Iraq War Protest Pages

Launched: 03/18/2003      Partially Updated: 03/27/2008

A great deal has happened in world events since my original writeup and update. What started out one way has now turned to a seemingly wonderful outcome. Or has it? Let's examine this. The U.S. war on Iraq was at first an invasion to rid Saddam Hussein of his weapons of mass destruction. But after no such weapons were found, the campaign was (re)named "Iraqi Freedom" with the new intent to liberate the peoples of Iraq from the iron fist of Saddam. The White House said that even though there were no illegal weapons in Iraq, enough reasons to invade Iraq still existed- it was just a matter of which reasons were emphasized (this isn't a direct quote, but it's very close). That comment is not too surprising if we think about it. Since the original intent was moot, Bush (and those who are the brains behind him) had to come up with SOMETHING else to justify the massive effort (to say nothing of the dollars spent) put forth to have HALF of our entire military force overseas. But let's look a little deeper, shall we? First, the original "war" itself: It was the most controversial of all the questionable issues of the Jr. Bush administration. Why? World opposition: Russia, China, France (three of five permanent members of the United Nations), Germany (holding a rotating seat on the U.N. security council) and virtually all of the other U.N members were against the U.S./Great Britain invasion. Granted, the U.N. doesn't have the clout that it should have, but that doesn't mean we can afford the arrogance of simply ignoring world opinion. Inspections: Many have said that the the U.N. inspections were a joke, that Saddam had been evading the inspections for 12 years. But that's not quite true- They were making good progress, particularly in the months before the invasion. Bad economics: There's no doubt that the economy under Bush Jr. is the worst it's been in decades. Unemployment is at an all-time high, Bush wants to give a colossal tax-cut to the wealthiest 1% of Americans, and yet he's spent over $500Billion on the invasion and maintenance of troops there afterwards. The costs of rebuilding Iraq are at this point only speculative, but clearly they'll be tremendous. The deficits that Bush's administration are generating are even likely to be higher than those under Ronald Reagan or Bush Sr.! Now recall that no weapons of mass destruction were used in the invasion. None were even FOUND, despite the fact that it was the U.S. who sold anthrax to Iraq in the first place. A number of cynical sources have speculated that it would not have been beyond the power or lack of ethics of the U.S. to PLANT illegal weapons in Iraq to justify the invasion and save face. Second, the change to "Iraqi liberation:" Let me get this straight- We go in there to find illegal weapons, can't find ANY, so we change the codename for the invasion and try to get the world to believe that we meant to liberate people all along? Could anyone come up with something LESS plausible? Sure, the troops tried to not kill civilians, yet over 2000 died initially and the body count has gone MUCH higher over time. But the fact is that the troops protected oil installations, not the museums and repositories of national (and indeed, global) treasures and antiquities. This disregard for the culture of the country makes it hard to believe the motives for removing Saddam were altruistic. Third, the aftermath of the "war": We've seen all the news coverage of Iraqi people cheering for our troops, that we're welcomed now that they have no fear of repercussion from Saddam. But there are many stories of anger from those very same people- Even stories that are presented by the U.S. media. No doubt there are more such stories that our reporters don't cover. There are still many questions remaining regarding the whole ordeal. We (the U.S.) have clearly "dropped the ball" in regards to rebuilding Afghanistan after our invasion there. Many have speculated that we'll do the same in Iraq. Sure, we'll get enough infrastructure in place there to ensure that oil still flows to the U.S., but that's hardly enough. If anything, that kind of behavior will only create more hatred and more terrorism against our country. Clearly this story is not finished; it's still unfolding. But still enough has happened to warrant us asking the question: "Can the ends justify the means?" In some smaller personal cases, I do think so. But in this case is entirely different than something I might do as an independent citizen. In this situation where thousands have died needlessly, the economies of multiple countries (to say nothing of our own) are thrown into worse turmoil, coupled with the global repercussions, I think the answer must be unequivocally "Certainly not."