The Iraq War: Ten Years of U.S. Crimes against Humanity, By Sara Flounders Global Research, March 21, 2013, workers.org
From the very beginning of war preparation, U.S. plans were calculated to use the most extreme forms of terror on the Iraqi people to force submission to U.S. domination. “Shock and awe” is terrorism by another name.
“Shock and awe” is technically known as rapid dominance. By its very definition, it’s a military doctrine that uses overwhelming power and spectacular displays of force to paralyze and destroy the will to fight. Written by Harlan K. Ullman and James P. Wade in 1996, the doctrine is a product of the U.S. National Defense University, developed to exploit the “superior technology, precision engagement, and information dominance” of the United States.
This well-known military strategy requires the capability to disrupt
“means of communication, transportation, food production, water supply,
and other aspects of infrastructure.” According to these criminal
military strategists, the aim is to achieve a level of national shock
akin to the effect of dropping nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and
Nagasaki.
War profiteers
The looting and pillage of Iraq on a grand scale were also planned
from the very beginning. It was hardly an accident, a mistaken policy or
the fog of war.The official who had total authority in Iraq immediately following “shock and awe” destruction, the chief of the occupation authority in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, enacted 100 orders which turned Iraq overnight into a giant U.S.-dominated capitalist free market. The 100 orders guaranteed 100 percent foreign investor ownership of Iraqi assets, the right to expropriate all profits, unrestricted imports, and long-term 30- to 40-year deals and leases. In the official turnover to Iraqi sovereignty, these colonial orders were to stay in place...
The cost of war
Nobel laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz calculated the cost of the Iraq war, including the many hidden costs, in his 2008 book, “The Three Trillion Dollar War.” He concluded: “There is no such thing as a free lunch, and there is no such thing as a free war. The Iraq adventure has seriously weakened the U.S. economy, whose woes now go far beyond loose mortgage lending. You can’t spend $3 trillion — yes, $3 trillion — on a failed war abroad and not feel the pain at home.”
Stiglitz lists what even one of these trillions could have paid for: 8 million housing units, or 15 million public school teachers, or health care for 530 million children for a year, or scholarships to universities for 43 million students. Three trillion could have fixed America’s so-called Social Security problem for half a century.
According to a Christian Science Monitor report, when ongoing medical treatment, replacement vehicles and other costs are included, the total cost of the Iraq war is projected to cost $4 trillion. (Oct. 25, 2012)
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The following Memo addressed to Prime Minister Tony Blair is purported to have been written by Blair’s foreign policy advisor David Manning. It was written in anticipation of PM Blair’s Visit to the Texas Ranch.
It indicates that now-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was committed to “regime change” in early 2002. It also outlines some problems a postwar Iraq might face. The document is presented as transcribed by the “Raw Story”
SECRET – STRICTLY PERSONAL
FROM: DAVID MANNING DATE: 14 MARCH 2002
CC: JONATHAN POWELL
PRIME MINISTER
YOUR TRIP TO THE US
I had dinner with Condi [Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice] on Tuesday; and talks and lunch with her and an NSC team on Wednesday (to which Christopher Meyer also came). These were good exchanges, and particularly frank when we were one-on-one at dinner. I attach the records in case you want to glance.
IRAQ
We spent a long time at dinner on IRAQ. It is clear that Bush is grateful for your support and has registered that you are getting flak. I said that you would not budge in your support for regime change but you had to manage a press, a Parliament and a public opinion that was very different than anything in the States. And you would not budge either in your insistence that, if we need pursued regime change, it must be very carefully done and produce the right result. Failure was not an option.
Condi’s enthusiasm for regime change is undimmed. But there were some signs, since we last spoke, of greater awareness of the practical difficulties and political risks. (See the attached piece by Seymour Hersh which Christopher Meyer says gives a pretty accurate picture of the uncertain state of the debate in Washington.)
From what she said, Bush has yet to find the answers to the big questions:
- how to persuade international opinion that military action against Iraq is necessary and justified;
- what value to put on the exiled Iraqi opposition;
- how to coordinate a US/allied military campaign with internal opposition (assuming there is any);
- what happens on the morning after?
Bush will want to pick your brains. He will also want to hear whether he can expect coalition support. I told Condi that we realized that the Administration could go it alone if it chose. But if it wanted company, it would have to take account of the concerns of its potential coalition partners ... continue
The Iraq Factor: Secret Memo to Tony Blair, Condoleeza Rice committed to regime change in early 2002, By Global Research, March 22, 2013.
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