeze March 10th, 2005. They ran the piece verbatim, without edits.
The University Daily Kansan ran it March 9th, 2005, under the title "Bush's reasons for Iraq war all excuses"

There are shiny and noble reasons that are given for the US being in Iraq, but a ridiculous amount of imagination is required to actually believe them. The Bush Administration has knowingly based the war on three false pillars: one, that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction; two, that they are linked with terrorists groups such as Al Qaeda; and three, that we are bringing its people freedom and democracy.

Where are the weapons of mass destruction? UN weapon inspectors found no credible evidence of them. Defectors testified that the remaining arsenal was effectively destroyed in the '90s. The chemical weapons that Iraq had been able to produce prior to the First Gulf War had a shelf life of less than three years. Documents "proving" that Iraq had attempted to purchase Uranium were nothing but forgeries. The most credible threat of WMDs that Collin Powell could present was that of mobile chemical labs -- a threat so intangible that no one has actually seen one, forcing Powell to use computer simulations instead of hard photographic evidence. But perhaps the most telling indication that Iraq had no WMDs is that after a year of occupation, we have found nothing.

How about the terrorists? Saddam Hussein was a megalomaniacal dictator, and by his very nature, he grubbed for any and all power. He did not tolerate grass roots movements of any kind, religious or secular, because any such movement constituted a threat to him. He expressed his contempt for Osama Bin Laden, and although Saddam was pleased by the Sept. 11th attacks, not a single hijacker was from Iraq. No, instead of combating terrorism, the Iraqi invasion has acted as a magnet for terrorists: it is the latest poster child for martyrdom.

And lastly, how does one "instill" democracy where historically, none has ever existed? It cannot come from the end of a gun. It is clear that the US does not want a democracy in Iraq, for any democracy in that country would certainly not be pro-America or pro-Israel. What if the good people of Iraq democratically decide that the US may not purchase its oil? No, a democracy in Iraq simply wouldn't do.

The best explanation for the war in Iraq is that we want to install a free market economy; there are fortunes to be made, both in rebuilding and in the oil industry, and now the flow of oil and currency can be virtually assured by the establishment of a permanent military base there.

History supports this explanation. In 1953, the CIA orchestrated a coup which overthrew the democratically appointed prime minister of Iran, Mohammad Mossadegh. He had no weapons of mass destruction. He detested autocracy and loved freedom. He tolerated no ties with terrorist groups. But Mossadegh would not let the oil flow, so we overthrew him, installing in his place the dictator Reza Shah, a man who brutalized his own people and allowed radical Islam to flourish. Our intense meddling with Iran's politics polarized whole sections of the population, so those radical Islamic groups became more and more Anti-American, and who could blame them? We put their George Washington under house arrest, toppled their democracy, and ended their civil liberties so we could exploit their natural resources. Why wouldn't they hate us? It is not unreasonable to draw connections linking the CIA's exploits of the 1950s to the terrorist retaliations of 2001. This begs the question: what punishment awaits our country in another fifty years for our current aggression in Iraq?

I can't pretend anymore, for behind all of Mr. Bush's impossible reasons for going to war, he is nothing more than a terrorist in his own right. Iraqi civilians and our own military personnel are being killed en masse because of his empty fabrications. Shameful, Mr. Bush. Shameful.