George Washington on Iraq

“…it is well known, that when one side only of a Story is heard, and often repeated, the human mind becomes impressed with it, insensibly.” George Washington understood that the repetition of a great untruth would inevitably lead to `brain washing.’ Forgive me for inserting this modern term into the great man’s thought process. On page 214 of his new biography of our first president, His Excellency: George Washington, Joseph J. Ellis sums up Washington’s view of the big lie in government, indeed in all human activities.

It was saddening to learn yesterday that President George W. Bush asserted, after having to acknowledge under pressure of the revealed facts and truth that our hegemonic venture into Iraq based on that country’s possession of and threats to use `weapons of mass destruction’ against us or our allies was without foundation, that our War in Iraq, was still a good thing.

Either President Bush is scandalously out of touch with reality or he is in the process of redefining reality. It is one thing to have taken this nation to war based on flawed intelligence. He (and I hope most of our citizens, including me) may be forgiven for believing that Iraq possessed chemical and biological weapons and was in the process of seeking to restart its nuclear weapons program. It is quite another to, in the face of his own government’s findings to the contrary, to assert, despite no evidence to support our attack, that what we did to that nation and ours was the best policy.

In effect, we attacked a stable nation whose government we despised, toppled that government, and inserted ourselves into a civil war on the side of the largest ethnic and religious faction. Regardless of the outcome of the election – almost certainly a Shiite victory – we have alienated Sunnis everywhere. The likely result will be an Iraqi government friendly to its traditional enemy, Iran, that calls into question the balance of power in the region.

It is possible, even likely, that we have destroyed a secular government in favor of one that will be controlled by a theocracy that is even more opposed to us and our presence in the central Civilization than was Saddam. It is difficult to imagine a worse outcome to this act of hubris that has cost us the lives and health of thousands of young men and women, destroyed the lives of thousands of Iraqis who admired us, poured our treasure to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars into the desert, alienated a civilization with more than a billion adherents, and cost us the respect of the nations of our own civilization, including Canada, Mexico, France, Germany and many more.

Repetition of obviously false assertions can work for only so long. The American people see what is going on and, more importantly, believe their eyes rather than the propaganda emanating from the president’s mouth. If Mr. Bush loses complete credibility on this vital issue, his presidency will be a total failure. If he cannot separate himself from those neoconservatives who took him down this terrible path, he will join them in being wrong on the single issue that will define his presidency in history.

Blog on!

Wild Bill