Was Iraq a Good War?

This week, the President and members of his administration have spent considerable time explaining to the world just how good the Iraq War was.Given that their postwar justifications do not match those in prewar speeches, it seems we are supposed to judge its "goodness" based on whether the silver lining is enough to pay for the clouds our action has seeded across the globe.THE LONG VERSION (skip to the bottom for the short version):To my mind this is not a very good beginning to any assessment.That said, I do believe in much of their estimate of the silver lining.1) The Iraqi people, while in the short term are NOT better off (as far as safety or living conditions), they certainly have a better POTENTIAL for a better future without Saddam around. Even under the nondemocratic government we are installing, it is likely they will have less general oppression, and live a freeer life.2) I also agree that IF a democratic government comes to power... maybe even a benevolent nondemocratic regime (the type we are supposedly installing)... a greater economic prosperity for the nation may be had. A free and RICH Iraq, by which I mean everyone and not just the oligarchy we are imposing, could be a great force in the region.This is the extent of the silver lining. Great potential for sure, but no guaranteed successes yet.The clouds however, have not been discussed:1) Each of the points above are speculative. One cannot predict all that the future holds and I sense a bit of hubris in declaring we've succeeded at this early stage. After all, the last emerald of a "free government" imposed on Iraq (by the british), failed in a number of decades and resulted in Saddam. So chickens cannot be properly tallied yet, just the potential for a growth market in chickens.In fact, if they do become a force with their own autonomy, there is no reason to assume they will not use arms against neighbors. And what will we do? Will we march on them, or keep troops in at all times to do so, anytime they decide to make a pre-emptive strike for their own security?Thus as an assurance that anything good for the region has actually occured and will stick, is purely counting chickens before they have been fertilized, much less hatched.2) As if an example that maybe nothing has changed, Ahmed Chalabi has this week taken credit for having delivered false intelligence to get the US to invade Iraq. While he claims the intelligence was not intended to be bad, he is unashamed that it was, claiming he does not care as we have done the job he wanted done.So to him, the Iraq War was not a war on terror, but a manifestation of his will to conquer Iraq.Toward this end, not only did he end up making our intelligence service look like idiots, he had Americans diverted from fighting our real enemies, to die in the service of removing his chief rival to power. This man, a convicted felon and close personal friend of Cheney, is not being censured even in light of this callous admission and stands poised to become the first Iraqi dictat... I mean leader.Given that he has already sent our men to die for him (taking no role in actual fighting himself) in a war that has killed over 10,000 of his own people, and shows no remorse for his actions as he climbs each rung to the throne of a nondemocracy of his own creation, I'll start taking bets on whether this guy ends up being the next Saddam Hussein. So far it is starting just about the same.Oh yeah, and he is a convicted embezzler, bilking money from the poor citizens of Jordan. Sound like someone we just overthrew? Think he won't do it again?Thus as a true freeing of Iraqis from leaders that will kill and rob them to attain power, and an establishment of a true democracy (rather than a representational oligarchy) the war was a wash.Its not even certain, beyond being able to own their own businesses, their economic or political future will hold anything than more of the same old same old.The only guaranteed difference, as Colin Powell noted during an arabic walkout of his speech, is that Iraqis will now have the ability to openly protest their government as long as their protests are wholly impotent and unable to change facts on the ground.2) Terrorist networks now have a new and open territory to work in. Our poor planning has certainly made Iraq a "front" in the War on Terror. I guess we are supposed to be thanking that it is Iraqis instead of US civilians getting blown up?Even once we get a government installed, and perhaps a real day to day peace going. There will not be an end to terrorists plotting or raising money there, just perhaps not for attacks on Iraqi soil. Unless we are going to turn it back into the police state it was (and that is why it was, it was fundies Saddam was fighting), expanded outlets for terrorism have grown and not shrunk in the aftermath of war.But let's address this "front" spin the administration is using. There is no such thing as real "fronts" in a war on terrorism. The whole point of terrorism is that it is asymmetric. They can hit ANYWHERE at ANYTIME.Now that we have to have our forces and intelligence operations protecting the Iraqis in addition to protecting us from Iraqis in Iraq, there are less resources protecting us at home, or attacking them where their main locations are (which has proven to be anywhere but Iraq). In order to "open" Iraq as a new front, we have just weakened our home "front".Thus as a gambit to provide additional security and make attacks less likely, Iraq has done nothing. It is pure fantasy to imagine that Al-Queda has been pushed "back to Iraq" where we are holding them off, as the train in Spain should surely explain.And so as a battle in the War on Terror it has actually been a net loss.3) US credibility is shot. Not that this will stop us from doing things in the future against the will of the world, but for those who care about honor, we now look gullible and disposed to premature ejaculations (of hate filled emotion). Certainly our intelligence service will not be considered a reliable source.Conclusion...Despite estimates of how valuable the silver lining could be, it seems more theoretical than the practical reality of the clouds, and practical is what we actually have to live with. That makes this war (IMO) not a very good war at all.And perhaps the answer to whether it was a good war or not is evidenced by the amount of explaining and campaigning the administration feels it needs to do.No one had to explain the Revolutionary War, or the Civil War, or World War ll. It has always been the poorer wars that needed an explanation to the public for why we did what we did.***THE SHORT AND SWEET VERSION:***Maybe it is as true for wars as it is for jokes, the good ones don't need explaining.[This message has been edited by holmes, 03-20-2004]

---

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

I think it's possible to do the right thing for the wrong reasons. We should have cleaned up Saddam years ago, and it's good that we've finally done so.But I'm neither a war supporter nor a Bush supporter. And I think that the war failed almost all of it's stated goals, mainly making Americans safer from terrorism. Certainly it didn't make Spain safer from terrorism.Doing the right thing for the wrong reason too easily leads to doing the wrong thing for the wrong reason. I'll be voting against Bush this November. Good riddance.

It seems that the U.S. gets stuck in the position of needing to support the lesser of two evils. Thus, the result is not the elimination of evil, but just the replacement of one evil with another.A "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation.Moose

Dear all,No. No war is good.
"Good war" is an oxymoron.Denesha

quote:

---

It seems that the U.S. gets stuck in the position of needing to support the lesser of two evils.

---

Hmmmmmmm. I'm not sure I totally agree with this assessment. In the case of Iraq why was the US in a position of "need" at all.I can see this being the case in Afghanistan. We needed to get at Al-Queda and since the Taliban were their cover we had to attack and replace them as leaders of that country. In our haste we were limited in our choice and so may very well have been placed in a position of choosing between evils.But Iraq was relatively stable and wholly unrelated to our pursuit of Al-Queda. We didn't need to attack.And as it stands we are now supporting the very people who betrayed us and have proven track records of betraying others. I am uncertain why in a nation of millions that lived and suffered under Saddam, letting outsiders like members of the INC rule Iraq is 1) the lesser of two evils, and 2) necessarily on a list of valid choices.Given Chalabis recent admission, you think he would be ousted by Bremer. I mean, if they don't have Chalabi to lead them, will they really descend into chaos?

---

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

"The world is a better place without him", "Iraq is better off without him."These statements have never made sense to me as a justification or otherwise. There are plenty of countries in this world that would be better off without somebody. Like half of Africa for example. But we don't give a crap, and it's painfully obvious why. Haliburton No, seriously. Remember all the hubub about Liberia, why did we never get involved? They are in horrible turmoil, their people murderd in the streets every day, chilldren as young as 6 years old being forced by sadistic warlords to fight for their cause. Certainly they would be better off with a little Amrican help. Haiti is another wonderfull mess, there is a country that was thuroughly screwd over by a "president" we put into power, and we were reluctant to get involved there again as well. Why? Simple, those counties are poor.Afganistan was a similar story, the Taliban had been doing it's thing for years, we couldn't care less.I really wish Bush would cut the "magnanimus" goodguy bullshit ant tell it how it is. We only invade weeker countries that have stuff we actually want, like oil etc.

After the terrorist attacks on the USA there was a lot of support for Al-Queda in muslim countries. Then when the USA toppled Afghanistan and Iraq, the enthusiasm in muslim dominated countries for Al-Queda like "we gonna show who's strongest by killing you all", turned back to it's usual semi-depressed "how come muslim countries are crap at everything?". That was what the war was about IMO, to check widespread muslim enthusiasm for violence. There are still many muslims who want to kill all Americans using ever more bizarre "justifications" for their violence, but it's a small group again, and the largescale support has been emptied of all credibility by toppling the regimes in Afghanistan and Iraq. I believe Iraq serves as a meatgrinder for these muslim extremists, as horrible as that is. They go there to fight the Jihad and most all get killed within a few weeks of arrival.I'm not saying that muslims, or anyone, should think like "why are muslim dominated countries crap at everything?", but a great share of muslims do think like that, unfortunately.I don't believe either Iraq or Afghanistan is going to make it as a democracy, because they both started again with the wishy-washy ethnic propotional represential, in stead of the regular everybody is created equal. Should the Sunni's lay this waterpipe or should the Shi'ites lay this waterpipe? Nobody is willing to work very hard in an environment where questions like that are seriously considered. That is how such a system works, or rather fails to work. It's surprising Bush let this happen, because of his strong opposition to any form of discrimination back home. I think this misguided policy must be Powell's doing, who benefitted from positive discrimination at one time in his career.Of course for as far as bad intelligence goes, the war was most all the Iraqi's regime own fault, with the unbelievable Iraqi ministry of information lying to, and misleading everybody. There's some tendency of people criticizing the war in Iraq to only look at failures of Western governments, not unlike kids only wanting to criticize mom and dad.regards,
Mohammad Nor Syamsu

HINT TO MUSLIM COUNTRIES: It would help if you let your women get jobs. If you only let men work you have half of the workforce of other countries your size. That's not going to be very competitive against the rest of the world.Also, your schools suck. Try to work on that, too. Letting women teach would help with that.

quote:

---

No. No war is good.
"Good war" is an oxymoron.

---

Are you saying it was wrong for the Allied forces to oppose Hitler's invasion and occupation of other sovereign nations?

Syamasu,I think you have some very good points here. Your post was interesting, and I for one appreciate the glimpse into the views of an Islamic "insider". Your comments about "who gets to do the work" parallels my own experiences in the only other significant Middle Eastern religious/ethnic-divided country I'm familiar with: Lebanon. I fear you're likely to be correct that the imposition of Western-style democracy on a country like Afghanistan or Iraq may be impossible in the long run, for many reasons.

Me either. The decisions are driven by politics not humanitarian reasons. But that being said on the whole I think the USA given it's hypocracy at times is as Martha Stewart would say "a good thing." Of course that opinion is bias because I am a veteran and a patriot not to mention well indoctrinated.

Hi all,Hitler was mad.
The problem is not Hitler's (or any one you want) illness.The real problem is to leave brain damaged people do politic business.Denesha

I found your post interesting and useful as a counterpoint to pointing fingers solely at ourselves. Indeed, Saddam dropped the political ball several times in the run up to the war, both in arrogance of his own ego and perhaps a naive belief that people outside his country cared that much for him.It is also an interesting point to mention that it could dampen militant enthusiasm.However, I think some things should be kept in mind about Iraq:1) Iraq as a meatgrinder. This is one of the reasons I think attacking Iraq was counterproductive. It was a meatgrinder for Jihadists (with the exception of Palestinian Jihadists) under Saddam. That is why he was helped into power, the problem being his meatgrinder tended to catch a lot of innocents as well.Now by taking over his meatgrinding operation we will by necessity place ourselves in the position of killing many innocents. We already have in fact. I do believe less innocents will be killed, and less general oppression will occur, under the new administration (even Chilabi), but it will not be wholly guiltless.If we were to start a meatgrinder, I'd rather have used a country that currently was not a meatgrinder for our enemies, and posed a greater threat to us in general.2) Bad intelligence as Iraq's fault. I find this a little silly. The point of any nation's intelligence is to deceive friend and foe alike about one's capabilities. If our intelligence service fails to pierce that veil it is our fault, not theirs.And in this case in particular MOST of the information did not come from Saddam's regime. It has been admitted by the proponents of the war that the faulty intelligence came from dissidents (procured by Chalabi) seeking an overthrow of Saddam by the US at any cost. This is terribly embarrassing even if our administration was not intentionally hyping intelligence.I think it is dangerous, if we are going to avoid serious errors in the future, to shift any amount of blame on intelligence issues over to Saddam.3) Combining Afghanistan and Iraq when talking about war. I had no issue with the Afghanistan war, and it may be interesting to note that we never had the administration explaining why THAT was a good war. I believe these are two totally separate issues, though you have made a case that both helped dampen spirits among militants.

---

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

Large scale actions may deter or eliminate large scale support, but the enemy was never going to engage us on the field in any significant way. What large scale actions do is invite a guerilla response where forces are not equal. It's a Scissors, Rock, and Paper game.Since the "end" of the Afghanistan war al-Qaeda has hit Mombasa, Bali, Riyadh, Casablanca, Istanbul, and now Madrid, plus some possible action in Iraq. I'd say the question of "widespread" Muslim enthusiasm is beside the point at this point.There's another part to this equation, however. The US currently has one division in reserve. Half of our regular army strength is now classified in the two lowest readiness levels. Other states understand that as well. We've undertaken a job which may take generations to complete. Israel's been making large scale responses to terrorism for nearly sixty years, but Israel today is not safe.Iraq was, clearly, an enormous undertaking in pursuit of a diversion, not terrorism. Our first job must be counter-insurgency, not psychological warfare with Islam.