Shock and Awe was Wrong!

Ten years ago I was dragged into some kind of reluctant support for the war in Iraq by a pack of lies foisted on us by the George W. Bush administration.
by Charlie Leck

Ten years ago, on the night that the terrible war in Iraq began, I was in a very nice hotel room in Manhattan. It was a marvelous night. I could look out over Central Park and take in the wonder of life in America. I was struggling to get myself into white-tail for an evening dinner and meeting at the Knickerbocker Club, just up the road on Fifth Avenue. The television was on and I watched the CNN live coverage of the beginning of the frightening American attack on Bagdad. It is a horrible memory that will not go away. I supported our invasion that evening because of what Secretary of State Colin Powell had said a few days prior at the United Nations. He convinced me, as President Bush could not, that Iraq really did have a significant number of dangerous “weapons of mass destruction” (WMD).

It turned out to be a lie. Not a mistake, mind you, but an out-and-out lie. The lie made that evening’s attack one of the most disastrous events in the history of the United States. It ended up costing us trillions of dollars and thousands of human lives.

And, it was a lesson for me. I would not be led easily into such things again. I would be a doubter forever when it came to things the government told me. I would forever demand significant evidence and irrefutable proof.

The War in Iraq was a mistake and it was wrong. It was a huge blemish on the reputation and character of our nation. It was as wrong as that war in Vietnam, from which I thought we had learned a significant lesson about believing the government. Iraq was clear testimony that we had not.

As the awful war in Iraq dragged on and the truth began to seep out, there was no way for the administration to explain or defend its actions there. Support melted away quickly

George Bush was never able to make a convincing argument that satisfied the American public. After we realized that WMD was a myth, the President and his administration lacked motive and reason. It became an empty war without goals and purpose. America was thrashing around and could not find direction.

At our gathering that evening, I sat at the dinner table very near John Seabrook, one of the wisest and most successful men I’ve ever known. We were all somber, chatting about what we had seen on television as the war began.

“I’m very afraid,” Mr. Seabrook said, “that we have started something we may not be able to finish. I think this will all work out to be something like a Greek tragedy.”

The moment I got back to the hotel, I wrote those words down in a journal that traveled with me. Only quite by accident, I came upon the journal a couple of days ago when I was searching my file draws for something totally unrelated to the historic event whose 10^th anniversary we observe this week.

Year after year, mistake piled on top of mistake in Vietnam. We had gotten involved in an unnecessary war and it cost us terrible losses of lives and fortunes. So many of us thought that we had, at the very least, certainly learned a valuable lesson from that debacle. Now we realize that we had not.

Someone, perhaps the Spanish philosopher, George Santayana, said: “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Indeed!

It is, I am certain, why President Obama refused to take the lead and put “boots of the ground” in Libya and why he is so reluctant to get involved in the current problems in Syria. Who can blame him?

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Weekend Reading

Here’s a link to some very special reading in the New Yorker Magazine about the winding down of the war in Iraq.
by Charlie Leck

Dexter Filkins’ piece in the New Yorker Magazine about the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq is quite short and it won’t take you more than a few minutes to read. It’s also exceedingly well written and it will raise amazing questions for your mind and significant emotions in your heart. Here’s where you can find it!

What happened in Iraq anyway? Does any good come out of it?
Nearly 4,500 Americans lost their lives in the war. More than 32,000 were wounded and injured there – some extremely seriously. Troops from other countries died also. For what?

Filkins, who spent almost four years in Iraq, crosses his fingers as he answers the question – not because he is fibbing, but because he is hopeful that his most ideal sketch of an outcome will prove correct. Yet, he talks of all the possibilities and you should not miss reading his essay.

The writer is receiving significant criticism for being too optimistic and hopeful. I wonder what else we can do after a decade of scorching so many parts of the nation. Will we ever know how many Iraqis lost their lives – perhaps hundreds of thousands? Lordsy, can’t we hope, for this price, that something wonderful will now happen there – that democracy will blossom and that people will learn to respect one another and be more tolerant about each other’s differences?

About Dexter Filkins

“Dexter Filkins joined The New Yorker in January of 2011, and has since written about a bank heist in Afghanistan and the democratic protests in the Middle East. Before coming to The New Yorker, Filkins had been with the New York Times since 2000, reporting from Afghanistan, Pakistan, New York, and Iraq, where he was based from 2003 to 2006. He has also worked for the Miami Herald and the Los Angeles Times, where he was chief of the paper’s New Delhi bureau. In 2009, he won a Pulitzer Prize as part of a team of New York Times reporters in Pakistan and Afghanistan. He was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University in 2006-07 and a fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government in 2007-08. He has received numerous prizes, including two George Polk Awards and three Overseas Press Club Awards. His 2008 book, “The Forever War,” won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Best Nonfiction Book, and was named a best book of the year by the New York Times, the Washington Post, Time, and the Boston Globe.”

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War without Understanding

I’ve played with the title of this blog, beginning with “War without Mission” and substituting a dozen words – comprehension, understanding, purpose, meaning, goal – in place of “mission” and nothing seems to work any better than any single one of them.
by Charlie Leck

As new generations mature and take their place in American politics, the Vietnam War era seems to be fading from America’s memory. And, as history is forgotten new errors are made by those who consider our national involvement in war.

As young people, we marched in the streets protesting America’s involvement in Vietnam in the 60s and the 70s. We, who protested, seemed to understand the internal history of Vietnam better than our national leaders. We clearly saw that the war had no real mission. The war makers said it was to stop communism from spreading throughout Southeast Asia and from there to other parts of the world. They presented incredible scenarios of one nation after another falling to the communist monster. We argued back that communism would devour itself.

When America finally withdrew from Vietnam, defeated and embarrassed, we (the young) thought our nation had finally learned a lesson: War without a mission and a purpose is shear foolishness; and the mission and purpose must be solid and in keeping with the will of the American people. If the will of the people is not strong and based on their understanding of the war, the war will fail utterly.

Today in Iraq, that nation’s Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki has sided with the nation of Iran is supporting the government of Syria against its activisit, democratic protestors.

“We believe that Syria will be able to overcome its crisis through reforms,” Maliki said. He rejected American calls for Bashar al-Assad to step down. Even while most other Arab states are reducing relations with Assad, Iraq and Iran have moved in the other direction.

Iraq?
Mind you, this is a nation into which we have poured over a trillion dollars during our current war and rebuilding program with them. We’ve lost many hundreds of young men and women there and thousands have come home with life-long disabilities to their bodies and minds.

Remember the purpose of the war with Iraq – the mission – the goal – the purpose! Long faded from mind, we went there because we were told a big lie. Vice President Cheney and President George W. Bush convinced most Americans that Iraq was replete with weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Somehow, even though it proved false, the war went on and on and on.

Afghanistan?
We went to Afghanistan to retaliate for the terrorist destruction of American property and life (9/11). Even when it was clear that we could not find Osama bin Laden in the mountains of Afghanistan and that he probably was in Pakistan, the war lingered on and on and on (without purpose or mission). Today, after horrendous loss of life and limb, we search for ways to extract ourselves from the embarrassment of that war.

America had only a vague understanding of the cultures and values of these two countries. We had no ability to predict what the will of the people might be. Vice President Cheney predicted that the Iraqis would welcome us as great liberators. Of course, they did not. And the Afghanistan citizens today look at us in wonder – wondering what the hell we are doing there.

The wisest move regarding war that was made by an American President since 1941 was President Obama’s decision not to put American military boots on the ground in Egypt. Instead, he insisted the military involvement there had to be led by our allies or there would be none.

The first President Bush
War without a clear mission is foolishness! That was the stance of the first President Bush and he held to it firmly and kept us out of a messy involvement in Iraq years before his son finally led us into trouble.

Now we are engaged in two missionless, purposeless wars in Arab nations that we simply do not understand. And for all our troubles, Iraq’s ruling political leader has today slapped us squarely across the face.

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A Seemingly Infinite Mess

I have avoided this film for long enough!
by Charlie Leck

Okay! I confess forthwith! I swiped the title from Wesley Morris and the Boston Globe. I couldn't resist because it says it so perfectly. It being the incredible mess in which the United States of America is now involved in the nation of Iraq. Morris used the phrase in his review of the documentary film, No End in Sight.

My wife has been bugging me to see the film for over a month now. Here's the problem: she's always busy! Don't blame it on me. I don't have a host of horses comin' after me. Nor do I have all those sheep and little lambs begging to be fed and looked after 7 days each week. I don't have a boss who insists I work on a Sunday morning at 6 o'clock and keeps me impressed in servitude until the sun has gone down. Yet, I am bright enough to know that the romance of all her work is going to keep you, my faithful readers, much more sympathetic to the plight of my betrothed than to me, the starving writer.

So, I shall go see the film on my own, some afternoon during the coming week. After all, how long can one put off seeing a film that has an average rating of 4.9 stars out of a possible 5 stars on Google's movie web site [ http://www.google.com/movies ]. That's based on reviews in the Chicago Sun-Times (Roger Ebert), the Boston Globe, Entertainment Weekly, GuideLive, and the Chicago Tribune. Only GuideLive gave it less than the maximum 5 stars (4.6).

The NY Times said of it: "This essential, infuriating documentary calmly and thoroughly chronicles the incompetence and arrogance in the early days of the American occupation of Iraq, which set the stage for what was to follow." A.O. Scott, who reviewed the film for the NY Times, wrote: "It's a sober, revelatory and absolutely vital film."

The documentary is the brain-child of Charles Ferguson, a former Brookings Institution scholar. Ferguson has a doctorate in political science. The thesis of the film, which every review I've encountered says he proves, is that there are no correct choices left in shaking ourselves of the disaster we alone created in Iraq. Very poor planning led to very poor results. The invasion was superbly planned and run. Running the nation following the invasion was another question all together and there was no real plan. We made two essential and devastating mistakes that cost us the war. First, we dismantled the Iraqi military and that left, as Ferguson points out, "nearly a half million armed men with no one to serve." Then, Paul Bremer's de-Baathification program made the intelligentsia of Iraqi society – the teachers, librarians, curators and engineers – jobless.

No matter what the public relations program of George W. Bush says, the chaos of Iraq has not subsided. Now, we are in an absolute no-win situation – a situation with which no nation on the globe has any interested in assisting us.

All the reviews show, and all my friends who have seen the film agree, that the arrogance, incompetence and stupidity of George W. Bush and his team is remarkable. History will not forgive this administration. It is astonishing that such a large cadre of loyalists remains committed to him and his desperate hope for victory in an unwinnable situation.

The common theme in all the reviews of No End in Sight is that it is a depressing and devastating look at Iraq and the mistakes we made there; yet, it is a vitally important film for each of us to see. I have avoided it long enough.

If Only There Were But Three Stooges

Or, observe the circular firing squad!
by Charlie Leck

Writing with as much wisdom, logic and perception as any writer in America right now, Frank Rich is a pleasure to read. In addition to his solid intelligence, he is a darned good word-smith. He’s a New York Times columnist and those of you who have him available in your local newspapers, and don’t boycott his employer because you think that newspaper is far too liberal, ought to read him regularly. I find him infuriating sometimes because he holds opinions contrary to mine. If you think he leans left, I think you are wrong. The man is a true moderate.

If I were someone trying to understand what is really happening in Washington politics and in this administration and its foreign policy, Rich is the writer I would read. When he says something, he almost always backs it up with clear evidence and/or supporting documentation.

This Sunday morning I followed my usual procedure of sitting for an hour or so with the Internet version of the New York Times. It’s a pleasure I have to pay for since most of the on-line Times is restricted to their paying subscribers. It’s a treat I consider well worth it and I rise very early in the morning so I will have plenty of quiet time to work my way through this massive publication.

Rich wanted to call his column “The Three Stooges;” however he couldn’t limit the number of idiots within the administration to just three.

Bremer, Paul
Bush, George W. (President)
Cheney, Richard (Vice President)
Feith, Douglas
Franks, Tommy (General)
Rice, Condoleezza
Rumsfeld, Donald
Tennant, George
Wolfowitz, Paul

Rich calls it a “circular firing squad of the war’s enablers.” I can’t tell if he includes Condi Rice, our esteemed Secretary of State, in this circle of goof-balls. His standard seems to be that these guys all finally figured out that the war in Iraq was a great, catastrophic mistake, but they are too spineless to admit it. He points out that the only member of the inner circle to show such courage was Matthew Dowd, a Dick Cheny aide, “who in March expressed remorse for furthering a war he now deems a mistake.” For his admission, Dowd was characterized by the administration as a mental case who couldn’t stand the pressure of war.

Somehow Colin Powell escapes inclusion in the circle of fools. There’s no doubt that Powell was so admired, as both a General and as Secretary of State, that we all want to believe he was simply used by the idiots to make a case for this war. Rich, however, saves a poignant, deserving comment about Powell

“Nonetheless, Mr. Powell should summon the guts to do so [take some responsibility for the mistakes that led to this war]. Until there is accountability for the major architects and perpetrators of the Iraq war, the quagmire will deepen. A tragedy of this scale demands a full accounting, not to mention a catharsis.”

Rich mines deeply in this column. He includes references and citations to everything he says.

The columnist saves his heavy guns for Condoleezza Rice. She tries to escape the truth of her involvement in promoting this war as just and necessary. She can’t. There are too many statements of record out there. In January this year, Rice was promising us that "over the next two to three months" Iraq will move forward on several significant fronts, including approving an oil revenue-sharing law; reversing the de-Baathificaion laws;... and reforming the country's constitution." Uh? What? None of these has been achieved or is close to being achieved 4 months later. As National Security Advisor, Rice helped sell this war and she needs to be held responsible as much as anyone.

And only this past week did President Bush continue the appeal that the war was against "the perpetrators of our 9/11 disaster." There is hardly anyone left in America foolish enough to believe that canard.

“The decision we face in Iraq,” Mr. Bush said Wednesday, “is not whether we ought to take sides in a civil war, it’s whether we stay in the fight against the same international terrorist network that attacked us on 9/11.”

"Such statements about the present in Iraq are no less deceptive — and no less damaging to our national interest — than the lies about uranium and Qaeda- 9/11 connections told in 2002-3. This country needs facts, not fiction, to make its decisions about the endgame of the war, just as it needed (but didn’t get) facts when we went to war in the first place. To settle for less is to make the same tragic error twice."

I find it amazing – utterly astonishing – that members of the administration don’t understand that they have a responsibility to present a full accounting to Congress, and thus to the American people, of the steps that led up to this war. Instead, they continue to stonewall and utter nonsense about “Separation of Powers.”

As Rich wrote:

“If former or incumbent national security advisers like Henry Kissinger, Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski could testify before Congress without defiling the Constitution, so can she.”

In another column in the Sunday New York Times, a guest columnist, George Prochnik, wrote:

“Near the conclusion of “Civilization and Its Discontents,” Freud wrote, 'One thing only do I know for certain and that is that man’s judgments of value follow directly his wishes for happiness — that, accordingly, they are an attempt to support his illusions with arguments.' Be afraid of the leader who refuses to look in the mirror, Freud argued — or, he might have added, the one who says he won’t 'go on the couch' to reflect upon earlier policy decisions, as President Bush memorably declared in 2004.”

That, my friends, says it all about these incredible stooges.