‘Shock and awe’ in Iraq: No mistake

Even those who have set themselves foursquare against the American invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq are guilty of an error: referring to George Bush’s unprovoked war as a “mistake” or a “costly mistake.”

In fact, it is no such thing. Those who call Iraq a mistake have not taken the time to give some thought to the meaning of the word. These are examples of mistakes: picking up a pen when one intended to use a pencil; putting on two different colored socks; mis-typing a PIN number. None of these acts is premeditated or the object of design. The Iraq adventure was.

Those who call Iraq a “mistake” are inferring that had Bush and his claque succeeded in their plans – establishing a free, democratic, and orderly Iraq under American hegemony within a matter of months – then the invasion of that nation would have been the correct thing to do. In other words, launching an attack against another country cannot be a mistake so long as one achieves one’s objectives.

Recall that the initial volley of American weapons of mass destruction into Iraq was dubbed “Shock and Awe,” the object being to impress Saddam Hussein with the power and reach of U.S. military ordnance. I cannot help but reduce this act to its least common denominator: What does one tell the first Iraqi mother to lose a child to the American attack? That she will feel better once her country is free, democratic and prosperous? Somewhere in my bones, I sense that telling her the invasion was a “mistake” would provide no comfort whatever.

Although the invasion of Iraq was no mistake, the appointment of George W. Bush as president and his subsequent re-election qualify as mistakes of monumental proportions. The American people no doubt aimed to elect a visionary leader who would utilize his experience and tap the bottomless depths of his wisdom to continue the republic along a path of prosperity, diplomatic engagement with other nations, and the improvement of our own democracy. Instead, we made a huge mistake and got a man who showed no curiosity about the world and reported that he received his instructions from God. As mistakes go, this was a lollapalooza.

The result of our electoral error has been, to say the least, dispiriting. The man who told us he was a “uniter, not a divider,” has cleaved the republic neatly in two (actually, it’s more lopsided than that – 70 percent of us disapprove of the president’s performance) by throwing the brunt of American military might against a Third World country run by a tin pot dictator presiding over a crippled economy and a hobbled, barely cohesive military. In order to achieve this goal, the president bullied the Congress, the media and the citizenry into believing that an already emasculated Iraq was capable of launching devastating attacks against the United States. Maine’s own Olympia Snowe, in her enthusiasm to demonstrate that she, too, had a dollop of testosterone, leapt at the opportunity to place her shoulder to this wheel of deception by warning us of potential nuclear devastation if we didn’t act.

In this light, our mortifying failure in Iraq – our death of a thousand cuts – is no surprise. In fact, we had been warned by the president’s dad that an invasion of Iraq would mean a long-term occupation of a bitterly hostile land. It seems that father did, indeed, know best.

And so we continue to hear, from this administration, the pleasant poetry of “progress” that flies in the face of all we know to be true. A new school here, a market opening there, a delivery of cold cash (that promptly disappears into the pockets of Iraqi and American profiteers). These government-issued dispatches detailing our “successes” in Iraq seem to be designed to convince skeptical observers that our attempt to subjugate a sovereign state is not – and could never be – a mistake.

Who knows? Perhaps I’m the one who is mistaken. Maybe Iraq was merely the wrong war at the wrong time, like the aforementioned off-color sock. In any event, 2008 will provide an interesting election experience. The president has crippled his country’s reputation in the world (Albania excepted), has weakened his own party as a positive political force, has condoned torture and secret prisons, and has destroyed most of the electorate’s faith in its present government. It’s quite a legacy. No wonder nobody wants George W. Bush’s presidential library. It’s one more mistake nobody wants to have to live with.

Robert Klose teaches at University College of Bangor. He is a frequent contributor of essays to The Christian ScienceMonitor.