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Was The Iraq War Worth It? >

Iraq War a Failure on All Fronts

Expensive, deadly effort did not make the U.S. any safer

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By Phyllis Bennis

, Director of the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy Studies

November 11, 2011

About Phyllis Bennis:

Phyllis Bennis directs the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy Studies. She is also a fellow of the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam. In 2001 she helped found and remains on the steering committee of the U.S. Campaign to End Israeli Occupation. She continues to serve as an adviser to several top UN officials on Middle East and UN democratization issues.

What, exactly, did the Iraq war accomplish? Put aside the propaganda, a western-style democracy emerging at the core of the Arab world, and look instead at the public and private U.S. goals.

A reasonably peaceful country, with a more or less accountable democratic government, at least slightly concerned about human rights?

[Obama Fulfills Campaign Promise in Declaring Iraq War Over]

No. The speaker of Iraq's parliament described corruption spread through the government "like an octopus." Election fraud, armed attacks, and violence so high that one day this summer 89 Iraqis were killed. Torture in Iraqi prisons continues, including new charges of torture by a special forces unit directly accountable to the U.S.-backed prime minister. More than 2.7 million Iraqis are displaced within the country (almost seven times as many as in 2003), about 2 million more refugees outside Iraq.

A pro-U.S. government eager for permanent U.S. bases throughout the country?

No. The Iraqi government, though dependent on U.S. financial and military backing, couldn't win public support for keeping even a small contingent of U.S. troops in the country after the end of this year. All U.S. troops and Pentagon-paid contractors will be out, and all U.S. military bases closed. Thousands of State Department-paid contractors will remain, but all troops will be out, and all but 18 of the 500-plus U.S. bases have already been shut down or turned over to the Iraqi military.

An Iraqi government willing to allow a U.S. attack on Iran from its territory?

[Is the United States Safer 10 Years After 9/11?]

No. The Iraqi government, despite its dependence on U.S. money, arms and training, is much closer politically to the government of Tehran. The SOFA prohibits the U.S. from launching an attack on any other country from Iraqi territory, and clearly Iran is far more influential in Baghdad than Washington.

Are we safer? Of course not--the Iraq war has destroyed U.S. credibility, making the U.S. symbolic of torture and targeted assassination instead of freedom and democracy. Justified by lies about "WMDs" and launched in the face of global and UN rejection, the war undermined international law and turned the U.S. into a rogue state in the eyes of much of the world.

And the costs.

The human cost: 4,482 U.S. troops killed, more than 32,000 injured; 103,451–113,029 Iraqi civilians killed (estimates--the Pentagon "doesn't do body counts").

The economic cost: $802 billion and counting (not yet including the years ahead of multibillion-dollar healthcare costs for wounded veterans and more) could pay instead for converting 344 million U.S. homes to solar energy, or hiring 11.7 million elementary school teachers for a year, or providing 409 million low-income children with healthcare. Which makes us safer?

[Condoleezza Rice Should Have Quit Over Iraq War]

In the first years of the war, the National Intelligence Council called Iraq "a training and recruitment ground [for terrorists] and an opportunity for terrorists to enhance their technical skills." According to the International Institute of Strategic Studies, the effect on al Qaeda of the Iraq war was "accelerated recruitment."

Tags:: Saddam Hussein,; Iraq,; Iraq war (2003-2011)

Other Arguments: #2

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51

No — It enhanced the narrative that the U.S. seeks to conquer and occupy Muslim countries

LAWRENCE J. KORB, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress; #3

57

56

No — The "democracy" mission in Iraq served primarily as a justification for U.S. forces

DANIEL J. GALLINGTON, Senior Policy and Program Adviser at the George C. Marshall Institute; #4

50

73

Yes — Arab culture is not the problem; absence of rule-of-law is

MICHAEL RUBIN, Resident Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute; #5

31

82

Yes — Hussein ordered the deaths of more people in the Middle East than any leader since the Mongol invasion

JAMES PHILLIPS, Senior Research Fellow for Middle Eastern Affairs at the Heritage Foundation; #6

22

86

Yes — The Iraq war freed the world of a dangerous, determined, and irrational leader

ABRAHAM SOFAER, George P. Shultz Distinguished Scholar and Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution

Reader Comments Read all comments (3)

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The invasion of Iraq was totally unwanted, unneeded and unmerited. The reasons for the invasion changed to many times. From harboring Bin Laden, to weapons of mass destruction and finally just to free Iraq of Saddam. Did anyone in their right mind think that Saddem would let Bin Laden stay in Iraq and pose a threat. Two, WMDs, with inspectors looking in every nook & cranny they could where were they? Even President Bush made a joke of it! Finally, the Iraqi people were free of Saddam, there's an old saying better to deal with the devil you know then the one you don't. Also, if the Iraqi people were so tired of Saddam why did they never try to organize at some point in time to over throw him? We wasted billions that could have been put toa better use in our own country. But most of all even though the loss of life suffered by military and civilians alike was low, the loss of one was one too many for this war built on lies. Lies, that the American public was only to glad to accept. Iguess the old adage is true, the bigger the lie the more believable it is.

Woof of AR 2:36PM December 15, 2011

One religion against another. Muslim's murder Christians and Christians murder Muslims. This fight has been going on since the beginning of both religions. I do not see anything different here when this subject is talked about in Muslim communities except that the numbers are always reversed. Christians claim they are being slaughtered by Muslims and Muslims claim they are being slaughtered by Christians.

Regardless of your religion you are still the same kind of human as any other person and no one deserves to die because of superstitious beliefs.. Believers do not seem to have access to any intelligence, or at least they don't exhibit it, that will allow them to deal with their fears of death, which religion is all about assuaging, without believing in some god...but it is still just belief.. Religious people have always killed others because of their different beliefs, or because they are the bearers of fact. Is it the people, or the religion, that are at fault? I personally think religious belief is the problem, but then, I am an atheist. Excellent article, thank you.

William W Haywood of WA 2:51PM December 06, 2011

The War in Iraq Will Accomplish Nothing Because Islamist Terror Lives On

The Catholic Church battled Islam for a thousand years, from the Middle East to Vienna and Spain. Finally saving Western Civilization from Sharia Law at the battles of Malta, LePanto and Vienna - and inflicting massive casualties at Rhodes - I note, "Nothing was ever lost so well as Rhodes."

History has been forgotten.

Now the Western will is weak and the Arab Spring will ultimately unite Islam against the West. Already churches are burning and Christians are dying. There is no way to prevent it. We have lost our will to win and replaced it with political correctness and U.N. Group Think.

This from a 100 years ago.

From Theodore Roosevelt’s “Fear God and Take Your Own Part”:

“During the thousand years that included the careers of the Frankish soldier (Charles Martel, 8th century) and the Polish king (John Sobieski, 17th century), the Christians of Asia and Africa proved unable to wage successful war with the Muslim conquerors; and in consequence Christianity practically vanished from the two continents; and today nobody can find in them any ‘social values’ whatever, in the sense in which we use the words, so far as the sphere of Mohammedan influences are concerned.

There are such ‘social values’ today in Europe, America, and Australia only because during those thousand years the Christians of Europe possessed the warlike power to do what the Christians of Asia and Africa had failed to do – that is, to beat back the Muslim invader.

If European militarism had not been able to defend itself against and to overcome the militarism of Asia and Africa, there would have been no ‘social values’ of any kind in our world today, and no sociologists to discuss them.”

Notes:

1. Roosevelt urged the U.S. to halt Muslim Turkey’s genocide of Christian Armenians and Greeks in Turkey and Asia Minor that occurred under the Ottomans in the 19th century and under the Young Turks in the first quarter of the 20th century. Thousand year old buildings were demolished. On 11/26/1979 the NY Times reported that the number of Christians in Turkey had decreased from 4,500,000 at the beginning of the century to 150,000.

2. In 1974, Turkish Muslims invaded northern Cyprus, and prominent Greek Orthodox churches were turned into mosques.

3. In 1975, Muslims destroyed the Christian towns of Damour and Jiyya in Lebanon and massacred and evicted their inhabitants. Over the next 17 years, 90,000 mostly Maronite Christians and Greek Catholics were killed, thousands mutilated, and hundreds of thousands evicted or fled.

4. In January 1999, Tens of thousands died when Muslim gunmen terrorized Christians who had voted for independence in East Timor

5. Since 1984, it is estimated that over 1.5 million Sudaneese Christians have been killed by the Janjaweed, the Muslim militia.

6. Since 1999, when Sharia was introduce into northern Nigeria over 30,000 Christians have been displaced.

R.L. Schaefer of CA 9:25PM November 15, 2011

Was The Iraq War Worth It? >

Iraq War a Failure on All Fronts

Expensive, deadly effort did not make the U.S. any safer

No — It enhanced the narrative that the U.S. seeks to conquer and occupy Muslim countries

No — The "democracy" mission in Iraq served primarily as a justification for U.S. forces

Yes — Arab culture is not the problem; absence of rule-of-law is

Yes — Hussein ordered the deaths of more people in the Middle East than any leader since the Mongol invasion

Yes — The Iraq war freed the world of a dangerous, determined, and irrational leader

Reader Comments Read all comments (3)

Was The Iraq War Worth It? >

Iraq War a Failure on All Fronts

Expensive, deadly effort did not make the U.S. any safer

No — It enhanced the narrative that the U.S. seeks to conquer and occupy Muslim countries

No — The "democracy" mission in Iraq served primarily as a justification for U.S. forces

Yes — Arab culture is not the problem; absence of rule-of-law is

Yes — Hussein ordered the deaths of more people in the Middle East than any leader since the Mongol invasion

Yes — The Iraq war freed the world of a dangerous, determined, and irrational leader

Reader Comments Read all comments (3)

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