Returning home from the horror of Iraq
Such a simple idea: invade Iraq, remove the tyrant and unleash democracy. Nearly ten years and a trillion dollars later, Western forces, now reduced to a sizable rump of American troops, are coming home. They will all be gone from Iraq in 19 days.
What are they leaving behind? A vast number of Western ‘mercenaries’ employed by assorted security companies; a country more divided, more insecure, and more uncertain in its destiny, and an Iran that holds a regional sway greater than at any time since the Persian Empire ruled supreme a century ago.
One senses that there will be few celebrating; indeed one wonders whether Messrs Bush and Blair will even notice the moment. History is unlikely to be generous about the Iraq adventure; the word oil is unlikely to be far from its evaluation.
I have never been more frightened in any theatre of war. To be on the ground was to be adorned in a flak jacket and to feel very personally threatened at all times. I was there perhaps a dozen times. I heard the car bombs, saw the tell tale plumes of black smoke rising into the sky.
I was there before, when the odious Saddam ruled supreme. After he’d gone, I saw the severed limbs, the blood, and the corpses of some who died. From Amman and Damascus to Glasgow and Birmingham, I met some of the millions displaced, and tried and failed to remain the objective journalist that I am paid to be.
And beyond, what of the four and half thousand American families, the hundreds of British, Dutch, Canadian, Nepalese families who lost a loved one, or the thousands who have lost a limb and their mental well being? What will history say to them?
The oil is flowing; regional defence sales are rising. But is the region a better place?
We must move on, we have new wars to fight, inside the eurozone, in the trading rooms, of Shanghai, New York and London. Oh, and there is Afghanistan still flaming, Pakistan besides; the Arab Spring still raging and uncertain.
What a time for leadership, unity, and purpose. We, the first generation in a hundred years to live life without a World War are blessed. But will history judge that we used our blessing well?
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There are 31 comments on this post
A war that should never have been.A war fought on illegal grounds.Had we have lost those responsible would be held on war crime charges.The fact that we won on the ground, should not preclude that.Yet Blair is allowed to swan round the world on official governments business,and give lectures earning him millions. Cambell the architect of false information ,is still allowed to spew his thoughts forth, and had the gaul to tell the Leverson inquiry of the”putrid press”.Straw still stands up in parliament after being re elected by tolerant voters, and what of the attourney general who gave the OK.All should be at the Hague.All have charges to answer ,yet never will, just like the bankers in charge at the financial crisis. Equally there is Bush and his American cohorts.Iraq will now be left to simmer and probably erupt into civil war.
We have not made the world a safer place
After the torchlight on sweaty face
After the frost silence in the gardens
After the agony in stony places
The shouting and the crying
Prison and palace and reverberation
Of thunder of spring over distant mountains
He who was living is now dead
We who were living are now dying
With a little patience
I have use TS Eliot to underline a tone before.
A good piece Jon, but so sad that many have to go through this so others can live.
Did you watch David Attenborough on the Andrew Marr show at weekend? It doesn’t look too far away when killer whales will be putting a stop to human interference.
We are simply animals , but our souls suffer, whatever a soul is.
As the songwriter said: ‘When will they ever learn?’
Jon,
Thank you for this piece. Well done.
As a regular visitor to Kuwait I can tell you the West’s actions and profiteering are reviled even amongst some families who have every reason to hate the Iraqi invasion and occupation of their country. Bear in mind too the West wouldn’t move to liberate Kuwait until the Kuwaitis paid up front for the military action. “Democracy” had next to nothing to do with it, anymore than did so-called Weapons of Mass Destruction, as events have shown. The fact is it was all one big lie manufactured by the Americans and the British to suit their oil interests – you won’t find many in Kuwait who think otherwise.
What the West did was thoroughly shameful, nothing more than modern colonial gangsterism. The same applies to Afghanistan and continuing threats and interference in other nations’ internal affairs.
The sooner we stop sending our young men and women to do Establishment dirty work the sooner we can attempt to form a decent and fair society. And we would also stop paying for their disgusting wars and mechanised mass murders. These are the only “objectivities” worth having.
I completely agree with all the valid issues Jon
Snow raises here.The futility of these murderous
“campaigns”, the utter waste of human life, especially the children,those dead and orphaned.However, will the “mainstream media” finally find the courage to inform the general public about this ongoing bloody slaughter, carried out by their respective governments in their name, at such a cost, both morally and financially,whilst at the same time attacking the most vulnerable in society,those who have,historically,gave their lives in tens of thousands, probably millions, in order to defend what are now laughingly described as “Democracies”.
Jon,
you neglected to mention that the original idea was neither to unleash democracy nor remove a tyrant, but simply to prevent weapons of mass destruction from ‘remaining’ in Saddams’ hands. The others followed once it got rather too difficult to maintain the legtimacy of the original purported aims. Let’s not allow them to feign sincerity of intention, nor swallow it when they do.
Some perspective here please! More people died on just day one of the Normandy invasion than in both Iraq & Afghanistan in ten years.
Russia lost 21 millions in WW2. Germany and Japan’s losses were also many millions. Ours were less numerous but dreadful all the same.
Many more Americans were killed & wounded in Europe in last century then in ALL of America’s wars since 1945.
It might not seem like it to you, but these horrors are getting less appalling. And the most bestial & murderous continent of all – Europe – is enjoying unprecedented peace after 2,500+ years of conflict.
There are many successful peace processes going on. But they don’t make the news. Do they?
>More people died on just day one of the Normandy invasion than in both Iraq & Afghanistan in ten years.
Wow! Whose deaths are you NOT counting?
There are no peace “processes” for the world. There is only one: an end to war. An end to killing and oppression. And there is no success to report there.
Hello Marverde
In all these tragic cases I include ALL casualties: both military (all parties) and civilian.
I agree with you that only an end to all forms of war is the completed peace process. But I disagree with any implication (which you may not have intended) that progress toward that is NOT being made. We are moving forward with peace after many millennia of wars, worldwide and otherwise.
I urge that we also celebrate the substantial progress that has been, and is being made to end this madness. Unfortunately, the very many peace processes that are achieving success – albeit not complete – do not attract C4′s attention. Perhaps because it’s hard to visualise the absence of war? And because peace is less dramatic & newsworthy than war and mass deaths.
I hope you’ll understand my recognition even of limited progress – which perhaps matches yours?
You are so right Jon. What a dreadful history for our future generations! We could not protect human lives in these wars but can we avoid further killings? Is it possible to fix our house first before attacking anyother nation? How much hunger and poverty we could have alleviated with these trillions of US dollars. I have hundreds of Questions to ask, would our ever so intelligent generations be ridiculing the smart western leaders of the 21st century?
Jon,
Have just watched the 7 o’clock broadcast.
In this, Qatar was identified as “Bahrain.”
Tsk tsk.
Hello Jon
Sorry – this is not relevant at all but I do think you and Matt are the A team for me now. Even the set seems to work better with you both
i guess the only people who can truly say are Iraqis. what about those skill living in Iraq, what do they say, do they think it was all worth it?
One of the achievements of the Iraq war was to demonstrate the ability of bigger, wealthier nations to bully and destroy smaller ones. How easy it is to exploit the idea of a wicked leadership, to pursue one’s own ends. How easy it is for certain politicians eg Blair, Rumsfeld and others to get rich through the actions of making war. It showed how politicians are willing to lie in pursuit of their personal desire for fame and historical repute, Blair again, and how little notice governments take of their “democratic” responsibilities. it showed that countries are run on agendas of greed and corruption, and how little their populations can do to influence events. So in all these respects, this was a truly eye-opening war.
You say that we are the first generation not to have to live with a World War, but isn’t that what the War on Terror is?
A world war in all but name?
And no, history will not judge us well. Removing Saddam was a good thing, but we did it for the wrong reasons; oil. We all know it was about oil because the US put in place a law giving their oil companies 70% of the profits for the next 30 odd years.
If they’d had plan for post-war, history might be kinder but we British will get the worst criticism as we never asked the US serious questions about their motives and plans.
The US has frequently abused this alliance and presumed on British friendship and support and the 50 years of hard work the FSO put in to restore Britains’ standing in the Middle Esat after the Suez debacle, was ruined by a religious fanatic (Blair) in support of an alliance which is no longer in Britains’ interests.
Time for a clean break; time to tell the world, “We are not like them. We have learned from the fall of Empire. We have learned, if nothing else, how NOT to behave and treat others.”
We must do this soon and apologise to the Iraqis, before we lose all standing and credibility in the region.
I could not agree with your piece more. Its a pointless exercise to ask what will America learn and take from this because as always they will learn nothing and take a lot. why do we insist on holding on to this myth of America being our great allies and friends? They never have been and never will be. It seems that we have to feel that we are forever in their debt because of WW 2. And that itself is a myth. For as I fully realise that the country would have banished without them I also fully realise that had not they themselves started to get hurt they would have let us banish. We do not owe them anything because they do not help us or any other country unless it suits them. I still live in hope that one day we will stop getting drawn half heartedly into Americas needless capitalist driven vendettas because we are not the same as we were in the days of the Empire and it is about time we cut off our apron strings so that other countries can see it. Thats what I hope for our future history because at least that will be a small start for world peace as a whole.
apron strings with America so that other countries cat heart heartedly
I’m a few years behind you in age and experience, Jon, but I think Iraq and Afghanistan are two of the phoney wars resulting from a world of nuclear weapons: everything is a form of stand-off using the latest mini bling-weapon the master states want to practise with – Israel does the same with its hi-tech nasty stuff on its enemies behind the apartheid walls.
The only ‘real’ wars seem to be taking place in Africa, where untold numbers of innocent civilians get hacked to death the old-fashioned way without the first world media even noticing much, as we don’t want to lose the minerals we rape from their soil – either that, or like in Mexico they are caught in the cross-fire of the drug wars, more phoney wars which are the product of another marketplace run by rich drug barons to sate the demand of the ‘land of the free’ crowd who pay back in guns to kill even more innocent victims.
We don’t have World Wars, certainly, but we do have the first Global Wars: wars of greed and amoral marketplaces built on finance capitalism and economic blackmail.
I don’t see that we are blessed at all – the madness is even more subtle and pervasive with no honour or justification.
Tragic that the number civilians killed has largely been forgotten, even more so that you don’t mention them in your piece.
The silence is deafening. Perhaps a sign that the politicians and war-mongers wish to see this shameful episode ended. I’ve seen a number of reports warning that unless there is investment in Iraq it will be a source of problems. Perhaps there need to be incentives in the form of grants. Maybe EU-Iraq or US-Iraq Arab-Iraq, grants that allow small businesses within Iraq to partner with others outside of Iraq and generate wealth. It needs to be from the ground up as there is too much corruption at the top which will merely exacerbate the problem. Perhaps such a scheme could be attempted in Afghanistan? If the people on the ground cannot see their lives getting better they will turn to those that promise that under their leadership they will improve in return for their sons or daughters lives.
Jon,
we have not known a world war in our generation. Technically correct, but surely these conflicts have had a world war type dimesion?
If they can track Osama then they could have traced Saddam. One mission, end of problem.
No need for 10 years of sanctions and years of war.
Yes of course the war was a tragic error – but where is your evidence that it was a ‘war for oil’? This is a tired old conspiracy theory, lazily trotted out by those on the left. Those responsible for the war were stupid – but not evil.
Hello Barry., Yes of course there’s no evidence that the US spent trillions of dollars on this war to enable wider access to Iraq’s oil fields.
How do you know that those conspiracy theories are the lazy output ‘of those on the left?’
The evidence that is was a war for oil is in the fact that the US governor, Paul Bremer, signed a law giving US and British oil companies 70% of the profits from Iraq’s oil.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/blood-and-oil-how-the-west-will-profit-from-iraqs-most-precious-commodity-431119.html
Dear Andrew and Barrie, The fact that the US and UK wanted, after the invasion, to see their companies gain some benefits (in return for the sacrifices which they felt they had made) may or may not be excusable, depending on your views. However it does not constitute the slightest evidence (meaning evidence which would stand up in a court of law) that oil was a reason for the war in the first place.
Jon Snow fronts the best news show on British TV. The left-of-centre views of its makers and presenters are very evident, but intelligent, open-minded viewers can filter that out without difficulty. However this Snowblog is clearly overpopulated with the views of those with closed minds on the subject of the evils of ‘Great Satan’ and its little sidekick – as well as other shibboleths of the left. I think I will leave this part of cyberspace to all you aspiring Dave and Deirdre Sparts out there. Toodle-oo
The unlawful invasion, the British media, the antiwar demonstrations, the brutal massacre of defenceless Iraqis and the looting exposed the truth of the ‘international laws’, of the ‘evidence’ presented before the UN by the US, and the truth of British democracy & media:a fraudulent media, government and Parliament – since long after the occupation and slaughter of over 100,000s of poor civilians in Iraq only then did the Houses began to seriously question the legality of the invasion!
Now Britain is preparing for a new bloody ‘campaign’: this time in Iran as for several years the British media have succeeded to label not just all Iranian politicians but ‘the Iranian nation’ as ‘irresponsible’ and ‘evil’ (Mail). British politicians still speak of ‘values’: the whole world knows of their business dealings & covert operations regardless of ‘values’- can’t they see how countless documents, research materials, committed, books, journalists and the internet have exposed their historical ‘values’ to the world: mass murder & openly working with criminal regimes in the ME have become order of the day. Pity the families of fallen soldiers. Where is the International Court of Justice, Jon?
In spite of all the turmoil of war, I think it’s very worrying that Iraq and Iran both want nuclear bombs.
I worry much more about the ones who ALREADY have them and haven´t the slightest intention of giving them up. They are usually the ones who make a bigger fuss about newcomers to the appalling club (well, most newcomers because they didn´t make it about Israel).
You can check the nuclear arsenal here, if interested: http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Nuclearweaponswhohaswhat
Yes, as KHOSROW says above, the USA and those countries who always seem incapable of saying no to it, like the UK, are preparing to do to Iran what they did to Iraq. If the media continue to COLLUDE in the pre-war manipulation as they´ve been doing so far, and as they did with Iraq, I do not wish to read another journalist´s “mea culpa” years later, when the corpses pile up and another country is destroyed.
The media´s duty is clear and it is now: expose and keep exposing the push for war, and combat it. Be brave now, instead of feeling guilty later.
The newsreader at BBC News actually SAID three times tonight that there HAD been weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Sami Zubaida, who was excellent, as usual, was looking at him in disbelief. That´s the BBC. My father wouldn´t have recognized it.
This war highlighted the changing nature of the concept of war itself. It is true, we haven’t seen a world war of attrition but that is because wars – new wars – are those seen as “peripheral” to the US military. Hence how unprepared for the insurgency and national building that came after phase one.
There is an urgent need to readjust military thinking… to incorporate the ‘periphery’ and prepare adequate counterinsurgency doctrine.
Also, yes, probably best not to go to war to blatantly steal another state’s resources under the guise of democracy promotion…
Where is the moral logic of denying small nations atomic bombs whilst ignoring the fact that bigger nations keep enormous stocks of them, please? And will somebody explain to me why, after all the carnage and tragedy of these two phoney wars, there actually appears to be some contemplation of embarking on yet another against Iran?
A great piece of writing John. Being a peace loving hippie I find it difficult to justify any of the western world’s wars after World War II. One cant help but see the media being used as a propaganda tool for the government to justify these wars over the years. At least on Channel 4 you get the impression that there is a much more democratic and untainted truth in the news. I guess the thing is that every war is directly or indirectly about money, strategic positioning and power. The western world doesn’t need to defend itself and I guess over the years it has caused much more damage than help. I read somewhere that 3 million have been displaced in the East since the beginning of Desert Storm and I think thats just the tip of the iceberg.