by Cheryl Abraham
The November/December 2007 issue of “Mother Jones” magazine “U.S. Out Now! How?” challenges all in the anti-war movement by asking us whether or not we are naively going about this business of demanding an end to the Iraq War in an irresponsible and simplistic manner. The article begins by stating the infamous, (though inaccurate urban myth), “Pottery Barn” rule as “You break it, you own it” and continues on with the premise that all Americans are responsible for fixing the ill created by the imperialistic program of the Bush Regime. The article states that it is “Time to get ready with the apology, the checkbook, and whatever else is required.” While it is true that the country of Iraq is absolutely broken, what is required right now is an immediate pullout of troops from the beleaguered country of Iraq. And while magazine editors debate the naivety of those in the anti-war movement, and we in the anti-war movement continue to struggle passionately to move the American public beyond their indifference, beyond the American addiction to consumption and frivolities, beyond the feelings of hopelessness about the state of the world, and beyond the fruitless hope of a new candidate’s promises, the people of Iraq continue to endure on a daily basis terror, horror, and death.
While it is true that America does bear, and will bear, maybe for generations, the responsibility for what has and continues to occur in Iraq, the message of the anti-war movement is not naïve, nor is it simplistic. The pendulum of public outcry must be pulled as far to the left as possible to offset the far right’s power and continual program of imperialist domination of the Middle East. We must be as radical as the reality we face.
Further exacerbating the issue are the false reports being made by the Bush Regime that the “Surge” is working. The deception of the “Surge” working also begs the question: Working for whom? As the reports of dropping casualty rates increase, so do the reports of the deadly effects of the war: the deaths of hundreds of thousands, the displacement of some 4 million Iraqis, a broken infrastructure, torture, murder, beheadings, kidnappings of men, women and children, not to mention the devastating and horrific effect on the women of Iraq. Iraqi women are increasingly the victims of assault, rape, and murder. The hard won rights of women in Iraq have been obliterated in the aftermath of a country strewn apart by the U.S. led chaos and fueled by religious fanaticism, a fanaticism once spurned by a mostly secular pre-war Iraq. The lives of Iraqi women have been likened to the conditions of women in the middle ages. While George Bush continues to spout his murderously outrageous and absurd rhetoric by hailing the successes of the surge, the bodies of men, women, and children continue to be dumped in the dusty streets of Iraq. http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,1890260,00.html
The outrageous deception of the “success” of Bush’s surge has been flooding the complicit media and repeated endlessly by a string of pundits and presidential hopefuls. These reports point to the falling casualty rate in Iraq as a direct consequence of the “success” of the “Surge”. Reality paints a different picture. While it is true that certain types of casualty rates have dropped, it is a dangerous falsehood that these statistics be attributed to Bush’s “Surge”. These drops in violence can be directly linked to the actions made by the Iraqi people themselves, specifically the decision by Anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr who ordered a suspension of his Mehdi Army militia for up to six months for restructuring back in August of 2007. Hazem al-Araji, speaking for army said then, “For the sake of public interest, we have decided to issue the following: Suspend the Mehdi Army, with no exception, for a maximum of six months starting from the date of this release, to restructure it in a way that would preserve its ideological principles.” (http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/08/29/iraq.main/) Since this “restructuring” the casualty rate of U.S. troops have dropped significantly from what had been the bloodiest summer in Iraq.
Not only does the lie of the “Surge” working ignore the possibilities of the Iraqi people taking a positive step in self-governance, but the false confidence created by this deception could lead to another falsehood: that U.S. troops are now in a better position to attack Iran.
The U.S. continues its policy of pitting Iraqi sects and tribes against each other. The U.S. uses collaborators and informants who are members of the most feudal and backward elements in Iraqi society to “keep the peace.” This tactic has fueled a level of violence that has been under-reported in the media. Ali al-Fadhily, a reporter for the IPS quoted in his column “”resistance fighters in al-Anbar did fight occupation forces, but now they are standing down from launching new attacks against U.S. forces. This is due in large part to U.S. military payments to collaborating tribal sheikhs — already totaling over 17 million dollars. The money funds tribal fighters who are paid 300 dollars per month to patrol their areas, particularly against foreign fighters. The military refers to these men as “Concerned Local Citizens,” “Awakening Force,” or simply “volunteers,” even though it is well known that most of them used to carry out attacks against the occupation forces. “Those Americans thought they would decrease the resistance attacks by separating the people of Iraq into sects and tribes,” a 32-year-old man from Ramadi — speaking on terms of anonymity — told IPS, “They know they are going deeper into the moving sand, but the collaborators are fooling the Americans right now, and will in the end use this strategy against them.”
The report goes on to say that “Iraqis across the province are complaining about harsh tactics being meted out by the new “Awakening Forces” supported by the U.S. “We will behead anyone who carries a gun in this province,” Wussam Hardan, a senior leader of the Awakening Forces in Ramadi told sources very close to IPS in the city. “No court, no lawyers, no nothing. We have our own ways to get those criminals to confess,” Hardan said. The people of the province fear the recent developments, despite the relative improvement in the security situation. “It is quieter because the Americans stopped many of their activities in al- Anbar,” Shakir Mahmood, a human rights activist in Ramadi told IPS — on condition that his false name be used. “There were so many arrests by U.S. forces, police and the Awakening during the past month and we cannot even talk about it because we feel threatened by all three of them,” he said. “So many of the detainees are well known to be innocent people taken into custody according to false information by others who have a personal feud with them or their families,” Mahmood added, “It is the same old story being repeated and God knows what is going to happen next.” Arrests are being made after individuals are accused of being al-Qaeda members or of having links with Iran. Thousands have been detained for a year or more without any court procedures, while the police and the Awakening militias have executed many others. On Nov. 13 the International Committee for the Red Cross estimated that there are around 60,000 people detained in U.S. and Iraqi prisons in the country.” Full story: http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=40280
Does the decrease of U.S. military deaths signal success? How can any undertaking be considered successful when it is clear that the Iraq war policies of the U.S. led by the incompetent and unscrupulous Bush Regime have little to offer in reducing the levels of death and violence inflicted on the Iraqi people, in fact such a claim is monstrous! The facts show that it is these policies that are fueling the fire of violence and terror in Iraq. We cannot ignore the responsibility we have as individuals and as a nation in ending this war now!
The public outcry against the invasion of Iraq was the largest in human history, yet we were ignored and shunned and silenced on almost every level. The tactic of silencing the growing voices of dissent continues to this day. The Bush Regime and its allies ignored, and continue to ignore the worldwide will of the people and marched on, and continue to march on with their program of imperialist domination over the Middle East. It is the Bush Regime, its allies, and its complicit congress that must bear the responsibility for “breaking” Iraq and they must be held legally and morally accountable. The cost of this war will continue to be a burden to the American people and the world for many years to come, but what should be most troubling to Americans is the hard lesson of how this sad drama in human history was allowed to happen at all. No longer can Americans hide their head in the sand and hope that all the horror of this war will “just go away”! We can no longer ignore that it is the responsibility of each one of us to declare our resistance to the Bush Regime’s program, to demand justice, to demand accountability, and to repudiate this program and its ilk for all time.
The first step in ending the Iraq war is to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq immediately. The absolute necessity of this first step is not simplistic, it is not naïve, nor is it irresponsible, it is imperative! The immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops is the first of many, many steps that it is our moral obligation as Americans and as human beings to take to restore Iraq to its people.