Motive for writing: Today's media industry is just that: an industry. News agendas consist of stories that produce the highest number of viewers, regardless of validity, relevance, or morality. The truth about Iraq has not been, nor will be, on CNN or Fox News. I encourage everyone to investigate truthful, real-life accounts of the war, as well as freely question why we are in this war. We cannot rely on our "news."
An Inquisition of the United States’ Presence in Iraq
The United States has been at war with Iraq since the procedure codenamed “Operation Iraqi Freedom” began on March 20, 2003. Today, four years after the beginning and what seemed to be the end of the war (Saddam Hussein’s capture), more and more U.S. troops are being sent to Iraq. When one considers the lives lost, money spent, and overall lack of reason for the U.S. presence in Iraq, it is not only apparent that the U.S. should not have invaded, but that the U.S. should not be there today.
President George W. Bush’s administration claimed that there were four main reasons for the need to declare war on Iraq. The first two reasons dealt with the threat Iraq was to the U.S. The administration declared that Iraq had used chemical weapons in the past and would use them again against the U.S., and that Iraq was developing nuclear weapons. The second two reasons related to spreading Democracy. The administration announced that it was the duty of the U.S. to help Iraq, and that the removal of Saddam Hussein was a necessary step in the War on Terror (Boje). Upon closer examination, one can see that none of these reasons were valid.
The claim that Iraq had used chemical weapons is true. The claim that Iraq could use them in 2003, however, was not. Iraq had used chemical weapons in the 1980s; chemical weapons which were provided by none other than the U.S. of A. In the early 1980s, the U.S. funded Iraqi attempts to replace their obsolete weapons. Along with the money given to Iraq for weapons, the United States also produced the chemical weapons later used by the Iraqis. This being said, there is no evidence of any such weapons in Iraq after the 1980s (Boje).
There is absolutely no credible evidence to support the idea that Iraq was building nuclear weapons. Before invading Iraq, UNSCOM Chief Inspector Scott Ridder declared that Iraq was disarmed of all weapons of mass destruction. The CIA estimated that under the conditions in Iraq at the time of the alleged nuclear weapon construction, it would take Iraq five years to produce one nuclear warhead. The only government who used nuclear weapons in Iraq was the owner of the world’s largest nuclear arsenal, the United States, which dropped 390 tons of nuclear weapons on Iraq during Desert Fox in 1998 (Boje).
As far as helping Iraq, the United States have done anything but. The U.S. has been leading unsanctioned bombings of Iraq since 1991. These bombings do nothing other than kill potentially innocent people. How this helps liberate Iraqis is an unanswerable question. Congressman Ron Paul commented on the thirty year estimate of U.S. presence in Iraq by stating that it is simply far too long for setting up a Democracy (Boje).
Naming Iraq under Saddam Hussein’s control as a terrorist threat was an unjustified action. There is absolutely no official evidence linking Bin Laden or the al-Qaeda to the Iraqi government. Fifteen of the nineteen terrorists involved in the attacks on September 11, 2001, were from Saudi Arabia (Boje). None were from Iraq. If the U.S. was concerned with al-Qaeda, Saudi Arabia would have been considered a threat. Former CIA agent Bob Baer noted that, although Bin Laden contacted Iraq’s government twice in the 1990s, there was no evidence of a partnership or Saddam intending to attack the U.S. (Boje).
Iraq is not the first war to be fought for reasons other than those claimed by the government. In Vietnam, the Gulf of Tonkin incident made way for public acceptance of a war in Vietnam. The legitimacy of the incident is now under investigation. Evidence suggests that part of the Gulf of Tonkin incident did not actually occur and was merely a method for justifying war in Vietnam (Ford). In Nazi Germany, a false Polish invasion was announced over the radio, which justified the mobilization of troops to invade Poland (Boje). Wars are sometimes fought for indirect reasons.
The U.S. is naturally inclined to violence in Iraq. Since the Gulf War, there have been U.S. sanctions in Iraq. Between 1992 and 1998, UNSCOM shut down Iraq’s nuclear program and destroyed its arsenal. When UNSCOM wanted to search Saddam’s palaces, he initially opposed but eventually agreed to the searches, which were carried out beginning in November of 1998. The U.S. claimed that there was too much intervention in the searches, and attacked Iraq in what was called Operation Desert Fox. The reality is that, out of the 423 inspections, there were only five individual Iraqi objections. These objections were mostly due to searches on religious days, but were used as grounds for attack (Boje). This natural inclination to declare war on Iraq draws attention to the U.S.’s true intentions. Some believe that George W. Bush is trying to finish his father’s failed goal of defeating Saddam Hussein. Others believe that the U.S. is after control of Iraqi oil. This seems plausible when one considers the Bush regime’s support of a report drafted by the Baker task force, of which former Enron Chief Executive Kenneth Lay was a member. Many members of the Bush Administration’s Department of Energy attended meetings held by this task force (“Bush’s”). The report suggests taking new measures with Iraq and specifically Saddam Hussein in order to secure oil (Morse and Jaffe).
It is obvious that the U.S. did not have sound reasoning for the invasion of Iraq. If the Bush administration’s requests for 2007 and 2008 are approved, the total cost of operations in Afghanistan and Iraq will total $746 billion. 3,337 U.S. solider have died and 24,313 U.S. soldiers have been injured in Iraq alone (“Costs”). This fiscal and moral cost is incredibly high, let alone for a war that is not justified. What could possibly be worth this money and, worse yet, these lives?
For current, valid war statistics, please visit: http://usliberals.about.com/od/homelandsecurit1/a/IraqNumbers.htm
Works Cited
Boje, David. “Postmodern Oil War II: Empire Strikes Back.” Peace Aware. 5 May 2007. Online. Internet. 2 Oct. 2002. <http://www.zianet.com/boje/peace/facts_and_myths_about_iraq_war.htm>.
“Bush’s Deep Reasons for War on Iraq: Oil, Petrodollars, and the OPEC Euro Question.” Socrates. 5 May 2007. Online. Internet. 27 May 2003. <http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~pdscott/iraq.html>.
“Costs of War.” End Iraq War Now. 5 May 2007. Online. Internet. 27 Apr. 2007. <http://www.endiraqwarnow.org/costs.htm?referrer=google>.
Ford, Ronnie E. “New Light on Gulf of Tonkin.” Free Republic. 5 May 2007. Online. Internet. 3 Aug. 2003. < http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-vetscor/957300/posts>.
Gallagher, Jim. Causes of the Iraq War. Stockton, NJ: OTTN Publishing, 2006.
Morse, Edward L., and Amy Myers Jaffe. “Strategic Energy Policy Challenges for the 21st Century.” James A. Baker III Institute For Public Policy Rice University. 5 May 2007. Online. Internet. 24 Oct. 2006.
<http://www.rice.edu/energy/publications/docs/TaskForceReport_Final.pdf>.