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No Exit From Iraq? Among the last works of the “Holy Prophet Philip Berrigan of Jonah House” before he died on December 6, 2002, are the following “worthwhile subjects of prayer:” ►
that we disarm our hearts and our society ►
that Americans begin to understand and resist the
three-pronged aim for the Bush Administration: the trashing of civil
liberties, perpetual war, and world domination ►
that the crime of 60 years of nuclearism,
its consequent wasting of our lives, and planet be revealed ►
that Americans grasp that war is our #1 business; that we
are a violent, killer people, and that we know virtually little of the
non-violence of Jesus and the Gospel What is certain is that American involvement in Iraq will change in 2006. But what if there is no Iraqi government to defend? What if the stalemate between Shiite and Sunni Muslims persists and the “low-grade civil war”─which has been rumbling since Saddam Hussein left Baghdad – erupts into anarchy, an unbridled sectarian war of all against all? What do the American troops there do? Don’t worry! In the undoubting, messianic mind of the Bush junta, the United States isn’t going anywhere. It wants the “Empire of Bases” (stretching from Estonia through Eastern Europe to Macedonia, Iraq, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekiztan, Kazakistan, Tajckistan, Afghanistan, Kyrgystan, Pakistan, Japan, South Korea, and Mongolia). These bases, along with 23 major deployments along the Persian Gulf through the Straits of Hormuz around to the Arabian Sea, control the oil routes and provide economic and military leverage over Iran, Russia, and China in a world of vanishing resources. The world is being bulldozed, not for human interests or even Iraqi interests, but for U.S. interests. And “Americans” means not only troops, but tens of thousands of mercenaries and the corrupt legionnaires of the corporations that are pocketing billions for doing nothing. In this sense Iraq is not Vietnam or Somalia or Lebanon. It is too valuable, and authentic sovereignty and even limited democracy would be too dangerous to be easily accepted. If at all possible Iraq must be kept under control. No doubt the Pentagon wants to withdraw – but only once an obedient client state is firmly in place, the general preference of conquerors, leaving just military bases for future contingencies. The larger bases, built by military contractors and secured and supplied by private mercenary corporations, are fortified chunks of Middle America, surreally plunked down in the desert, replete with Burger Kings, Pizza Huts, Internet cafes, first-run movie theaters, gyms, and swimming pools. Camps Anaconda, Cooke, and Speicher are often referred to as “enduring bases” for which the Pentagon is requesting $348 million in emergency funds for further construction, beyond the billions already spent. These vast military bases raise the specter of American permanence in Iraq, although to some they more acutely suggest American irrelevance. (See “Hunkering Down: A Guide to the U.S. Military’s Future in Iraq,” by Fred Kaplan in The Atlantic, June 2006, pp. 34-37.) Also, one might add the new American Embassy under construction for $600 million, which will have its own water supply and electrical grid systems and enclose a complete shopping mall. All this vast imperial expenditure for full- spectrum global domination increases while $50 million requested by a conservative Republican Congressman from Louisiana to help the victims of Katrina is rejected by the Congress. In “The Lesson of Tal Afar” George Packer argues that the policy of gathering troops at enormous bases is Old Army Thinking─centralization of resources, of people, of control. Counter-insurgency requires decentralization. (See The New Yorker, April 10, 2006.) But even at the brigade and battalion level people and homes are demolished by tanks and Apache helicopters firing depleted uranium missiles. Air strikes, artillery fire and GPS-guided rockets are fired from dozens of miles away, yet the fantasy of counter-insurgency where the enemy is everywhere and nowhere still believes that American troops can “clear, hold, and build” in Tal Afar, Ramadi, Haditha, and Ishagi. In short, you can come in, get to know the city, the culture, establish relationships with the people, and then go in and eliminate the “bad guys” without leveling the city, à la Fallujah. In the words of President Bush, “the Iraqi people will be shown that spreading liberty and democracy is at the heart of our policy.” Parker closes with a dilemma:
Contact between Americans and Iraqis has led to mistakes, deaths, and mutual exhaustion. In the New York Times (June 3, 2006), Maureen Dowd writes in reference to the Haditha massacre:
Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki laced into the American military, accusing it of regular attacks on civilians. “They push them with their vehicles and kill them just on suspicion,” he said, adding that some in the military “do not respect the Iraqi people.” It’s a bitter irony that since the atrocious regime of Saddam, the American war has become something of an atrocity. “It’s one of those things where we have become the enemy,” John Murtha said ruefully on CNN. In fact, the occupying troops on the ground operate as more lethal high-tech sectarian militias under the ruse of counter-insurgency. “Many people ask . . . what does it take to help Ramadi, what does it take to get rid of the insurgency?” The company commander of the marines in Kilo Company, Capt. Andrew Del Gaudio says, “It is exactly what we are doing right now: going on the offense and killing these people. . . . They’ll keep coming and we’ll keep killing them. Eventually people will get the message.” Sgt. Edward Somuk adds, “You could blow the shit out of a building with a JDAM [depleted uranium bunker-busting bomb] from an F-16 or F-18. . . . The next day there will be somebody else in there. It just never ends.” After some three years of war, parts of the city look like Beirut after 15 years of civil war. Tens of thousands of depleted uranium bullets have torn the facades from buildings and clawed unnatural shapes in walls. Beyond the pools of sewage, piles of toxic, radioactive rubble, and broken storefronts, the downtown streets are abandoned. (U.S. News and World Report, May 29, 2006, pp. 23-25.)
In “The Trial of Depleted Uranium” Philip Berrigan angrily confronts the reader. “It’s no accident that you haven’t heard about depleted uranium (DU). Without much fanfare it’s become a staple of the U.S. arsenal. Not only does it kill better, it kills longer. And what it doesn’t kill, it maims─for generations.” Britain and America have dramatically increased the use of DU in the present war to a minimum of 5,000 tons, extending the use to guided missiles, large bunker-busters and 2,000-pound mega-bombs. In a battlefield context the A-10 Warthog is arguably the most devastating weapons system yet fashioned. It is built around a Gatling gun capable of firing thirty-nine hundred rounds of depleted uranium bullets per minute. “Depleted” uranium is in many ways a misnomer. For “depleted” sounds weak. The only weak thing about depleted uranium is its price. It is dirt cheap toxic waste from nuclear power plants and bomb production. However, uranium is one of the earth’s heaviest elements and DU packs a Tyson’s punch, smashing through tanks, buildings and bunkers with equal ease, spontaneously catching fire as it does so, and burning people alive. “Crispy critters” is what the U.S. soldiers and marines at Fallujah, Tal Afar, Heditha, and Ramadi call those unfortunate enough to be close. They are “greased . . . offed, lit up,” or laid out “like Shredded fuckin’ Wheat.” The ultimate irony is that America has used radioactive weaponry to justify invading Iraq to search for radioactive weaponry. Bitter irony too that our service members were put at increased risk because of the weapons our government gave them. Our use of these weapons in these places is killing our troops as well as the citizens of Iraq. Our troops are poisoned with radioactive substances and dying from it. Their children are born with massive defects. In “The Horror of U.S. Depleted Uranium” James Denver categorically states that “over 200,000 U.S. troops who returned from the 1991 Gulf War are now invalids with ailments officially attributed to service in Iraq.” (See Global Outlook: The Magazine of 9/11 Truth, Issue Number Ten, p. 74) One soldier, Sgt. Andre Jenkins, who has just returned from serving time in Iraq had this to say:
In 1996
and 1997 UN Human Rights Tribunals condemned DU weapons
for illegally breaking the Geneva Convention and classed them as “weapons of
mass destruction,” incompatible with “international humanitarian and human
rights law.” (The Global Outlook, p.
75) In February 2006 Rumsfeld released his Quadrennial Defense Review, a congressionally- mandated report setting out long-term military policy. Its language mentioned the need for greater capability in civil affairs, military policing, cultural and language expertise, and counterinsurgency, all as part of what the document called “the long war” against global terrorism. But in its budget choices, which reveal the real priorities of the Defense Secretary, the Iraq war hardly registered. Instead of cutting back on hugely expensive weapons programs in order to build more troop divisions, the review favored nuclear stealth destroyers (Aegis class), new nuclear attack submarines, new stealth bombers, advanced fighter jets, and aircraft carriers. (The U.S. already has 19 of the 24 carriers in existence.) All these advanced weapons systems are the lifeblood of the corporate-military-scientific contractors and members of Congress. (Parts for these weapons systems are divided among the 50 states.) In pursuit of Full Spectrum Domination, from depleted uranium bullets to nuclearized space satellites, the Pentagon seeks “ownership” of land, sea, air, and outer space. (See my article, “Philip Berrigan’s Nightmare: The World of Nuclear Proliferation,” Catholic Peace Fellowship, Feb. 2006.) The American air war inside Iraq today is perhaps the most significant and underreported aspect of the fight against the insurgency. In the Pax Christi U.S.A. response to “Towards a Responsible Transition in Iraq,” by Bishop Thomas Wenski there is a pertinent observation that while emphasizing that U.S. must guard against overly aggressive and unwise military responses that endanger civilians, The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) statement does not address the ongoing and escalating air war in Iraq. Reports that the Bush administration will begin to draw down troop levels indicated that an intensification of U.S. air strikes will replace the on-the-ground presence of U.S. troops, further escalating indiscriminate violence and civilian casualties. Quick, deadly strikes by U.S. warplanes are seen as a way to improve even the weakest Iraqi combat units. Five hundred thousand tons of ordnance has been dropped on predominantly Sunni provinces and along the Syrian border, killing untold numbers of women and children. As yet, neither Congress nor the public has engaged in a significant debate about this “terror” from the air. One pilot quips, “you get no struggle from rubble,” another, “it’s like clubbing baby seals.” A military planner added “there is no sense of an air campaign, or a strategic vision. We are just whacking targets – it’s a reversion to the Stone Age.” (For a complete analysis see “Up in the Air,” by Seymour M. Hersh, The New Yorker, Dec. 5. 2005.) So the plan is “force protection” for the army and marines with occasional theatrical micro military forays in the name of nation-building and counter-insurgency from “Burger King” bases to impress the media and satisfy the higher echelon officer corps. The Air Force will extend its bombing campaign into Syria and Iran. Tactical nuclear weapons will be put in place. Some operations, apparently aimed at intimidating Iran, are already under way. American Naval tactical aircraft, operating from carriers in the Arabian Sea, have been flying simulated nuclear weapons delivery missions─rapid ascending maneuvers known as “over the shoulder bombing”─since last summer. Halliburton and Bechtel, Dyncorp and Blackhawk, and all the private contractors will maximize profits. There is a belief that diplomacy is for wimps and is doomed to fail. The bottom line is that Iran cannot become a nuclear weapons state. The problem is that Iranians realize that only by becoming a nuclear state can they defend themselves against the U.S. Something bad is going to happen. (See “The Iran Plans,” by Seymour M. Hersh, The New Yorker, April 17, 2006.) President Bush remains convinced that it is his personal mission to bring liberty and democracy to Iraq and Iran, and that he is impervious to political pressure, even from fellow Republicans. After the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks the President felt that “God put me here” to deal with the war on terror. His belief was fortified by the Republican sweep in the 2002 elections. Publicly, Bush depicted his 2004 reelection as a referendum on the Iraq war and the crusade for liberty and democracy; privately he spoke of it as another manifestation of divine purpose. He doesn’t feel any pain. Bush is
a believer in the adage, “People may suffer and die, but the Church advances.”
In regard to military action in Iran, one House
Member said, “The most worrisome thing is that this guy has a messianic
vision.” (Hersh on “No Exit from
Iraq,” and “Iran Plans,” in The New
Yorker.) To realize the “messianic mission” to bring Democracy to the Middle East, El Salvador is offered by Rumsfeld and Cheney, and Colombia by Bush as models for Iraq. A national army and a paramilitary police force would be the dominant actors. Iraq should become a dependable client state with basing rights for the American occupation army. Bishop Wenski in “Toward A Responsible Transition in Iraq” does not limit terrorism to non-state actors but also addresses the issue of state actors in the terrorist discussion. Death squads, torture practices, political assassinations, denial of rights to prisoners and indiscriminate destruction of innocent people demonstrate a “strong line of continuity” connecting El Salvador, Colombia, and the U.S.A. Terrorist acts by states should be included, as well as those by non-state actors argues Bishop Wenski. (See Pax Christi USA responds to “Toward A Responsible Transition in Iraq,” January 13, 2006.) For a documented survey of the activities of former Salvadoran assassins, Pinochet national guardsmen, and South African mercenaries in Iraq see the book, Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy, by Noam Chomsky. Close to two million Iraqis have been in the process of “liberating” themselves by leaving Iraq since the American occupation began. They are middle-class doctors, teachers, and professionals who can afford to move their families. The blogger Zeyad, a Baghdadi dentist who welcomed the American overthrow of Saddam, and whose blog, Healing Iraq, was once one of the preferred sources for many boosterish conservative bloggers in the United States described Baghdad today:
Until
we understand that we can’t believe David Graham |