Remembering all those arguments made 1,500 deaths ago

[rodeodance]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=2270&ncid=2270&e=9&u=/krwashbureau/20050309/ts_krwashbureau/_bc_galloway_column_wa

Remembering all those arguments made 1,500 deaths ago

Wed Mar 9, 5:03 PM ET


By Joseph L. Galloway, Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON - Something about anniversaries prods us to pause and reflect on what's transpired in the intervening time. March 20 is the second anniversary of the invasion of Iraq (news - web sites), and it's a good time to consider what's happened since then.

Do you recall our civilian leadership's rationale for a pre-emptive war against Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)? President George Bush (news - web sites) and Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) and, yes, former Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) told the world that the United States had no choice but to invade Iraq. They said Saddam was hiding chemical and biological weapons, and that his scientists would be able to produce a nuclear weapon in a few years.

Do you remember those who predicted that the operation would be financed in large part by sales of Iraqi oil? It would be cheap, easy and, oh yes, so swift that civilian leaders in the Pentagon (news - web sites) ordered the military to plan to begin withdrawing from Iraq no later than the summer of 2003.

There was no need for much post-war planning because there wasn't going to be any post-war. America would come, conquer and get out. If Iraq was broken, its new government headed by the neo-conservatives' favorite exile, Ahmad Chalabi, could fix it. There would be no need for American nation-building, just some modest humanitarian aid..........

[tuvor]

1. Recommended for Greatest.

Never forget.

[rodeodance]

3. thanks for the greatest recom. It is a sombering article that all should

read and pass to all they know.

[Skip Intro]

2. wow

[Nite Owl]

4. So few do remember

just what was said thanks to the media ignoring and placting the WH whenever they ask.

Dont't forget to rate this!

[montana_hazeleyes]

13. 4.96 now

with 34 votes.

[inchhigh]

37. The freepers must be waking up now.

"4.96 now with 34 votes."

It's down to 4.03 with 216, including mine.

[gratuitous]

5. And don't forget the cost

It was all going to be paid for with Iraqi oil revenues. Not going to cost the U.S. taxpayer a dime. Well, maybe a billion dollars. Okay, two, but two billion tops.

We spend twice that every month, Paul Bremer mishandled $9 billion, and nobody seems to know or be very interested in where any of the money for Iraq's oil is going. Gee, two Texas oilmen in the White House. You don't suppose . . . ?

[teakee]

6. 9 billion, poof!---gone and Bremer gets a medal. n/t

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

7. Oh, I've got a pretty good idea where the $9B is.

[teakee]

9. LOL, damn I wanna job like Bremer!

Boots with suits. Such a little fashion statement of Bremer's; Rumsfinkle copied it.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

10. I think Bremer was just the bag man.

He probably got/will get a piece of the vigorish, though.

[Career Prole]

8. Damn...I clicked to post a message at the end and it appears to link to

the wrong message board. :shrug:

[bvar22]

11. Recommended

Yahoo rating 5.0 w/23 votes.
Don't forget to vote.

[Skittles]

12. I wish he had counted the Iraqi death toll in his title

:(

[Blue_Tires]

14. wow...great piece about the ballooning costs

and lack of proper troop compliments/equipment

BUT: What this story fails to mention, and what would make a great ending is if the writer mentioned the INCREASING reliance on mercs and paid killers who are accountable to know one, and shoot up the country like the wild wild west...another mention of the war profiteering (also related to the mercs) also bears repeating

[LeahD]

15. We can't be reminded too often. Thanks. n/t

[Babel_17]

16. "Two thumbs up ....

way, way, up!" Thank you for the link.

[grytpype]

17. This is going to be a big hit in the blogosphere!

It's a summary of everything the Bushists want you to forget.

I heard that snivelling piece of shit say "the 3000 who died on 9/11 didn't die in vain, because now Iraq is free." Try to figure that out, your head will explode

[Lorien]

21. OMG

He said that? Shameless. "We never said Iraq was involved in 9/11"...but they sure as hell know how to imply as much! :grr:

[rocktivity]

18. I certainly remember what I said in one of my first posts here

"We'd better put some thought into how we retalliate, or we'll end up with a war that has Viet Nam's fingerprints all over it."

:headbang:
rocknation

[Hissyspit]

19. Thomas Powers Predicts Insurgency AND Financial Cost of War:

I've posted this before. Posting it again:

Journalist Thomas Powers, who wrote an article in the New York Times "The Man Who Would Be President of Iraq," was interviewed on public radio's Fresh Air. He is a Pulitzer Prize winner and expert on the CIA and intelligence, and author of "Intelligence Wars: American Secret History from Hitler to al Qaeda."

The interview with Terry Gross was on March 17, 2003, before the ground war had started. The ground war started on March 19.


"GROSS: If we create a new government, and if that government is, as you describe it, more of a client government, do you think that government is going to be under attack either by other Iraqis or by terrorists from other countries?

POWERS: It's hard to say when the trouble will begin.

You know, the thing that worries me about this whole episode is the magnitude of the grand scheme that the Bush Administration has dreamed up for transforming the political landscape of the Middle East. You know, big ideas are the ones that give you the most trouble and trying to make the world perfect just leads to disaster, in my opinion, and I think that has sort of been the record of human history, and whenever we've engaged in a really big endeavor, trouble comes.

Now exactly when that is going to happen, I don't know. There's gonna be some kind of a government there. We're gonna be there. Eventually, after the fighting stops, the dust settles and everything is quiet for a while. And for a time it looks like: 'Gee, this wasn't so hard. You know, this is gonna be a big success.'

But you've changed the fundamental relationships of people there and gradually they realize what the limits of their action are, and they realize, well, we can't have any military forces with tanks attacking the Americans, but it isn't that hard to kind of sneak up on 'em in the streets.

And I think sort of an endless amount of trouble will slowly begin to bubble forth, so I figure we're gonna have a month of war, and then we're gonna have a month of indecision, and then we're gonna have a couple of months where everything looks pretty good. And then after that, things are gonna start going downhill, and it's gonna be trouble, and it's gonna be money and it'll take a generation to resolve it."

[RaleighNCDUer]

45. And it worked out exactly as he predicted. n/t

[AuntiBush]

53. Remarkably on the Target. Yet, so sad...

[obxhead]

20. and now a moment of silence please....

[susanna]

22. I will always remember.

I lost one of my best friends in the first week of this "war." The second anniversary of his death is fast approaching as I write this.

Time may lessen the acute pain of loss, but it will never eradicate the more subtle jabs to the heart that survivors know so well. I liken it to the idea that time may lessen the remembrance of the bloodshed related to our "nation-building" in Iraq, but it will never truly be over; not considering the way we went about it, anyway.

This post recommended for best. Thank you for this thread, rodeodance.

[Hissyspit]

24. I just almost lost former student yesterday in Iraq in the huge hotel...

garbage truck explosion/attack. She said she was facing a window on the side of the explosion when it occurred and was thrown back 9 feet. She is not in the military; is working to train Iraqi police. She is a friend I have keept in touch with after having her as a student for two months several years ago. I saw her in December and she didn't mention anything about going to Iraq. Next thing I know she's sending out these emails about training here in the U.S. and then she's in Iraq (working for an independent contractor.) I guess I wasn't a very good teacher, because she seems to have bought a lot of the propaganda. I got all over her in December for believing that we had found weapons of mass destruction.

[RaleighNCDUer]

46. Interesting. The short mention of the explosion on CNN.com

said it was at the Ministry of Agriculture or something like that. But Riverbend blog also said it was at the hotel that is used primarily by foreign contractors and mercs.

So do we believe CNN or the people who are there and witnesseed it?

[chlamor]

23. Where is a mention of the Iraqi people in article-100,000 dead? Nowhere

We know about the study of the estimated 100,000 dead and i have seen a more recent estimate of 198,000 from Lancet Journal I believe. This article did not even breathe a whisper about the Iraqis it was framed entirely as if only what happens to US is important. That is unacceptable.

[tuvor]

25. I'm sure someone on DU would count the Iraqi milestones

if only the bush administration allowed for some way of keeping track.

I don't think any member of DU disagrees with you for one second.

[RaulGroom]

26. Oh, I think there are certainly some

They are the same people who pushed all of these lines so hard on DU before the war. The GOP has no monopoly on ignoring Iraqi dead.

[tuvor]

28. Who pushed what "lines"?

Are you suggesting there are DUers (aside from sneaky freepers and the like, of course) who don't care about Iraqi deaths? Really? WOW.

You can "think there are some" all you like. How 'bout you provide some proof so we can all be as wise as you?

And "Oh, I've seen it around" just won't cut it. Nothing is more pathetic than posting something like what you just did and neglecting to back it up.

[RaulGroom]

41. I see you weren't here before the war started

It's unfortunately against DU rules for me to list the names of all the DUers who spent night and day arguing in favor of the Iraq war in the months before it began.

Some are gone now, booted after long, long careers of shameless pimping for hard-right viewpoints. Some are still here.

Sorry if that "doesn't cut it" for you. You can choose to believe what you like. However, ask some folks who were reading this board in February of 2003 if there were any DUers who pushed the GOP party line about "disarming Saddam," how easy it would be, how right it was, how foolish those of us on "the wrong side of history" would one day look.

Once you find a nice list of folks, see if you can uncover one single example of one of them lamenting the tens of thousands of Iraqi dead. You won't find it.

[tuvor]

50. Thanks for replying.

I better understand that you made a claim without being able to back it up.

I'll defer to your better insights based on DU seniority, and I apologize to you for jumping to conclusions.

[Knight of Ni]

42. And it's not like the media is digging for it........

It was at or above 100K even before the election. God knows how high it is now.

What the neocons did in starting this war of choice was bad enough even without taking the 100,000+ Iraqi deaths into account.

But if you include that figure, let's just say that Bush and his pals should have a special spot reserved in Hell.

[Vladimir]

38. Because dead Arabs don't count

but evidently you didn't get the memo...

[Lone Pawn]

47. To be fair, the Lancet estimation is the only study

with numbers that high. Still, I do agree with your basic point--it's sickening how the US claims to be all about freeing Iraqis, but doesn't give a damn how many it has to kill or how many genocides it has to ignore to do it.

[Bark Bark Bark]

49. Write The Author

Let him know it was a great article...but the stories of the tragedies on the Iraqi civilians' side ALSO need to be told.

You have given the news article Remembering all those arguments made 1,500 deaths ago a rating of 5.
Its current average rating is 3.98 with 312 vote(s).

Please don't lash out at him, though, for not telling them right out the gate. Any article has to be told from a decisive POV. And frankly, if it's going to change any chickenhawk minds, it has to tap their infantile self-interest to soften them up. Simultaneous talk of Iraqi casualties just makes them defensive and withdrawing.

Separately, the Iraqi story may touch a glimmer of remaining humanity in some of them. Slim hope, but always worth a try.

[JusticeForAll]

27. just 1500 dead?

Imagine if we had a cruel evil regime leading our country, armed with weapons of mass destruction...

oh never mind you know the rest...and the sarcasm of the first line.

on edit, God bless those who died for oil when thinking they were fighting for democracy and those who are forced to continue without a noble purpose.

[EFerrari]

29. They only count Americans. Those thousands of Iraqi

napalmed civilians or those fortunates who lived to be contaminated by our depleted uranium munitions, those are not counted.

What a terrible terrible time this.

[MadisonProgressive]

36. They weren't napalmed!

Remember that the US military calls it something different now because it's more environmentally friendly! /sarcasm off

[Media_Lies_Daily]

32. I wonder how many have died, and continue to die, in Afghanistan?

[Frederik]

30. And according to Wolfowitz...

The number of US troops would be reduced to 30,000 by fall 2003.

[dbt]

31. WHERE ARE THE WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION??

We've had two fucking YEARS to find them. Where ARE they? Shit, we've had time to manufacture them, ship them covertly to IraQ, hide them, "find" them and bring them home for a parade down Main Street by now.

KIA: 1500
WMD: 0

[Knight of Ni]

43. Repubs are gonna say they were moved to Iran or Syria.....

....or whatever country the neocons want to invade...err..."liberate" next.

You know the drill.

[Capn Sunshine]

51. Hey, aren't they in Venezuela?

:nuke:

[Don1]

33. Done

You have given the news article Remembering all those arguments made 1,500 deaths ago a rating of 5.
Its current average rating is 4.03 with 191 vote(s).

As others have mentioned, the article should also mention the > 100K civilians dead. It's not only an important point, but also very relevant to the article. Remember how Bushco was making statements about how the Iraqis would throw roses at our feet? Now, the "insurgency" there of 100k to 200k is nearly the same number of Iraqi civilian deaths, 100k to 200k.

[mbperrin]

34. Rated!

You have given the news article Remembering all those arguments made 1,500 deaths ago a rating of 5.
Its current average rating is 4.04 with 196 vote(s).

[NVMojo]

35. Excellent and we need more like this all over the damn place

so that we end up angry enough in this nation to impeach these false bastards!!!

[Roland99]

39. And, it was Gen. Garner that pushed for elections right away.

He got fired and replaced with Bremer.

[grace0418]

40. Even those of us paying attention can sometimes forget all this

in all the buckets of bullshit being thrown on America by BushCo. We really must never forget and never let America forget.

[RaleighNCDUer]

44. 4.0 rating @ 275 n/t

[chuckrocks]

48. nvf

nominated, voted(3.99), and forwarded.

[AirAmFan]

52. Argument NEVER made in MSM: Iraq invasion was naked 'energy security' realpolitik

Argument NEVER made in MSM: Iraq invasion was naked "energy security" realpolitik

Googling for thoughtful analyses of the Iraq invasion brought me to a two-article BONANZA at http://www.fpif.org/indices/topics/energy/index.php?sort=author . Michael Renner of the Worldwatch Institute marshals little-known documented facts of international oil politics to make sense of the invasion as NAKED CONQUEST for US "energy security". In a January 2004 article, "Fueling Conflict", he makes broad assertions backed with detailed statistics in another article written a year before, "Post-Saddam Iraq: Linchpin of a New Oil Order".

Here are some excerpts from "Fueling Conflict":

"The rate of oil discoveries over the last few decades tells a clear story. In the 1960s, an average of 47 billion barrels per year were discovered. ... the annual rate plummeted to 35 billion barrels in the 1970s, 24 billion in the 1980s, and a mere 14 billion in the 1990s. The United States has gone to great lengths to maintain its domination over world oil during the past half-century. Washington has made particularly heavy investments in keeping the immensely oil-rich Persian Gulf region in its geopolitical orbit. It has done so by propping up client regimes with arms and credits, acquiring military bases, overthrowing or marginalizing those that stand in the way, influencing the routing of oil export pipelines... Securing oil supplies has consistently trumped the pursuit of peace, human rights, and democracy.

... invasion took place for a number of reasons, though NOT THE ONES PUBLICLY ADVERTISED BY THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION. IRAQI OIL IS PLENTIFUL, CHEAP TO PRODUCE, AND HIGH QUALITY, MAKING IT LUCRATIVE SPOILS OF WAR. ... A major increase in Iraqi oil production following reconstruction would accommodate the rise in oil demand projected by the Bush administration and reinforce the oil-centered world energy system. ... a pro-U.S. Iraq would help reduce U.S. dependence on Saudi Arabia.

... by achieving Security Council Resolution 1483 in May 2003, the occupiers gained broad control over the Iraqi oil industry and sole decision-making power until December 2007 over the use of oil revenues.... The occupation regime is pushing for a broad privatization of Iraq's economy in accordance with Bush administration goals. BEFORE THE START OF THE WAR, THE ADMINISTRATION DRAFTED SWEEPING PLANS FOR ASSET SALES, CONCESSIONS, LEASES, AND MANAGEMENT CONTRACTS ACROSS THE IRAQI ECONOMY, INCLUDING THE OIL SECTOR. The plans stipulated that the first year of occupation would be spent building 'consensus' for privatization, to be followed by asset transfers over a three-year period.

... who will get preferential access to Iraq's riches? TO WHAT EXTENT WILL EXISTING CONTRACTS CONCLUDED BY RUSSIAN, FRENCH, AND CHINESE COMPANIES WITH HUSSEIN'S REGIME BE UPHELD? BEFORE THE WAR, THERE WERE THINLY VEILED THREATS THAT COMPANIES WHOSE HOME GOVERNMENTS REFUSED TO SUPPORT AN INVASION WOULD BE SHOWN THE DOOR. By implication, the big winners in such a reshuffling would likely be the U.S. and British companies, such as ExxonMobil, Chevron-Texaco, BP, and Shell..."

All these assertions are supported with detailed statistics and references at http://www.fpif.org/pdf/reports/PRoil.pdf , in an article written months before the US invasion even took place.

See also a discussion thread for these two Michael Renner articles at http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x1653776 .