After the American War in Vietnam,
there were many books and articles written about the Lessons of Vietnam,
but we as a nation basically did not learn those lessons,
perhaps because too much time had passed
between the Vietnam war and the occupation of Iraq.
And sometime in the period between today
and when the US troops finally leave Iraq,
there will be a new set of lessons
that we are supposed to have learned from this misadventure:
1.
REINFORCE CHECKS-AND-BALANCES
SO THAT NO FUTURE U.S. PRESIDENT
WILL BE ABLE TO CONDUCT A PRIVATE FOREIGN POLICY
USING THE MILITARY FORCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
2. THE UNITED STATES SHOULD NOT BE WORLD POLICEMAN.
3.
SOMETIMES EVEN MILITARY DICTATORSHIP
IS BETTER FOR THE PEOPLE
THAN NO GOVERNMENT AT ALL.
4.
THE POLICE SHOULD ALWAYS SPEAK
THE LANGUAGE OF THE PEOPLE.
LESSONS
FROM IRAQ
by
James Park
1. REINFORCE CHECKS-AND-BALANCES SO THAT NO FUTURE U.S. PRESIDENT WILL BE ABLE TO CONDUCT A PRIVATE
FOREIGN POLICY USING THE MILITARY FORCES OF THE
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
The United States of American is supposed to be a
democracy,
which means that the people rule.
But in the case of the American take-over of Iraq,
the voice of the people was not heard.
Rather, this military adventure was devised
by a very small group of men in Washington DC.
What went wrong with American democracy in this case?
The United States Congress is supposed to be a check
against the excesses of any President of the United States.
For example only the US Congress has the power to declare war.
But it did not work in the case of the occupation of Iraq.
The US Congress was bamboozled into believing
that Iraq had weapons of
mass destruction,
which required us to take over that country
in order to protect the world from certain destruction
if Saddam Hussein had the germs or the atomic bomb.
Colin Powell appeared before the Security Council of
the United Nations
presenting what was supposed to be evidence of such weapons.
But only the United States (and a few others) were convinced.
And in retrospect, the rest of the world has turned out to be right: There were no weapons of mass
death.
One glaring error in Powell's story was
presenting drawings of canvas-sided trucks
which were supposed to be mobile labs for creating biological weapons.
They turned out to be trucks for generating hydrogen gas for weather
balloons.
Any person who has taken science in high school
knows that no person in his right mind
would make biological weapons in a truck-trailer with open
sides.
Biological weapons would have to be created by real scientists,
not just soldiers who lacked knowledge of the hazards involved.
And real scientists would not endanger themselves
by creating germs and toxins
that would be extremely dangerous to
everyone
in the trailer of an 18-wheel truck with removable canvas sides.
But the Congress of the United States was convinced
in sufficient numbers (there were many who voted "no")
for the Congress to endorse any military action that the President
wanted.
The checks-and-balances we all learned about in
school had failed.
What can we do now and in the future to prevent
any future President from doing something similar?
There do not seem to be any easy answers.
But one thing we could attempt to do
is to elect more Representatives
and Senators
who are able to think for themselves.
The political leaders of most other counties were not taken in
by the fantasy or lie about weapons of mass
destruction.
And millions of ordinary Americans were not taken in by this deception.
Nevertheless, our Congress voted to authorize taking over Iraq.
Later the occupation was justified as a means of
spreading
democracy to Iraq.
But only a failure of
democracy in the United States
permitted this military misadventure
to begin.
A better system of government in the USA would have prevented this
disaster.
2. THE UNITED STATES SHOULD NOT
BE WORLD POLICEMAN.
It
was a fundamental mistake for the United States
to overthrow the government of another country,
especially when few other countries could not be persuaded
to join in such a military adventure.
Before the military forces of the United States
moved in 2003 to get rid of Saddam Hussein
(who had just been re-elected President of Iraq),
the United Nations was conducting meaningful and effective
weapons-control inspections and destruction of weapons
that were not permitted after the 1991 Gulf War.
This was a quiet but effective program.
And subsequent events proved
that there were no more weapons of mass
death in Iraq.
No matter how evil and destructive the government of
another country might be,
it is not proper for any one nation (or small group of nations)
to decide to get rid of any particular form of government
and to attempt to replace it with another form of government.
The Charter of the United Nations specifically forbids
interference in the internal affairs of another member state.
The Earth has plenty of nation-states that are
governed by military dictators
and other forms of government that we do not endorse.
One reason the President of the United States decided to overthrow the
dictator of Iraq
was because it could be done.
The military forces of the United States easily overcame the military
forces of Iraq.
But then the President of the United States did not know how to govern
Iraq.
What if other nations decided to play policeman
and use military might to overthrow governments they did not like?
(This question of the
USA policing the world is explored more deeply here: "How a World
Peace Force Would Handle Situations Like Iraq
Better than the United States as Policeman": http://www.tc.umn.edu/%7Eparkx032/CY-PEACE.html)
3. SOMETIMES EVEN MILITARY
DICTATORSHIP IS BETTER FOR THE PEOPLE THAN NO GOVERNMENT AT ALL.
There is no question that Saddam Hussein was a
brutal dictator.
He kept law and order in Iraq by threats and terror.
He killed thousands of his own countrymen in the north (Kurds)
because some of them tried to resist his rule.
And he was justly convicted and executed for this crime.
But the chaos that followed the US take-over of Iraq
has resulted in many more
deaths than Saddam committed.
If and when we are faced with a similar military
dictatorship in another country,
we should consider how many people will die with either option:
How many will die if the world does nothing?
How many will die if other nations try to intervene?
In retrospect, we might conclude
that we should have allowed Iraq to continue at it was.
Saddam Hussein would have died from natural causes
and his sons would have taken over.
But at least the factions and tribes of Iraq
would not be killing one another at every opportunity.
And eventually democracy might have arisen in
Iraq,
created by the intelligent people of that country
rather than some kind of puppet government set up by a foreign army.
We should have learned from Vietnam
that there is no way for foreigner occupiers to set up a government
that will be supported by the people.
4. THE POLICE SHOULD ALWAYS SPEAK
THE LANGUAGE OF THE PEOPLE.
The 'war in Iraq' has now become basically policing
Baghdad.
There is no front line of armies fighting each other.
Rather, we have created a failed state with limited law-and-order.
The tribes of Iraq are taking the occasion of the lack of a central
government
as a good time to kill as many of their 'enemies' as possible.
Even the police of Iraq are not really loyal to the
nation
as much as they are loyal to their own tribe or clan.
They accept money from the American tax-payers for their work during
the day.
And at night, they join with their partisans to kill the members of
other groups.
This situation will not change until the American
soldiers
stop trying to patrol the streets of Baghdad.
As long as American troops are walking around Baghdad
and driving around in convoys,
they will be targets for any Iraqis who have weapons that can kill them.
This does not create law-and-order.
It creates more opportunities for murder and mayhem.
The people of Iraq do not care about the lives of Americans.
And many crimes arising out of this occupation show that the feeling in
mutual:
American soldiers and security contractors
frequently do not care about the lives of Iraqis.
Whenever foreign military forces try to enforce law
and order,
they will commit many mistakes
just because they do not understand what the people are saying.
How would we feel in New York City, for example,
if Arabic-speaking soldiers with huge guns visited our
apartments
searching for people who did not support the government?
They might come with translators,
but there would still be lots of confusion created by the language
barrier.
And many New Yorkers would be killed and imprisoned by mistake.
The same is now happening in Baghdad.
This problem of foreign occupation will not be cured
until law-and-order is established by Arabic-speaking police forces.
The police must be trusted by the people.
And that trust will only be earned by some months
of positive experience with the new police force.
Do the police in fact enforce the law without any ethnic bias?
Have they been able to prevent further mutual genocide?
If and when a new central government of Iraq emerges
that wins the support of most people in Iraq,
then that government might be able to hire
peace-keepers from other
Arabic-speaking nations,
if there are not enough trusted citizens of Iraq
who can make up the new police force. (This
option is explored in another cyber-sermon:
"Exit Strategy for Iraq: Arabic-Speaking Peace-Keepers": http://www.tc.umn.edu/~parkx032/CY-EXIT.html.)
5. OTHER LESSONS
There are doubtless other lessons to be learned from
our misadventure in Iraq.
Some of these might be added here, in later editions of this
cyber-sermon.
Created
September 20, 2007; Revised 10-4-2007; 10-6-2007; 11-11-2007; 11-16-2007
AUTHOR:
James Park is an independent existential philosopher,
living and writing in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Much more will be learned about him from his website: An Existential
Philosopher's Museum.