An End in Sight for Some, but Not Others

Five years after the Bush administration destroyed most of Iraqi society, Iraq has finally begun to stabilize. Violence has declined sharply, and some semblance of normal daily life is returning to Baghdad and other Iraqi cities. John McCain, the Bush administration, and a number of neoconservative analysts argue that this heralds the beginning of an American victory, and vindicates the Bush administration's policies. If so, it is a very odd victory indeed, and if this is winning, I'd hate to see what losing would look like.

To be fair, it is unquestionably true that "the Surge," or more correctly the Surge and General Petraeus' community-oriented counterinsurgency policies, have greatly reduced violence in Iraq, more than I or most other observers felt was likely. There is even some evidence of halting, limited political progress. At the same time, however, this process of stabilization is institutionalizing a national and regional system that constitutes anything but "victory." Until about a year ago, the occupation of Iraq was conducted with a degree of incompetence, arrogance, and stupidity perhaps unparalleled in the last 50 years, and its effects will be lasting. Consider the following:

First, Iraq's power structure is solidifying into a fundamentalist Islamist, often pro-Iranian, spectacularly corrupt, and generally anti-American Shiite regime. A major fraction of Iraq's new leadership, including its prime minister, lived in Iran for 20 years and rely on a militia, the Badr Organization, that was trained by Iran's military and secret police. Other powerful groups such as the Sadrists are virulently anti-American and fundamentalist. All major groups are stunningly corrupt. In 2007, the last year for which ratings are available, Transparency International rated Iraq number 178 of 180 countries in national corruption.

Second, Iraq's infrastructure, government, educational system, and middle class have been decimated by Bush administration policy, and will take decades to recover if they ever do. Estimates of the civilian death toll between 2003 and now range from 100,000 to 600,000; nobody knows for sure. Millions have been injured and traumatized. Over 5 million people, 20% of Iraq's entire population, are now either internally displaced or foreign refugees. As of several months ago, 10,000 people per month were still fleeing their homes. Of Iraq's 34,000 doctors in 2003, about 2,000 have been assassinated, and another 20,000 have fled the country. About 20% of the professors at Baghdad University were murdered. Only recently have any infrastructure indicators reached prewar levels -- and remember, Iraq in 2003 was a society that had endured a decade of extremely harsh economic sanctions and gross mismanagement under Saddam's regime. The average Iraqi now has electricity for a few hours a day, and rarely has access to running water, sewage treatment, transportation, or education.

And finally, as a result of the Bush administration's disastrous errors, the United States remains pinned down and rendered powerless to affect events far more dangerous than Saddam was. Iraq's tenuous stability remains highly dependent on American military force. Under no foreseeable conditions will the United States be able to withdraw the majority of its 150,000 troops any time soon; even Senator Obama calls only for the withdrawal of front-line combat troops, who only constitute 25% of all U.S. forces. And while the U.S. continuously struggles to recover from its disastrous mistakes in Iraq, Iran continues unchecked in its development of nuclear weapons, Pakistan is falling into Islamic extremism, and Afghanistan is deteriorating rapidly in the face of renewed growth of the Taliban.

To obtain this result, the Bush administration has used the lives of over 4,000 soldiers, wounded over 100,000 more, has caused the deaths of perhaps a quarter million Iraqi civilians, and has spent $2 trillion. Victory, anyone?

Watch the complete version of No End In Sight:

Visit the No End In Sight YouTube page.

Comments

[Mnemanth]

Of course it's a victory. It's a victory for them! It's not about Iraq, it's not about freedom, it's not about what's right. It's about them stealing the highests seats of power in our nation. It's about stuffing their pockets (and the pockets of their supporters) with trillions in taxpayer dollars. It's about them getting ready to walk off the stage with a big smile while they fly the finger at us all and laugh, "So long, Suckers!"
It's about the American sheeple doing nothing more about it all than writing on their blogs and sending emails to the the admin assistant of their state representatives.
I'm sick of this this morning. We didn't do anything to stop it. So everyone quit griping about the reaming we've endured, and continue to take. "Oh, why am I being treated like this? Why am I getting raped?"
Because we're letting it happen.

[PADDYWHACK]

History will only say that you did not support the troops and the right of the Neocons to pocket trillions.If we have hearings and trials some sense of direction and public trust will be restored.Don't hold your breath.

[Nonamnesiac]

Every nickel the US has misspent in conducting the Iraq War has directly contributed to our near bankruptcy and our drowning in a sea of debt and corruption. Osama bin Laden's purpose of attacking the US on 9/11 was to bring us down economically. That's what he said at the time and that's the reason the World Trade Center was attacked.

It appears that John McCain, George Bush and the US Congress have given the victory to bin Laden, including the funding for the surge. While they all gleefully point to a diminution in the violence in Iraq, none of them deny the $10 billion per month cost into the indefinite future and the fact that Ahmadinejad received a hero's welcome when he visited Baghdad this summer.

Now, largely because of the Iraq War and Reaganomics, the US is struggling economically, just as bin Laden wants and we won't even stop the spending on the war.

Bin Laden is winning as a result of the Iraq occupation including the surge and John McCain's insistence that we continue to bankrupt ourselves in executing the anti-American occupation.

[OneLessReason]

We Win!!!!! YAY!!! what exactly did we win for our trillion taxpayer dollars? I still have no healthcare or a job. The Bush Administration has destroyed this country way more than any WMD ever could.Vict­ory.......­hahaha these goons are more stupid than they think the average citizen is...hahahaha

[Jackalheadedgod]

Beware! The satraps want perpetual war. I really hope Obama is concealing his agenda and he really is a radical socialist peacenik who will extract us from the Bush/McCain wars immediately. Might even save the economy. And then twenty years or more of fending off pissed off Iraqi terrorists who come for revenge.

Cheers,
Jack

[Robertx5]

it worries me that in the U.S. ' the surge' has been credited with reducing the violence, I suspect that it may have been largely irrelevent.
Surely a more likely reason is that the Shiite majority won the civil war.
The Sunni minority got themselves into the foolish position of fighting on 2 fronts, one against the Shiite and the other against the U.S. troops. The Shiite on the other hand after early bruising street battles with the U.S. realised that concentrating on destroying the Sunni's would be a more successful strategy .
I suspect the Sunni awakening movement that started to grow in 2006 and the subsequent decline in violence against American troops was more to do with them trying to shore up their own position in that civil war.

[rmreddicks]

I think you're pretty damn close. And I don't have any knowledge that would get anyone closer.

[Puller58]

How can we have a victory? The permanent base deal isn't going to be rubber stamped by the Iraqi government. How can the neocons attack Iran if we don't have troops in Iraq? I'm curious what would happen if we called the neocons' bluff and tried to leave Iraq because we "won".

[Tommygun264]

Haven't you heard? Losing is the new winning.

[demfriend]

When McCain talks about "winning" and "victory" he has yet to expalin what those two words mean in the context of Iraq. He has pumped himself up with the words like they mean something and yet the Iraq war isn't nearly what he would have us believe. It is fragile and too close the what in happening in the countries around it. Mccain would have the military use the "surge model" in afghanistan but we don't have enough troops to even do the minimum in that country because of the amount it is takig just to keep the balance for what it is. McCain is deluded by the fact that he loves war and he has encouraged Bush at every turn to make more war. I am saddened by how little his concernis for the troops and what they need for their own health mental and well being. If he thinks it is honorable and has sent his sons over that is fine but does his own sons have to keep up the pace of long term rotations? Do they get special treatment? Joe Biden's doesn't get any special treatment nor would he ever ask.

[TenThings]

We've Got A Long Way To Go, Baby. Any way you cut it - Iraq's effects will be lasting. The Aim now is to create what is acceptable.

[bucks1414]

Well said!

Bucks Burnett
Dallas

http://TheDemoCats.com

[jollyelle]

How many Bush/Cheney cronies have profited from this war?

[PT6]

In Government, spending by the Pentagon must eliminate the SOLE SOURCE BIDDING on things like meals for soldiers and other common items.

When it costs from $75 to $150 for a soldiers meal (i.e., eggs, toast, bacon, and coffee) there is something dramatically WRONG.

Why would the Pentagon SOLE SOURCE meals at such extraordinary prices. Is their corruption?

Of course, just as on Wall Street there is a "Den of Corruption" in our military that must be cleaned out.

Eliminating waste is a Good Thing and must be done.

We simply have to spend our LIMITED FUNDS a whole lot SMARTER and that another reason why we are in such a crisis!

[Hastings]

Let me see if I understand Mr. Ferguson's point of view. The United States destroyed the infastructure in Iraq that did not exist in the first place. The United Sates has been responsible for the vast number of deaths in Iraq not the vicious genocide of al-Qaeda, the Saddamist, and the Iranian proxie thugs. The surge, which I assume Mr. Ferguson opposed, has worked but it is just not perfectly enough for him. The democraticly elected government is beginning to funtion but just not perfectly enough for Mr. Ferguson's sensibilities.

Give me a break. The sad truth is that the Mr. Fergusons of the world were more than willing to turn their backs on the Iraqi people and their new fragile constitutional democracy for shallow partisan opportunism. Nothing more. Nothing less.

VICTORY IN IRAQ IS A LIBERAL CAUSE!
LIBERALS FOR McCAIN!

[RexPrimoris]

When a nation invades another country without a plan in place for maintaining civil order, that nation is responsible for the civilian deaths that result from the ensuing chaos and ethnic strife. Thus, whether or not civilian deaths were directly caused by U.S. troops, they nonetheless stem directly from our little nation-building exercise and our failure to have enough troop strength to maintain order. The divisions within Iraqi society were well-known before the invasion, as was the predictable chaotic outcome of an attack without sufficient troop strength to police the situation (see General Shinseki). It's a simple concept.

[Hastings]

RexPrimoris, you are absolutly correct that the decision not send in the 400,000 troops that were set to go to Iraq after the invasion was one of the greatest military blunders in the history of the United States of America.

However, that does not excuss those who, for shallow partisan reasons, threw their humanitarianism to the the curb and chose to abandon the Iraqi people to vicious genocide of al-Qaeda.

[PT6]

Fake war justified by Fake Leaders and supported by Fake claims and irresponsible people!

[StillAmused]

"the infastructure [sic] in Iraq that did not exist in the first place"????

After THAT defiant display of ignorance, everything else in your sophomoric right-wing rant is moot.

WE trashed the place, with the able assistance of a burgeoning insurgency that DIDN'T EXIST before we invaded and turned Iraq into a jihadi invitational.

"VICTORY" IN IRAQ IS A WINGNUT DELUSION.

[Puller58]

Fantasy is a poor substitute for reality.

[gifu]

We kicked the Hornet's nest out of the tree. And as for your subjective notion of what constitutes a "victory"?? I thought the Mission was Accomplished a long,long,long, (longer than World War 2) time a go???

[Hastings]

al-Qaeda stirred up the hornet's nest and all of you embraced their strategy and propaganda just so you could worship at and preach from the alter of Bush hate. For the life of me I don't see one thing liberal about that.

[rmreddicks]

They are laughing (if only kindly) at the U.Sl The U.S. looks at ghosts as reality. Iraq looks at its world.

[MagisterLudi]

By rehashing the obvious failures of disastrous invasion one accomplishes nothing is accompished but the flogging of the proverbial deceased equus.
Solutions, anyone???!!!

[Querent]

Get rid of all Republican Congresspersons and Senators. Iraq was and is a Republican debacle, and should have chose us not to trust Republicans on military or foreign policy. It's interesting how Republicans feel that the most trivial historical details are weapons to be used against Democrats, but their own colossal and unmissable stupidities in governance are things nobody can profit from discussing. Of course, no Republican can profit, and to Republicans, only other Republicans are anybody. Republicans have made a fine art of making horrendously bad assumptions, which they adopt uncritically, and which leads them into their everlasting disasters. Why they think anyone should follow them is a mystery.

[PT6]

We need to prove to OURSELVES and the WORLD that we are not the CORRUPT EVIL EMPIRE so it NEVER HAPPENS AGAIN!

Only the guilty say "FORGET ABOUT IT!"

[rmreddicks]

Cross your fingers and hope and vote. Organize and pick up your 2nd amendment rights. Praise the lord BUT pass the ammunition. Keep your powder dry.

The only solution is the people's will. I don't be seeing that happening any time soon.