Earth to Bush: "The Chaos in Iraq was Caused by YOU!!!"

[Guest Gandalf Grey]

Earth to Bush: "The Chaos in Iraq You Now Decry was Caused By You!"

 

By Walter C. Uhler

Created Jul 13 2007 - 9:10am

 

Having watched our pathetic president's July 12th news conference concerning

the "Initial Benchmark Assessment Report," I felt the urge to applaud Helen

Thomas for verbally assaulting George W. Bush for the war criminal and mass

murderer that he is. God bless her for asking: "Mr. President, you started

this war, this war of your choosing, and you can end it alone, today, at

this point.Don't you accept - don't you understand, we brought the Al Qaida

into Iraq?"

 

Bush, of course, lied to Ms. Thomas when he claimed Saddam Hussein "chose

the course" compelling Bush's invasion by ignoring the warning from the UN

Security Council: "Disclose, disarm or face serious consequences."

 

But, "disclose, disarm" what? As virtually every individual on planet earth

now knows, Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction to disarm or disclose.

More significantly, had it actually been left to the UN Security Council to

enforce its resolution - which is to say, had the Bush administration not

violated a legally binding international treaty, the UN Charter -Saddam

Hussein probably would be alive today and still ruling Iraq, like it or not.

 

Bush might "firmly believe that the world is better off without Saddam

Hussein in power," but that's hardly a justification for committing the

worst of all war crimes, unprovoked naked aggression. Moreover, were the

world's population forced to choose between Hussein and Bush, it's likely

that many more millions throughout the world would agree that the world

would be better off without George W. Bush in power.

 

(Imagine our horror, were we to ever find that the world possessed

sufficient military power to successfully force its will upon us! Who, then,

would be appealing to international law and the protections due to sovereign

states?)

 

But Bush's lie to Helen Thomas was not the only lie he told during his press

conference. Look at the lie he embedded in his discussions about

pre-invasion troop strength with General Tommy Franks: "During our

discussions in the run-up to the decision to remove Saddam Hussein after he

ignored the Security Council resolutions, my primary question to General

Franks was: Do you have what it takes to succeed?"

 

In fact, Saddam Hussein complied with the Security Council Resolution 1441,

which afforded Iraq "'a final opportunity to comply' with its disarmament

obligations, and accordingly it set up an enhanced inspection regime."

[Christine Gray, International Law and the Use of Force, p. 271] As

international law scholar Christine Gray has concluded: "The determination

of a material breach after Resolution 1441 was unilateral in the sense that

it was made by the USA, the UK and Australia rather than by the Security

Council." [ibid, p. 277]

 

And, thus, it was the war mongering Bush regime that cut the inspections

short, lest UN weapons inspectors demonstrate that Iraq possessed no WMD -

or lest the weather in Iraq would become too hot for invading troops.

 

Bush's third lie at the press conference was his biggest - and he stumbled

while defending it. When Bush asserted, "the same folks that are bombing

innocent people in Iraq were the ones who attacked us in America on

September the 11th," one reporter called him to task. "What evidence can you

present to the American people that the people who attacked the United

States on September 11th are, in fact, the same people who are responsible

for the bombing taking place in Iraq.And also, are you saying sir, that Al

Qaida in Iraq is the same organization being run by Osama bin Laden

himself?"

 

After asserting "Al Qaida in Iraq has sworn allegiance to Osama bin Laden,"

Bush was forced to retreat. "And the guys who had perpetuated (sic!) the

attacks on America - obviously the guys on the airplane are dead. And the

commanders, many of those are either dead or in captivity - like Khalid

Sheikh Mohammed." Unfortunately, Bush did not retreat to the entire truth.

 

Had he been entirely honest, Bush would have asserted that U.S. intelligence

still has no evidence of operational ties between Saddam Hussein and al

Qaida prior to 9/11, that his administration - especially Douglas Feith,

Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Cheney -- despicably

seized upon already discredited shards of evidence to make such a connection

and that he and Cheney continue trying to establish a link in order to

persuade the American public that the invasion of Iraq was necessary in

order to combat international terrorism.

 

Had he been entirely honest, Bush would have mentioned the intelligence

reports, which concluded: (1) the U.S. invasion of Iraq inspired numerous

otherwise middle class Muslims to become jihadists and (2) the U.S. invasion

of Iraq is creating more al Qaida terrorists than the U.S. is killing in

Iraq.

 

Had he been entirely honest, Bush would have noted that only 15 percent of

the average daily attacks in Iraq are launched by al Qaida. Some 70 percent

come from Sunni insurgents who are determined to rid their country of a

foreign invader and occupier. Shiites militias launch the remaining 15

percent.

 

Thus, had Bush been entirely honest, he would not have claimed "the same

folks that are bombing innocent people in Iraq were the ones who attacked us

in America on September the 11th."

 

Nevertheless, after devoting much of his news conference to either

exaggerating the progress described in the "Initial Benchmark Assessment

Report" or resurrecting old lies to defend his indefensible illegal, immoral

invasion of Iraq, Bush brandished the astonishing chutzpa to complain about

both the chaos in Iraq created by al Qaida and the "tragic escalation of

sectarian violence, sparked by [al Qaida's] bombing of the golden mosque in

Samarra."

 

Chutzpa? Yes! Experts had predicted such chaos and sectarian violence long

before Bush ordered the invasion. Thus, Mr. President, precisely because

"you started this war," which "brought the Al Qaida into Iraq," you alone

are ultimately responsible for all the chaos, death, destruction,

dislocation and sectarian violence committed in its wake. It's a verdict

fairly screamed from virtually all points on planet earth and one you'll

never escape.

_______

 

 

 

About author Walter C. Uhler is an independent scholar and freelance writer

whose work has been published in numerous publications, including The

Nation, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the Journal of Military

History, the Moscow Times and the San Francisco Chronicle. He also is

President of the Russian-American International Studies Association (RAISA).

waltuhler@aol.com [1]

 

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"A little patience and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their

spells dissolve, and the people recovering their true sight, restore their

government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are

suffering deeply in spirit,

and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public

debt. But if the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have

patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning

back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at

stake."

-Thomas Jefferson