connecting*the*dots

Another milestone in Iraq has come and gone. As of yesterday, America’s occupation in Iraq has officially eclipsed the length of time America spent in World War II.

No matter your personal view on the potential of terrorist tactics, we’re not at war to stop an advancing fascist or an existing genocide dead in its tracks (such as modern-day fascist Kim Jong-il of North Korea or the current genocide in Darfur).

There’s only one similarity between WWII and the occupation of Iraq; in both cases, it took an attack on US soil to rally and motivate the American public to back entering an armed conflict. Of course, the attack on Pearl Harbor directly emanated from the ongoing conflict of WWII, whereas the emotional ties between the events of 9/11 and the perception of Iraqi leadership remain simply that — emotional.

Iraq has never been an immediate threat to our nation; no weapons of mass destruction ever threatened our safety from afar. Could that situation have changed for the worse over time? Sure, but so could any number of scenarios in the world, which is exactly why the tactic of preventive war is considered state-sponsored terrorism in many people’s eyes.

Fact: The combined death toll from all major, classically defined terrorist activities over the past twenty years pales in comparison to the loss of life at the hands of the Nazi fascist state.

This administration twisted false stories of Iraq hunting for yellow cake in Niger into a narrative that fit our administration’s desire to go to war in Iraq and delivered this false case to Congress to justify an invasion.

In a post-9/11 America still freshly licking its wounds, we all should have known what would happen within our political arena:

Who Lied To Whom?: …”Two days later, Secretary of State Colin Powell, appearing before a closed hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also cited Iraq’s attempt to obtain uranium from Niger as evidence of its persistent nuclear ambitions. The testimony from Tenet and Powell helped to mollify the Democrats, and two weeks later the resolution passed overwhelmingly, giving the President a congressional mandate for a military assault on Iraq.”…

When that cover was blown by, well, reality, our government simply began to whisper false ties to 9/11 to go after a client-state that refused to play nice anymore, all beginning with its 1991 invasion of Kuwait.

What we have “accomplished” in Iraq since the occupation began in 2003 is quite amazing, actually. A Shi’ite majority has now been voted into power — something that no US planner would have hoped for, but constitutes a perfect example of what democracy at the end of the barrel of a M-16 will get you.

Essentially, we’ve backed the formation of a government and a constitution that leans in the opposite direction from modernity and strengthened the potential for a collaborative, radical mid-east region, at the cost of more than 2 billion dollars per week, while losing close to 3,000 US patriots and killing at least 50,000 Iraqi civilians.

One can only imagine how that loss of life is going to be avenged.

We could be tried as war criminals based on the 1991 war, primarily for images like the one below.

No, that’s not ‘The Mummy’ from a bad 1930’s flick. That’s one of the many Iraqi troops/civilians from the infamous ‘Road of Death’ during the retreat from Kuwait. This type of damage suggests the use of napalm, phosphorus, or other incendiary bombs, which were all outlawed in 1977.

And, by the way, it’s also against international law to fire upon troops who are "out of combat." But we always seem to take things one step further. We didn’t even attempt to differentiate between Palestinian and Kuwaiti civilians and Iraqi troops; we just created a massive traffic jam and annihilated over ten thousand people.

I was watching film last night of our helicopter pilots hovering over the desert at night, with night vision goggles, tearing apart individuals as they strolled across the desert in a haze, trying to reach some sort of civilization. There was no way they could have been confirmed as combatants. We even paused to fix upon bodies laying on the ground to dump tons of rounds into them. These were the types of images that forced Colin Powell to suggest an end to the war.

Now, I know war isn’t pretty. Supposedly, “All’s fair in love and war” and whoever coined that phrase, they were absolutely right about love. But there are laws concerning warfare and they were created to honor the humanity of all combatants, including US troops. I highly doubt we could ever be held to such standards.

We’re so quick to flash our badges of honor, respect and heroism as a country, and then we run rough shot through the UN and the rest of the world as if they don’t even matter.

Okay, back to being quietly steamed.