STEVEN JONAS MD, MPH, Senior Editor
The Vietnam War was a US victory. The peaceful establishment of socialism was prevented. The country was devastated…as an example for those who might dream of defying the malignant empire. 

Were wars since Vietnam won or lost by the US? The answer to those questions may not appear to be the obvious ones. If the unspoken government objectives of the various wars are taken into account, indeed they aren’t. Let us start with Vietnam.

The standard interpretation of the US War on Vietnam is that the US lost it. The classic picture is of that last helicopter taking off from the roof of the soon-to-be former US Embassy in Saigon. But if one considers the original US objectives of the intervention-to-become-war in Southeast Asia, it was actually a win.

The French-Vietnamese War ended in 1954. The Geneva Conference of that year produced a treaty signed by the French and the Vietnamese and guaranteed by Great Britain and the Soviet Union. It brought hostilities to an end, temporarily divided the country in two, and provided for national elections to be held in 1956 — elections that everyone knew would be won by Ho Chi Minh and his people. Pointedly, the US refused to sign or recognize the treaty.

They knew that if the plan in it were allowed to proceed, the chances were very good that Vietnam would peacefully progress to socialism and could be an economic success. If that happened, the same thing might well peacefully occur in other Southeast Asian countries, were democracy to be given a chance. Even as certain US analysts attempt in hindsight to disavow it, the “domino theory” about the spread of “socialism with a national face,” distinguished from and not necessarily allied with the Soviet Union, and certainly not with the traditional enemy, China, communist or not, was quite correct.

And so, in the view of the US leadership of the time, the Dulles Brothers, John Foster at State and Allen at the CIA, everything had to be done that could be done to prevent the democratic process from introducing socialism to a country and then possibly succeeding in a peaceful setting. Once started, the process just continued on its own momentum, especially since any opponent of the war was labelled a “commie sympathizer” or worse by its supporters.

If looked at in this light, the Vietnam War was a US victory. The peaceful establishment of socialism was prevented. Its spread by example and peaceful means to neighbouring countries was prevented. Vietnam today has a sort of market socialist economy, becoming more “market” and less “socialist” by the year. But the country was ravaged by almost 20 years of war and two to three million of the best and the brightest of its people were killed. It is hardly the economic or social engine of the development of democratically-installed socialism that it might have become had it been left alone. In terms of the original American goals for the intervention, this was a win, a palpable win.

Next, let’s consider the various interventions in the former Yugoslavia. Certainly lives were saved and a good deal of stability was eventually established, in Bosnia and Kosovo. But they do not fall under the usual rubric of “victory.” In terms of the promotion of US imperialism around the world, however, “victory” was achieved. The US showed, for example, that it could bomb the capital of another sovereign nation for 70 or so days straight, without UN sanction, and no one with any authority could say boo to a goose. In terms of international law, it was sort of like the Japanese invasion of Manchuria, the Italian invasions of Libya and Ethiopia, and the German-Austrian Anschluss. In terms of Kosovo, the US showed that a piece of a sovereign country, in this case Serbia, could be split off from it and made into an independent country, again without UN sanction. (Ukraine/Crimea, anyone?) And the US has a quite large permanent military base in Kosovo—Camp Bondsteel. Spoils of war?

And then we come to Iraq. It is now teetering on the brink of even more disaster than it has been subject to since the US invasion, and political figures like “Negative Ace” McCain are now shouting that the US should have stayed there, and it’s “all Obama’s fault.” As I said in a recent Tweet, “Blaming Obama for Iraq tragedy is like blaming the sweepers for the elephant droppings needing clean up after the circus parade has passed.” (Yes, and the “elephants” were purposely chosen.) This is so even though George Bush could not negotiate a Status of Forces Agreement with his hand-picked Prime Minister, al-Maliki, to exempt US troops and civilian contractors from local law in the case of violations of it, and that Obama has just lost it by the pull-out. (That’s an excellent, in-depth column by Dexter Filkins, by the way.) If Iraq falls into civil war or is split up into three parts (which Joe Biden and I must say myself both suggested shortly after the beginning of hostilities), many voices will indeed be shouting “loss.” But once again, in terms of the original objectives, it was not.

First of all, one of its original major justifications, other than the non-existent WMD, was that the War on Iraq was a part of the “War on Terror” (which is still going on). One should note (and I must note that I have done so on a number of occasions) that, according to one retired Army General, to call a military action a “War on Terror” is akin to calling another action a “War on Flanking Manoeuvres.” “Terror,” however you want to define it, is a tactic used by an enemy. It is not itself an enemy. But it was very much in the interests of those forces [inside America] which forced the US into war to cement the “terror/fear” environment in the minds of the US people. And they certainly have achieved that goal, within the GOP/TP “base,” at least.

Second of all, sometime after the Iraq invasion began, it started to become clear that the primary objective was not at the beginning what many of us on the Left thought it was: “oil and bases” – and it was to a degree. However, there was a goal that was probably more compelling to the neocons, although not mutually exclusive.

On the surface, the CheneyBush War Policy was becoming curiouser and curiouser. “Things are getting better in Iraq,” they said, when they were clearly getting worse. “We must fight on to ‘victory’ ” they said, without ever defining what they mean by “victory.” And “we must fight on to ‘victory'” when virtually every other military and political authority on the matter said that no matter how you would define it, “victory” was impossible. But that would be “victory” in military terms.

However, let’s connect the dots to see what was really happening. 1. As is very well known, Bush/Cheney lied the U.S. into war. 2. There was no post-war planning, as is also well known. The U.S. State Department had a plan, and all 2,200 pages of it were just ignored. 3. The museums looting that could easily have been prevented could have part of a plan (well a different kind of plan) to develop permanent chaos. That would also explain the staffing of Paul Bremer’s pro-consulate by totally unqualified, very young, Republican political operatives: not accidental or careless, but purposeful. In essence it was thinking what might be stated like this: “Let’s do whatever we can to gum up the infrastructure even further than it is already gummed up by Saddam and our invasion.” 4. In late 2006, the report of The Iraq Study Group, headed by no less than the man who coordinated the effort to steal the 2000 election for Bush, James Baker, had provided a perfect cover for withdrawal to begin then. CheneyBush disposed of it before the ink was dry, and [the famous/infamous “Surge” was begun. 5. At various times, the major Muslim countries offered to provide cover for an American departure, especially if it were attached to a real settlement of the Palestine/Israel problem. They were not taken up on those offers.

In the 2008 Presidential campaign, John McCain at one time rattled on about “staying in Iraq for 50 years.” (Gosh. Some things never change, changing conditions to the contrary notwithstanding). Indeed, the US eventually left Iraq, not with any kind of “victory” but because it was pushed out, by the very puppet government that Bush/Cheney set up. But the Permanent War Society, or at least the Permanent Preparation for Permanent War Society, is very much in play. In terms of its original objectives, regardless of what happens in the Middle East now, the War on Iraq can only be said to have resulted in a victory – for those who originally planned and prosecuted it.

As for Afghanistan, that may be the one major war the US has fought since World War II that could not be said to be, in any sense of the term, a “victory.” But that one’s for another time.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Senior Contributing Editor Steven Jonas, MD, MPH is a Professor Emeritus of Preventive Medicine at Stony Brook University (NY) and author/co-author/editor/co-editor of over 30 books. In addition to being a contributor to The Greanville Post, he is a columnist for BuzzFlash@Truthout and the Editorial Director of and a Contributing Author to The Political Junkies for Progressive Democracy. Dr. Jonas’ latest book is The 15% Solution: How the Republican Religious Right Took Control of the U.S., 1981-2022: A futuristic Novel, Brewster, NY, Trepper & Katz Impact Books, Punto Press Publishing, 2013, and available on Amazon.

ALEX LANTIER, Senior Analyst, wsws.org
“The 2003-2011 US war in Iraq, as pursued by both the Bush and Obama administrations, involved a vast and criminal squandering of human life, American as well as Iraqi…”

Maliki—a Shia and a tool of the US—has greatly contributed to the troubles by acting like a brutal despot toward the Sunnis.

With the eruption of civil war in Iraq, the foreign policy of the United States has suffered a shipwreck of massive dimensions, with far-reaching political implications.

On Monday, as Islamist forces increased their control over significant parts of Iraq, US Secretary of State John Kerry turned to Iran for assistance. Washington is “open to discussions” with Tehran, he said, adding that he would “not rule out anything that would be constructive.”

The appeal came as the Obama administration announced a partial evacuation of the US embassy in Baghdad, the largest and most expensive embassy in the world, constructed following the 2003 invasion.

The turn to Iran testifies to the extent of the debacle in Iraq. Just this past February, Kerry was denouncing Iran for continuing to support Syrian President Bashar Al Assad as the US financed an insurgency led by the same Islamic fundamentalist forces currently threatening the Iraqi regime of Nouri al-Maliki. Now Kerry is seeking Iran’s assistance in staving off a disaster in a country the US invaded more than eleven years ago.

There exists no framework within American politics for the expression of opposition. A total bipartisan consensus has existed in support of the criminal operations of imperialism. The media has functioned as a propaganda agency, cheerleading whatever war was on the agenda.

For 35 years, since the 1979 Iranian Revolution toppled the Shah, hostility toward Iran has been a central pillar of US policy in the Middle East. During the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s, the Reagan administration financed and aided Saddam Hussein against his regional competitor.

In his 2002 State of the Union address, President George W. Bush denounced Iran as part of the “Axis of Evil,” while Washington and its allies made clear that the invasion of Iraq, which took place in 2003, was only a prelude to a US invasion and occupation of Iran. In 2003, a senior British official described the views prevalent in the Bush administration: “Everyone wants to go to Baghdad. Real men want to go to Tehran.”

Exploiting the issue of Iran’s nuclear program, the US has relentlessly targeted the country, imposing devastating sanctions and working with Israel to murder its scientists and wreak havoc on its industrial infrastructure.

Just one year ago, the Obama administration was on the verge of bombing Syria, in large part for the purpose of further isolating Iran and depriving it of a major ally in the Middle East. In fomenting civil war in Syria, the US and its monarchical Gulf allies backed various Al Qaeda affiliates, including the Sunni extremist Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS). When the defeats suffered by Washington’s far-right Sunni Islamist proxies in Syria drove it to the negotiating table last year, it insisted that Iran could not attend the talks.

While there have been tentative moves toward a rapprochement with Iran since elections last year, the current turn constitutes a stunning reversal.

US foreign policy is collapsing under the weight of the contradictions that have built up over decades of bloody wars across the region. Having recklessly turned to various subsidiaries of Al Qaeda in an attempt to topple Assad, Washington was apparently blindsided when ISIS changed targets, rampaging through Iraq and attacking Washington’s Shiite puppet regime there.

The 2003-2011 US war in Iraq, as pursued by both the Bush and Obama administrations, involved a vast and criminal squandering of human life, American as well as Iraqi. Combined with the US decision to oversee the arming of forces like ISIS, which makes a mockery of Washington’s claims to be fighting a “war on terror” against Al Qaeda, the US subjugation of Iraq has set the stage for a new, even more devastating bloodbath in the Middle East.

It is a well known historical law that regimes that suffer a foreign policy shipwreck like that of the Obama administration become highly vulnerable to the eruption of mass popular opposition within their own countries.

A diplomatic debacle of the type suffered by the United States is the product of a deeply dysfunctional political system, in which a ruling class stupefied by the constant flood of easy money obtained through financial speculation pursues disastrous, short-term policies with total disregard for the consequences. There exists no framework within American politics for the expression of opposition. A total bipartisan consensus has existed in support of the criminal operations of imperialism. The media has functioned as a propaganda agency, cheerleading whatever war was on the agenda.

From the start of the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the American ruling class based itself on the belief that all it needed to conquer Iraq was enough ammunition, combined with a willingness to commit the most barbaric acts in the pursuit of its aims. It is now getting its comeuppance, its “rendezvous with disaster” as the World Socialist Web Site anticipated.

The tragic encounter of the Iraqi people with American imperialism is by no means over. The ruling class has no shortage of foul and bloody tricks up its sleeve, and US troops, drones and Special Operations Forces have already been sent to preserve what they can. As the Obama administration is considering its options, a fresh invasion of the country is by no means ruled out.

Yet there can be no doubt that the debacle in Iraq will reverberate throughout the world—and above all in the United States. It will intensify political and social tensions and further undermine and discredit the ruling class and all of its institutions in the eyes of the working class.

Bill Van Auken, wsws.org

Glenn Greenwald, Ed Snowden, Julian Assange, and Chelsea Manning have done more to illuminate the truth about American policy than all papers and TV networks combined.

A column written by Chelsea (Bradley) Manning from his cell in the military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas has done more to illuminate the real sources of the present debacle for US imperialism in Iraq than all of the lying and self-serving pieces produced by the well-paid pundits of the New York Times, the Washington Post and the other major news outlets combined.

The column by the imprisoned US soldier, published in Sunday’s New York Times, is directed at exposing the role of government secrecy and control of the media in foisting onto the American public a war of aggression launched on the basis of lies.

Manning insists that the sudden collapse of the US-trained and funded Iraqi army and the descent of the country toward a full-blown sectarian civil war only demonstrate that the concerns that motivated him to pass some 700,000 secret documents on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars as well as US foreign policy skullduggery around the globe to WikiLeaks “have not been resolved.”

Breaking the wall of secrecy and misinformation maintained by the government and the media provoked the wrath of the US ruling establishment. The soldier and former intelligence analyst is now serving a 35-year prison term. In April, an army general rejected a motion for clemency.

Manning examines the US reaction to the 2010 election of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who had been installed by the US occupation four years earlier. The American press, the imprisoned soldier recalls, “was flooded with stories declaring the elections a success,” aimed at creating the image of the US war having “succeeded in creating a stable and democratic Iraq.”

During this same period, he writes, he and other military analysts in Baghdad were receiving continuous reports of “a brutal crackdown of political dissidents by Iraq’s Ministry of the Interior and federal police,” acting on behalf of Maliki. Opponents of the US-backed prime minister “were often tortured, or even killed,” he notes.

Bill Van Auken is a senior analyst with wsws.org. 

Iraq ISIS rebels.

ROSS CAPUTI

This week Iraq emerged from the recesses of American memory and became a hot topic of conversation. Alarming headlines about ISIS’s “takeover” of Mosul and their march towards Baghdad have elicited a number of reactions: The most conservative call for direct US military action against ISIS to ensure that the government of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki remains stable in Baghdad. The most liberal lament the ongoing violence and divisions in Iraqi society caused by the US occupation; though they make no attempt distinguish between the violence of ISIS and the violence of the Maliki government.

This range of ideas and perspectives is fascinating, and it says much about American war culture, but mostly for the ideas and perspectives that are omitted from this debate. Entirely absent is the perspective of Iraqis and the issues that are important to them: accountability, independence, and resistance. Moreover, the real complexities of this issue have been lost in a number of the Western media’s favorite binaries: terrorism vs. counterterrorism, good vs. evil, and insurgency vs. stability.

If we dare to take Iraqi voices seriously and think outside of the dominant framework presented to us by the mainstream media, a very different picture of the violence in Iraq emerges and a whole new range of options open up for achieving peace and justice.

The Rise of ISIS

One year ago ISIS was concentrated in Syria, with almost no presence in Iraq. During this time, a nonviolent protest movement, which called itself the Iraqi Spring, was in full swing with widespread support in the Sunni provinces and significant support from the Shia provinces as well. This movement set up nonviolent protest camps in many cities throughout Iraq for nearly the entire year of 2013. They articulated a set of demands calling for an end to the marginalization of Sunnis within the new Iraqi democracy, reform of an anti-terrorism law that was being used to label political dissent as terrorism, abolition of the death penalty, an end to corruption, and they positioned themselves against federalism and sectarianism too.

Instead of making concessions to the protestors and defusing their rage, Prime Minister Maliki mocked their demands chose to use military force to attack them on numerous occasions. Over the course of a year, the protestors were assaulted, murdered, and their leaders were assassinated, but they remained true to their adopted tactic of nonviolence. That is, until Prime Minister Maliki sent security forces to clear the protest camps in Fallujah and Ramadi in December of 2013. At that point the protestors lost hope in the tactic of nonviolence and turned to armed resistance instead.

It is important to note that from the beginning it was the tribal militias who took the lead in the fight against the Iraqi government. ISIS arrived a day later to aid Fallujans in their fight, but also to piggy-back on the success of the tribal fighters in order to promote their own political goals.

A command structure was set up in Fallujah within the first weeks of fighting. It consisted primarily of tribal leaders and former army officials and went by the name of the General Military Council for Iraqi Revolutionaries. This council was led by Sheikh Abdullah Janabi, who also led the the Shura Council of Mujihadeen in Fallujah in 2004. After the 2nd US-led assault on Fallujah, Janabi fled to Syria, but returned to Iraq in 2011. His calls for cooperation between the various militant factions in Fallujah was a significant unifying factor.

Yet despite the glaring differences between the various militant groups in Fallujah, the Iraqi government insists on treating all fighters as terrorists. A government official said it clearly to Reuters, “if anyone insists on fighting our forces, he will be considered an [ISIS] militant whether he is or not.” The Iraqi government launched an indiscriminate bombing campaign that to date haskilled 443 civilians and has wounded 1657 in Fallujah, and has displaced over 50,922 families from Anbar Province as a whole. The Fallujah hospital has been targeted numerous times, and residential neighborhoods have been bombed and shelled daily for six months. Struan Stevenson, President of European Parliament’s Delegation for Relations with Iraq, wrote an open letter calling the Iraqi government’s operation “genocidal”.

Over the course of the months of fighting with the government, ISIS has grown in strength. Their access to funds and weapons has made them an attractive group to young Sunnis who see no future for themselves in Iraq as long as Maliki remains in power. Many of the recruits who have joined ISIS are the same men who were nonviolent protestors one year earlier. Many of them remain opposed to the ideas of federalism and sectarians—ideas which are central to ISIS’s political platform. What unites them and the hardcore ideologues within ISIS is their desperation to be rid of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki, who has left them with no choice but to operate outside of the political system in order to better their lives in Iraq.

Insurgency or Revolution? 

This week the media buzzed with the news that ISIS had captured Mosul, the 2nd largest city in Iraq, and was prepared to march towards Baghdad. Two assumptions in these reports went unexamined: that ISIS had been a lone actor and that Mosul had been “captured” rather than liberated.

While the first assumption is a matter of fact, the latter is a matter of perspective. It was noted in the New York Times that ISIS had collaborated with several local militias in Mosul, including Baathist and Islamist groups; although the significance of such a fact went understated. If one further acknowledges that ISIS has cooperated and continues to cooperate with several militias in several Iraqi cities, it begins to appear that ISIS is not a lone actor in Iraq, attempting to capture territory for a future Islamic state. Rather, it appears that ISIS is just one faction in a larger popular rebellion against the government of Nouri al Maliki.

When 500,000 residents of Mosul fled their city earlier this week, they did not do so out of fear that ISIS would subject them to sharia courts. They did so out of fear of their government’s reprisal. Many have even expressed gratitude towards the fighters who kicked Maliki’s security forces out of their city.

This loose coalition of militias—from the tribal militias in Fallujah, to Baathist militias like Naqshabandi, and Islamist groups like ISIS—have come to embody the hopes and aspirations of Sunnis in Iraq to one day be free of Maliki’s oppression. For them there is no other option, no other future is imaginable, and there is no turning back.

A Path Forward

President Obama has announced that the US would not intervene in Iraq until the Iraqi government made concessions to the disenfranchised Sunni community within Iraq. However, the US has already increased its “intelligence and surveillance assistance” and has shown no sign of decreasing its supply of arms to the Iraqi government. While publicly criticizing the Maliki government’s sectarian policies, the US has been aiding and facilitating this “genocide” against the Sunni population for months.

The impunity of the Maliki government is never questioned in the debate raging within the US. It is simply unimaginable within the limits of this debate that Maliki might be held accountable for the war crimes his regime has committed against his own people. Equally unimaginable is the notion that his regime should fall and that Iraqis should be able to dismantle the constitution and the institutions that the US-led occupation imposed on them.

We must take seriously the legitimacy of Sunni resistance, while at the same time taking seriously the fear that a group like ISIS elicits in Shia Iraqis. These fractured communities within Iraq must decide their own future, without the interference of Washington or Tehran. Most importantly for us, as Americans, we must make an effort to analyze this issue outside of the paradigm of US political thought and try to see this issue through the eyes of those most affected by it. We must respect their ideas and values, their politics and culture, and their right to determine their own future, unimpeded by foreign interference.

Source: Common Dreams

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ross Caputi, 29, is a US veteran of the occupation of Iraq. He took part in the second battle of Fallujah in November 2004. That experience led him to become an anti-war activist.