The Inside Assyria Discussion Forum #5

=> Repackaging the occupation by: Haytham Bahoora

Repackaging the occupation by: Haytham Bahoora

Posted by Jeffrey (Guest) - Saturday, August 8 2009, 9:30:26 (CEST) from 69.14.30.71 - d14-69-71-30.try.wideopenwest.com Commercial - Windows XP - Mozilla Website: Website title:

Repackaging the occupation The unprecedented calls from within the United States for a withdrawal from Iraq must be magnified, writes Haytham Bahoora The chasm separating the Bush administration's version of events in Iraq and the actual reality of the occupation has, it appears, become so absurdly wide that even Republican supporters of the illegal war and occupation have begun to question the Bush administration's inability to publicly face the disastrous truth. Conservative Republican Senator Chuck Hagel recently commented about the war, "It's like they're just making it up as they go along," adding that the White House is "completely disconnected from reality". Such bold statements by Republicans, criticising a fellow Republican administration, have forced the Bush administration to wage a propaganda offensive aimed at convincing an increasingly sceptical American population that the situation in Iraq is under control. A recent meeting between President Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim Al-Jaafari was followed by a prime time speech by Bush a week later in which he repeatedly sought to justify the occupation with references to 9/11, as if still unaware that the two are not related. The spectacle of Bush and Al-Jaafari together, speaking glowingly about the progress being made in Iraq will surely be digested by the majority of Iraqis as the deceitful propaganda that it is. While Iraqis swelter in this, their third summer under occupation, with power cuts, a lack of clean water, and no improvement in the security situation, they must also bare the sight of their prime minister effusively thanking George Bush and the American people for their "sacrifices" in Iraq, but Al-Jaafari was doing nothing more than paying the necessary homage to the man responsible for the existence of his government. The deteriorating situation in Iraq, and eroding public support for the war and occupation in the US, have forced the American and British governments to consider withdrawing thousands of troops by next year. A document written by the British defence secretary, leaked to the press this week, indicates that Washington would like to hand over security in 14 of Iraq's 18 provinces to Iraqi security forces by next year, slashing US troop levels from the current 176,000 to around 66,000, and British troop levels from 8,500 troops to 3,000. Not surprisingly, a significant American troop presence would remain in Sunni dominated central Iraq, including Baghdad. Perhaps seeking to placate the increasingly vocal dissent in the US, the possible partial withdrawal would not fundamentally alter the dynamics of the occupation in the four provinces where the resistance is strongest: Anbar, Ninevah, Baghdad and Salahuddin. More likely, this "withdrawal" plan is a ploy to win back support from the American public and congressmembers who have demanded a policy change by the Bush administration. A partial withdrawal would allow the US to maintain a sizeable occupation force in much of Iraq, including Baghdad, and would continue to exacerbate sectarian tensions in the country. Nevertheless, the Bush administration seems to understand the political capital present in the word "withdrawal". By exploiting the current public mood without significantly altering its policies on the ground, the Bush administration will co-opt dissenting voices while fundamentally maintaining the status quo. All signs indicate that maintaining the status quo is precisely what the Bush administration has in mind in Iraq. In a much publicized recent television interview, US Vice-President Dick Cheney smugly asserted that the insurgency in Iraq is in its "last throes". Yet, the month of May saw the greatest number of car bombs in Iraq, 77, since the initial invasion and occupation. Between April and June, there were a total of 232 car bombs, killing hundreds and wounding thousands of Iraqis. After receiving sustained criticism for his comment, by right-wing Republicans no less, Cheney, unsurprisingly and true to character, refused to back down, instead attempting to display his linguistic prowess by clarifying the nuances of the term "throes", to the American public. "If you look at what the dictionary says about throes, it can still be a, you know, a violent period, the throes of a revolution," Cheney told CNN in an interview, though he did not comment about his initial use of the word "last", perhaps attempting to pull the curtain over the meaning of that word. Unable to take responsibility for any wrongdoing, whether it be the tortures at Abu Ghraib, the fabrications and lies that led to the war, or the abuses of international law, the Bush administration has shielded itself by repeating the same mindless phrases about progress, democracy, a "waning" insurgency, and of course the non-existent relationship between Iraq and 9/11. It would be, however, incorrect to assume that the Bush administration is genuinely deluded and innocently naïve. The deceit by both the American and Iraqi governments is intentional, and like passengers on a sinking ship, they realise their fates are intertwined. Two right-wing leaders, Al-Jaafari, leader of the ultra-religious Dawa Party, who refused to shake the hand of Condoleezza Rice during a recent meeting with her, not because of her politics, but her gender, and George Bush, the born-again Christian, anti-science and anti- choice, have embraced each other, with Al-Jaafari having no qualms colluding with a far right-wing, lawless American administration that has presided over the murder of thousands of Iraqis and the tortures of Abu Ghraib. But this is not surprising at all, considering that the government of Al-Jaafari is sequestered and isolated in the American controlled and operated Green Zone. Al-Jaafari and his handsomely paid ministers are aware that their power derives entirely from the protection of a foreign occupation army. Without the Americans, they would not exist. It appears, though, that the dissonance between the calculated distortions of reality the Bush administration conveys and the reality that is transparent to everyone else has finally begun to register among disparate members of the US government, including a bipartisan group of Congress members and senators who held a hearing in Washington 16 June at the behest of Democratic congressman John Conyers over the "Downing Street Memo", which provides further evidence that the Bush administration had decided to wage war on Iraq as early as July 2002, and had, as the memo states, "fixed the intelligence to fit the policy". The bipartisan hearing announced the first congressional bill calling on the Bush administration to set a timetable for withdrawing US troops from Iraq. The sudden avalanche of criticism occurs as Iraqi lawmakers from within Al-Jaafari's own party this week demanded the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq. In a letter to Iraq's parliament speaker, 103 parliamentarians representing a wide political spectrum, including communists, secularists, Kurds, and lawmakers from the United Iraqi Alliance (UIA), the party of Al-Jaafari, called on the prime minister to fulfil one of the main promises of his party during the brief election campaign: that they would demand a withdrawal of US troops from Iraq. The government of Prime Minister Al-Jaafari is perceived by Iraqis as inept and corrupt, unable to find a political solution to the insurgency, unwilling to stand up to the Americans, and composed in large part by exiles. What the Iraqi people know, that apparently their "elected" officials do not, is that the most potent force reinforcing the insurgency is the simple idea that the US is in Iraq indefinitely. What are we to make of the unprecedented burst of criticism directed at the Bush administration from within the US? The most popular critique appears to be over the "mishandling" of the war, which blames the neocons for not having a post-war occupation plan or an exit strategy. But this critique fails to understand the fundamental motivations guiding the administration's policies. There was no exit strategy because the US never planned on exiting. The establishment of permanent military bases in Iraq, at least 14 of them, and the projection of American power to fashion a political and economic order beneficial to US interests, were the primary motivations for the invasion. The Bush administration is not "disconnected from reality", as Senator Hagel proclaimed. For them, the disastrous reality is a messy diversion, a price worth paying for the long term benefits of economic and political control of what should be one of the wealthiest countries on earth. They may tinker with troop levels and bring some home to satisfy a restless American public, but the foundation of the occupation will remain the same. To withdraw fully would not only be admitting failure, but would alter the Bush administration's long-term strategic goals. Perhaps more importantly, it would deflate the idea of American exceptionalism and virtue to Americans themselves. The false notion of the noble American, selflessly waging war to bring civilisation to unruly natives is precisely the image that must be dismantled if any substantive change in US foreign policy is to occur. --------------------- - BACK TO INDEX - REPLY - QUOTE - EDIT - DELETE -

The full topic: No replies.

Content-length: 9992 Content-type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8 Accept-charset: ISO-8859-1,utf-8;q=0.7,*;q=0.7 Accept-encoding: gzip,deflate Accept-language: en-us,en;q=0.5 Connection: keep-alive Cookie: *hidded* Host: www.insideassyria.com Keep-alive: 300 Referer: http://www.insideassyria.com/rkvsf5/rkvsf_core.php?.AXky. User-agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.0.13) Gecko/2009073022 Firefox/3.0.13

Powered by RedKernel V.S. Forum 1.2.b9