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Category: Iraq

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By Erich Vieth on November 12th, 2009

What does this say about the government we support in Iraq?

Yes, Blackwater paid a million bucks to bribe Iraqi officials to placate those officials and thus allow Blackwater to continue garnering a huge paycheck in Iraq. Lots of people are rightfully pissed at Blackwater. But what does this say about the Iraqi government that more than 3,000 U.S. soldiers died to establish?

Imagine this in 2003: Dick Cheney tells the public that we’re going to spend one trillion dollars and allow 3,000 U.S. soldiers to die in order to establish a corrupt Iraqi government when we don’t actually know whether Iraq has any plans to attack the United States. How much support would there have been for that kind of needless military adventure?

Corruption • Iraq • Politics • Psychology Cognition
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Get real about Afghanistan?
By Brynn Jacobs on September 04th, 2009

Get real about Afghanistan?

Building on our recent discussion of Afghanistan, a couple of items of interest today. Daring to stand up to the budding consensus that it may be time to get out of Afghanistan, Ruben Navarette today released an commentary on the topic. He notes that “Senior Pentagon officials are expected to ask for as many as 45,000 additional American troops this month. Currently, there are about 68,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan.” To him, this is not a bothersome development. He complains that the only “nation-building” the left supports is the type done by the Peace Corps, rather than the military. With no indication why this position is incorrect, he asserts that

“Liberals love to build things, especially with other people’s tax dollars. They just don’t like the idea of U.S. troops doing the building. Maintaining a military presence on foreign soil makes the left nervous because it feeds the perception that the United States has an itch for imperialism and can’t go long without scratching it.”

Maybe it’s just me, but I think it’s the 737 military bases around the world and millions of deployed soldiers that really “feeds the perception” that we have an “itch for imperialism.” I wonder why Navarette doesn’t criticize war-mongering conservatives for “loving to build things, especially with other people’s tax dollars”?After all, the Pentagon estimates that our overseas bases are worth at least $127 billion– does he think they were paid for through donations from grateful Iraqis and Afghanis?

Current Events • Featured • Iraq • Media • Military • Politics
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By Brynn Jacobs on September 02nd, 2009

Subcontracting war

New reports cast more doubt on the use of private contractors in a war zone. CNN is reporting that the watchdog group Project On Government Oversight (POGO) briefed reporters and sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton about widespread hazing incidents allegedly taking place at the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan.

POGO says two weeks ago it began receiving whistleblower-style e-mails, some with graphic images and videos, that are said to document problems taking place at a non-military camp for the guards near the U.S. diplomatic compound in Kabul.

“This is well beyond partying,” said Danielle Brian, POGO’s executive director, after showing a video of a man with a bare backside, and another man apparently drinking a liquid that had been poured down the man’s lower back.

These latest allegations are about ArmorGroup, a British company that was formed in 1981. These types of companies have seen exploding rates of growth since the start of the Iraq war as more and more functions that have been traditionally assigned to the military have been outsourced to private security companies. In 2004 it was reported that there were over 180 private companies providing services in Iraq. This massive deployment has skewed traditional warfighting:

In the first Gulf War 15 years ago, the ratio of private contractors to troops was 1 to 60; in the current war, it’s 1 to 3.

In fact, the private sector has put more boots on the ground in Iraq than all of the United States’ coalition partners combined. One scholar, Peter Singer of the Brookings Institution, suggests that Bush’s “coalition of the willing” would be more aptly described as the “coalition of the billing.”

Those bills are in the billions and rising.

Corruption • Current Events • Featured • Iraq • Military • Politics • The Middle East • War • law and order
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Barack Obama’s impressive speech in Cairo
By Erich Vieth on June 04th, 2009

Barack Obama’s impressive speech in Cairo

Obama gave a terrific speech (here’s the video). In the first ten minutes, he detailed the many connections between Islam and the United States (yes, Rep. Keith Ellison did take his oath of office using a Koran once owned by Thomas Jefferson).

The first condition for progress of any type is to plainly state where we are, and Obama’s speech did a great job of this. Yes, our many misunderstandings, driven by irresponsible media frenzy, occlude plain facts, several of them highly embarrassing to the U.S. For instance,

For many years, Iran has defined itself in part by its opposition to my country, and there is in fact a tumultuous history between us. In the middle of the Cold War, the United States played a role in the overthrow of a democratically elected Iranian government.

That, then, is how we can repair the damage: by establishing trust by stating the facts. Only after speaking frankly can tone matter. Obama’s tone was impressive, based on the many applause interruptions.

But good tone is nothing without admitting undeniable facts. Only then can we move forward. By traveling to Cairo to make his speech, Obama has made a dramatic statement that America is no longer framing its diplomatic strategies through the use of crude stereotypes. I don’t know whether the audience entirely trusts America, but this was a huge step in the right direction.

Featured • Iraq • Military • Politics • Religion • The Middle East • War
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By Erich Vieth on May 27th, 2009

The real reason Bush invaded Iraq . . .

Why did George W. Bush invade Iraq? Clive Hamilton confirms one of my suspicions at Alternet:

In 2003 while lobbying leaders to put together the Coalition of the Willing, President Bush spoke to France’s President Jacques Chirac. Bush wove a story about how the Biblical creatures Gog and Magog were at work in the Middle East and how they must be defeated. . .

President Bush’s reason for launching the war in Iraq was, for him, fundamentally religious. He was driven by his belief that the attack on Saddam’s Iraq was the fulfilment of a Biblical prophesy in which he had been chosen to serve as the instrument of the Lord.

Iraq • Religion • War
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Rumsfeld’s religious war
By Erich Vieth on May 17th, 2009

Rumsfeld’s religious war

I’m truly disgusted to learn of newest evidence for the religious underpinnings for Donald Rumsfeld’s (and George Bush’s) thought process. GQ has revealed that Rumsfeld authored an entire series of Bible/war memos, “Top Secret Briefings,” to get Bush fired up that he was on God’s side in a Manichean struggle.

This mixing of Crusades-like messaging with war imagery, which until now has not been revealed, had become routine.

For those who say that religion is good, that is sometimes true. Many people have been inspired by religion to channel their natural empathy into acts of kindness.

To those who say religion is dangerous, that is also sometimes true, as witnessed by America’s religious war waged in Iraq. Thanks to the Bush Administration’s application of religion, 100,000 people are dead, tens of thousands of Americans wounded, and millions of Iraqis who have lost their homes.

I would say, as a general rule that we should always discourage violence in the name of religion. Religion is too often a potent mind-altering trip. Too often, it causes people to unplug their pre-frontal cortices, so that their base instincts, especially their xenophobia, rise’s to the top. Religion is too often used to concoct needless imaginary lines between and among groups of people, resulting in growing distrust, which too often ripens into seething hate.

Bottom line: Thanks to Rumsfeld’s (and Bush’s) embrace of what we now know (better than ever) to be religious violence, our “secular” government was able to conclude that their religious ends justified their military means, and that any lie, any torture, and any amount of collateral damage was justified.

All of this in the name of God.

Corruption • Featured • Iraq • Politics • Religion • War
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By Erich Vieth on February 11th, 2009

Defense Department to review policy banning photos of flag-draped coffins

From DemocracyNow:

Defense Secretary Robert Gates has ordered a review of the Pentagon policy banning media from taking pictures of flag-draped coffins of military dead. The military has said the policy is meant to protect the privacy of the families of the dead soldiers, but critics say barring photographers is a political maneuver meant to sanitize the war.

Related post: What would happen if we freely published the images from Iraq for one week?

Iraq • Media • War
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By Erich Vieth on January 15th, 2009

Rachel Maddow says good riddance to Bush’s good-bye

Rachel Maddow says good riddance to Bush’s good-bye, starting things off with a few staggering statistics regarding Bush’s legacy.
I’m wondering whether there a live audience to this deplorable confabulation by George W. Bush.  If so, where they required to remove their shoes before entering the room?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32-cZnvyU_k[/youtube]
Click here to see Arianna Huffington’s critique of Bush’s “delusional” [...]

Economy • Iraq • Politics • Statistics • War
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By Mark Tiedemann on January 14th, 2009

Legacy

I watched a good portion of Bush’s last press conference and couldn’t help thinking it was an audition for the part of a recovering junkie recently fallen off the wagon.  It wasn’t the words so much as the body language and facial expressions that held my attention.  Surreal?  Hasn’t the whole sad thing been surreal?
The [...]

American Culture • Communication • Culture • Current Events • Economy • Education • Energy • History • Iraq • Law • Military • Noteworthy • Politics • Religion • Reproductive Rights • The Middle East • War • ignorance • law and order
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By Erich Vieth on January 12th, 2009

Yet another example of why “Sunshine is the best disinfectant”

This latest example of well-armed humans being cruel to relatively helpless humans has embarrassed Israel, as it should.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJaPZLNLBu8[/youtube]
Meanwhile, there are more than 100,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, doing who-knows-what because the U.S. media is not covering Iraq anymore.  The official word is that our soldiers are still out there “defending freedom.”  I wonder what we’d [...]

American Culture • Iraq • War
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By Erich Vieth on January 01st, 2009

The night of 9/11

From Vanity Fair’s oral history of the Bush White House:
Richard Clarke: That night, on 9/11, Rumsfeld came over and the others, and the president finally got back, and we had a meeting. And Rumsfeld said, You know, we’ve got to do Iraq, and everyone looked at him—at least I looked at him and Powell looked [...]

Iraq • Politics
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By Erich Vieth on December 13th, 2008

Frank Rich: Rod Blagojevich is a small fry in our metastacizing culture of corruption

Rod Blogojevich is not a big fish by any means.   Most of the big fish remain nameless and free, according to Frank Rich of the NYT:
What went down in the Land of Lincoln is just the reductio ad absurdum of an American era where both entitlement and corruption have been the calling cards of power. [...]

American Culture • Current Events • Fraud • Iraq • War • ignorance
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By Mark Tiedemann on November 05th, 2008

The Morning After An Eight Year One Night Stand

In the dim light of the bar, it seemed like such a good idea.  Things had been dull, though financially there’d been some improvement.  Time to relax, maybe have a fling.  The stranger sauntered over, holding a longneck, and leaned against the counter, smiled, and said “Hi.  Come here often?”
“Used to.  Looks a little different [...]

American Culture • Civil Rights • Communication • Culture • Current Events • Economy • Iraq • Language • Media • Politics • The Middle East • War • ignorance • snake oil
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