Fight'm Over There!?!

Is the American psyche really so fragile? Do we take on views and beliefs based on a bumper sticker type sound bite that have been repeated millions of times by our government and its’ propaganda machine? “Fight’m over there so we don’t fight’m over here” is one such sound bite that has penetrated the American psyche and become truth to millions of Americans. This sound bite, however, has no basis in reality and does not even make sense on multiple levels. It doesn’t stop millions of Americans from repeating it ad nauseam as a reason to continue a war seemingly forever. “Fight’m over there” has become the mantra of conservatives all over the United States.

First I must point out that 9/11 happened not because of terrorists “over there” but because of terrorists already here. There were people being trained by United States citizens to fly planes. Yes, they may have been acting on orders from people “over there” but taking over any number of countries would not have stopped this act. There was no single country that was responsible for this attack. 9/11 was planned by a few individuals and carried out by a handful more. Most of these individuals were from Saudi Arabia.

Sometimes the government and the media like to pretend that they have no idea why the terrorists attacked us. In fact, these individuals carried out this attack because of our policies and interference with Iraq, Afghanistan, and other middle eastern nations. We know this because they told us. We helped them drive Russia from Afghanistan and then we ignored them while the Taliban took over. We attacked Iraq and drove them out of Kuwait and then we left them with permanent basis in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. We have left troops in their countries and they don’t like it. Fighting “over there” actually caused the attack over here.

Our recent efforts to fight over there have destabilized the entire region much more than had we left it alone. Everyone in this country supported the invasion of Afghanistan to find Osama bin Laden. Everyone in this country supported the U.S. troops’ use of force to oust the Taliban government in Afghanistan. President Bush, however, pulled our forces out of this country in the middle of the operation in order to begin another war. The direct cause of this decision was the destabilization of Afghanistan and the escape of Osama bin Laden. Our brave and heroic military had Osama bin Laden on the run and hiding. All they had to do was go find him. Rather than finish the job Bush ordered that they let local groups capture him so that Bush could pull the troops out and send them to Iraq. This resulted in Osama bin Laden paying off the locals so that he could escape. Now, if Bush was really out to get the 9/11 terrorists “smoke’m out, dead or alive, head on a silver platter” then why would he allow bin Laden to escape? By leaving Afghanistan prematurely it allowed the Taliban to come back in and retake much of the region. Right after 9/11 the conservatives were suddenly so concerned with women’s rights in Afghanistan and the horrendous living conditions imposed by the Taliban for women in the region. Then they left those women to suffer the same fate at the hands of the same group so that they could go fight in Iraq. The irony is that the U.S. did the exact same thing after we helped free Afghanistan from Russia and this is why Osama bin Laden first started to hate us. The United States trained bin Laden to fight the Russians and we promised him support. When the Russians left we did not support the new government and this allowed the Taliban to take control and made Osama bin Laden our enemy. This is not ancient history. Why did we not learn from it?

We have also destabilized Pakistan because of our meddling. The Pakistani President supported the U.S. and let the U.S. use his country to attack Afghanistan. This left him vulnerable to extremists who are anti-American and paint him as a collaborator with the United States and the west. As our reputation as an inhumane conqueror of middle eastern countries grows the Pakistani President’s enemies gain ground politically. Destabilization in this country is extremely dangerous because they have nuclear capability. If terrorists or even an unfriendly elected government takes over Pakistan the region could be in BIG trouble. It would be our fault.

Then there is the entire Arabian Peninsula. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Some people, who aren’t paying attention, still believe that they were somehow involved even though Bush and Cheney both have said clearly that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. It is another example of saying something enough that it becomes true in the minds of citizens. The media and the conservatives have linked Iraq and 9/11 in sentences so many times that people are confused. It is obvious that this was intentional. Saddam Hussein was an evil man. He did terrible things to the people of Iraq. Everyone agrees that this is a fact. The problem is that there are many evil leaders in the world. At what point does another country need to step in and stop this evil from taking place? International law says that we cannot invade another country unless they are a threat to us. The Downing Street minutes made it quite clear that we did not have any evidence that Iraq could in any way be a threat to the United States. The Iraq inspectors said that Iraq was not a danger to the United States. To solve the problem the United States deliberately fabricated evidence to make it seem like we had evidence that Iraq was a threat to us so that we could invade. There is a mountain of evidence that the United States deliberately deceived the people of the world into believing that Iraq was a threat when in fact it was not a threat to anyone.

Attacking Iraq had nothing to do with saving the Kurds. Saddam did attack the Kurds with a terrible nerve gas but this was before the first Gulf War. My husband and others fought in this war so that Saddam would no longer have the power to do such a thing. It worked. He was no longer a threat to his neighbors and did not posses any weapons of mass destruction that he could use against his own people, his neighbors or especially not us. Saddam also was an enemy to the Taliban, Al Queda and Osama bin Laden. Any one in Al Queda would have been in grave danger in Iraq. Had we played our cards differently Saddam would have probably helped us round up any Al Queda members in Iraq … if there were any. Evidence shows that there were not any because Saddam was careful not to let anyone like that in his country live. Again, not necessarily a positive trait however it ruins any argument that we were going after the terrorists who caused 9/11 when we attacked Iraq.

Attacking Iraq had nothing to do with protecting the Iraqis from torture. I think we proved this when we started torturing them even using some of the same techniques that Saddam used. If you are going to claim moral superiority as a reason to take over a country then you have to maintain moral superiority during the fight. We have not.

Another argument about Iraq that I have heard a lot from conservatives is that Saddam was thinking about making weapons of mass destruction. International law does not really allow you to bomb or take over a country because of what they might be thinking about doing sometime in the future. They created this law so that countries could not invade other countries claiming that there might be a threat at some time. If all countries ignored the law as we have then everyone could invade whomever they wanted whenever they wanted without consequence. When Pakistan developed their nuclear weapons program we stopped China and India from wiping them off the planet by using the argument that you can’t bomb a country just because they may be a threat sometime in the future. Actually, Hitler used the argument that he could invade Poland because he thought they might be a threat sometime in the future. Hitler also had his own army fake attacks against Germany and blame Poland in an attempt to show a reason to attack Poland. Look how that worked out. Maybe these international laws were created for a reason!

The destabilization in Iraq was the biggest miscalculation and mistake (if it was a mistake) in military history. The country of Iraq was glued together with gum and twine, which was only held together by Saddam. As evil as he was, he was the only thing that held together the Sunnis the Shiites and the Kurds in relative peace and tranquility. These three groups shared neighborhoods, shopped at the same markets and worked together peacefully under Saddam. Christians and Jews, although in the minority, were also a part of these communities. Iraq was not an ideal situation, however the sectarian violence that we see today was not present. Even after the start of the Iraq War the sectarian violence did not exist until the U.S. started it. I saw an entire PBS special about this very topic. Top military and diplomatic leaders from the United States made serious mistakes after the invasion that resulted in the current sectarian violence. Those responsible admit this freely. Why does the mainstream American public not recognize this? Also, by starting this war in Iraq we have let Al Queda come into a country where they could not exist before. They continue to be a very small part of the problem in Iraq, however before we opened the door for them they were not a part of the equation at all.

Iran was the next country who was changed by our involvement in the region. Iran has an extremely young population (mostly because of the war with Iraq years ago). This population of young people is one of the most progressive populations in all of the middle east. They overwhelmingly like and approve of the United States and western culture and have many more individual rights and freedoms than their middle eastern counterparts. Although they elected their current prime minister, Ahmadinejad, public opinion was against him. He had been trying to take away some of the freedoms that the younger generation had come to enjoy and they were ready to get rid of him. Not only that but one must remember that he actually has very little control over foreign policy in Iraq. He is the figure head of the government. He is not the one in control. According to the constitution, the supreme leader of Iraq, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has the last say in internal and foreign policies including the commandment of the armed forces and the declaration of war.

Public opinion was so negative toward Ahmadinejad that many people expected that he would not continue to be Prime Minister much longer. Unfortunately, the United States has succeeded in changing much of this public opinion and has instead helped Ahmadinejad remain Prime Minister. First Bush identified Iran as the “Axis of Evil.” This served to scare the Iranians into believing that Bush may just start attacking them for no reason just as he had done to Iraq. Then, when Ahmadinejad started to stand up for Iran and faced off with Bush this helped him gain popularity with Iranians who had been ready to get rid of him. Nothing helps secure your popularity like standing up to a bully in support of your country. It makes no difference that the man is crazy and a loose cannon. To the Iranians, he is willing to protect them and stand up against the United States which is necessary now that the United States is ignoring international law and randomly attacking other countries.

Now, if you were a country that had been identified as belonging to the “Axis of Evil” along with Iraq and North Korea what would you do? Iraq could do nothing because they had been sanctioned for 15 years so they were invaded and taken over. First Jimmy Carter and then Madeline Albright had negotiated with North Korea to keep them from developing a nuclear program. North Korea had been cooperating for years (although they occasionally flexed their muscles and had to be “dealt with”). North Korea decided to stop cooperating with those agreements the day after the axis of evil speech. They turned off the agreed upon cameras and started their nuclear program back up again. Bush ignored North Korea because he was distracted by Iraq and because he refuses to speak to North Korea and now North Korea has a nuclear program. Now Bush would not dream of invading North Korea.

The Iranians were left with little choice but to start talking about nuclear technology. Bush refused to speak to Iran diplomatically and instead continued to call them names and attempt to provoke them. Bush has placed huge war ships in the Persian Gulf in an obvious attempt to provoke Iran and even forced a false flag episode between Iran and Britain. Fortunately, Ahmadinejad has not been easily provoked. He returned the British seamen after the false flag event and put all nuclear interests on hold after diplomatic talks with several countries (NOT the United States) in 2003. Bush was informed by all 16 intelligence agencies in August (or even before) that Iran had suspended its nuclear program in 2003 because of diplomatic pressure by other countries. Bush, however, continued his bomb Iran, axis of evil rhetoric until November when the NIE became public. Joe Biden said it best when he stated that Bush was either lying or incompetent and asked Bush to pick which. Bush has known for many months, if not years that Iran was no threat to us and had no nuclear program yet he continued to try to mislead Americans into believing that we were about to go to war with Iran. Had the NIE not been made public by the intelligence agencies Bush may have even started World War III with the blessing of many Americans who did not know the truth. When Ahmadinejad begins to look like a reasonable man seeking peace and stability compared to your own leader you must begin to wonder what we, as Americans, are doing.
The entire situation becomes even more muddled when you consider the role of CIA agent Valerie Plame in the mix of events. Most people have assumed that Valerie Plame was revealed as a CIA agent and her career ruined as retribution for her husband, Joe Wilson’s, revelation that a sentence in the President’s state of the union address was false. Wilson had been sent to Niger by the CIA to investigate claims that Iraq had sought yellow cake uranium from this country. Joe Wilson found no such evidence and reported this to the President. The President, however, included the claim that Iraq had yellow cake uranium from Niger in his state of the union address. Joe Wilson publicly announced that this was not true. His wife’s cover was then blown by the administration including Scooter Libby, Karl Rove and Dick Cheney. Although the right wing propaganda machine insists Valerie Plame was not a covert agent, the CIA, congressional hearings and other public records show that she was, indeed, a covert agent working on nuclear proliferation cases. She was traveling around the world as a covert agent attempting to keep the United States safe by reporting on nuclear activity in other countries including Iran. This brings a new question to mind. Was Valerie Plame’s identity revealed in order to ruin the CIA’s ability to monitor nuclear activity in the middle east and especially in Iran. By outing Valerie Plame the Bush administration not only ruined her long career but also endangered her contacts and put in jeopardy the entire web of contacts and informants of the CIA. This most certainly hindered their ability to accurately inform the President of nuclear proliferation for several years while they re-built their informant list and undercover web. That entire ordeal may have been an attempt to begin another war based on false intelligence and fear.

Iran is intimately connected to our invasion of Iraq in another even more important way. Iraq was formerly controlled by the Sunni sect. Although the sects were able to live together under Saddam it was the Sunni people that were the leading class while the Shiites had little power. Iran is a Shiite nation. When the United States invaded Iraq and created a new government the United States backed the Shiite people to run the country. They tried to set up a democracy where all people could have a say in the government but it was the Shiites that would have controlled the government if everything had gone the way the United States had planned. It does not take a genius to figure out how this fact may influence the future of that region. Iran would love to have Iraq led by Shiites. That would be their dream come true. The conservative talking heads keep complaining about Iran giving weapons to Iraqis. They would only be giving them to the Shiite’s who were originally on our side. We should have seen that one coming and should expect nothing less. The Saudi’s, on the other hand, are supplying more weapons and people than any foreign non-allied nation in the entire war. Saudi Arabia backs the Sunnis who were the original group fighting AGAINST the United States. The Sunnis are the ones who did not participate in the original elections and fought our troops. Why didn’t we hear the administration and the conservative talking heads complaining about Saudi Arabia’s involvement? Bush never mentions Saudi Arabia’s involvement and the fact that they are fighting against us in Iraq because he is friends with the royal family and needs to remain their friend for their oil.

Bush has also destabilized Israel, Palestine, Lebanon and Syria. The last thing Clinton did before leaving office was to have peace talks and work out an agreement with Israel and Palestine. I’ve seen him speak extensively about his decision to make this a priority in the last months of his Presidency and his struggle to bring peace to that region. Everyone, of course, understands that peace is tenuous at best in that region and that these peace talks were but a first step. Bush, however, has not continued this effort. He has deliberately avoided any peace talks with any country in the past 7 years. He pushed for elections in Lebanon even though several other countries cautioned him that it was too soon. Other leaders understood that elections in Lebanon would mean Hezbollah would win. Bush ignored them and Hezbollah and another anti-Syrian group won most of the seats in Parliament. This election then led to the war between Israel and Lebanon in 2006. After the war began the United States refused to force peace talks between the nations and allowed the fighting to continue until the U.N. finally put a stop to the violence.

Another factor in that war was Iran. Israel, Lebanon, Syria and Iran all felt much more comfortable that they could “get away with” violence in the region with the United States bogged down in a quagmire of violence in Iraq. Lebanon’s newly formed government was overwhelmingly Shiite and supported by Iran. The government was also anti Syria. With the United States preoccupied and without their usual moral authority (it is hard to tell people not to fight each other when you have invaded a sovereign nation without cause or provocation) it was the perfect time for Lebanon to provoke Israel. After the short war, southern Lebanon was left destroyed. The United States offered money to the government to rebuild but Iran gave cash to each person whose home was destroyed by the war. Iran sent contractors and equipment and started the rebuilding efforts the next day. Ahmadinejad may be an extremist with some crazy ideas but he knows how to turn popular opinion.

Attacking Iran at this point would be the final nail in the complete annihilation of a stabile middle east. The United States does not have the military force to sustain an attack against Iran. Right now we could still undo some of the damage and preserve the support of the Iranian people. They like the west and western ideas. If we bomb them we have lost it forever. We would also gain nothing by bombing Iran. Ahmadinejad would become more powerful. Syria, Lebanon and even their arch enemy Iraq would support them instead of us. China would even be angry with us and they hold all of our war debt and have the capability of crashing our entire economic system. It is time for diplomacy with Iran and it is time to stop the threats of more war that we can not possibly sustain. Iran has a much stronger army than we do at this point. We would have to reinstitute the draft to sustain a war with Iran. All of this to stop a country from gaining nuclear capabilities in possibly 10 years that they could never ever hope to use. Israel has an estimated 200 nuclear weapons. Iran will never be stupid enough to launch a nuclear weapon toward Israel. They would be just like Pakistan is now. They would have a nuclear weapon that they could never use. It would simply be insurance that no one would mess with them. More nuclear weapons is certainly not the best idea. The more there are the more chance there is that some terrorist will have access to one. Now, however, is the time for diplomacy to stop the further development of these weapons. Threats of war will only encourage countries to develop them to protect themselves.

Finally, and most important to our safety AT HOME, all of our policies in the middle east have increased terrorism around the world. If our goal was really to fight terrorism we have done a terrible job of achieving our goal. The United States has helped Al Queda in ways that they could have never previously dreamed possible. On 9/11 we had the sympathy of every nation in the world. Even our enemies offered to help us and were willing to give us the perpetrators. The United States has turned many of those countries against us. By invading a sovereign nation with no means to defend itself we did not look heroic and strong but like a bully picking on a child. By lying and ignoring international laws we have become hated and maligned. By stooping to the level of the terrorists and torturing people, we have helped fuel an insurgence and a groundswell of support for Al Queda. Al Queda makes 100 times the amount of money they used to make and that money is coming from Iraq. Most of the money supporting Al Queda is coming from United States tax dollars in Iraq says a recent national security document. Contractors pay off Iraqis who then fund Al Queda. There could have been no better recruiting tool for Al Queda than to start another war in the middle east. Bush has given Osama bin Laden another gift. The gift of another generation of extremists who hate the United States more than the first and who are willing to die for that hate. Osama bin Laden is still alive to gloat because we let him go. Americans are much less safe because of our policies abroad and everyone in the world knows it but us.

There are things that would make us safer at home. Increasing border security would make us safer. Inspecting all cargo entering the United States would make us safer. Developing a better system for identifying foreign citizens who have stayed longer than their visa permitted our who have come to America on a student visa but have never attended a class would make us safer. There are hundred of ways to make our country safer here at home. The 9/11 commission had many suggestions that the administration has completely ignored. Bush is convinced the only way to fight terrorism is to ignore the problems at home and invade countries abroad. This has only made us more vulnerable. Fighting them over there does not mean they will not come over here. It only gives them more reason to come over here. We need to stop listening to this nonsensical rhetoric and adopt the suggestions of the 9/11 commission. Now that democrats control congress they have started this very process but they need a veto proof majority to do it. Bush would rather veto bills that adopt 9/11 commission recommendations than admit that he should have done them 5 years ago.

Another thing that would make us safer at home would be to have our troops home. They would be here to help us during natural disasters such as Katrina. They would be here to help patrol our borders and inspect cargo. They would be here to defend us during an attack. They would be stronger if they were well rested and trained properly. They would be ready to defend us abroad if needed. They would be stronger if they could buy the proper vehicles and armor and build up their forces. We would be safer at home if we had a strong military that was ready to defend against a real enemy.

Finally, the best way to defend America is to stick to the ideals that made us a great nation. Our nation condemned the use of torture during World War II. We should not use it now. When asked whether water boarding is torture Rudi Giuliani replied that it depends on who is doing it. This is exactly the attitude that any torturer takes. Every country could justify what they do because they have a “good reason.” Water boarding was wrong during the Spanish inquisition, it was wrong when Japan did it to our soldiers and it continues to be wrong even if we have a really good reason. We hung the Japanese torturers who used this technique on our soldiers. If we do not want other people to torture our soldiers then we must refrain from torturing. It is the best way to help protect our soldiers and our citizens and it is the best way to protect the law.

We also have laws against domestic spying. If law enforcement officials suspect terrorist activity they can get a warrant to listen to phone calls before they listen or even within 3 days after they do. The FISA court was specifically designed for this purpose and has worked for years. Bush argues that getting a warrant is not “fast enough” but this makes no sense considering warrants can be obtained retroactively. The only reason to skip getting a warrant would be if you were spying on someone that the court would not approve such as a political opponent, a peace activist or other citizen who opposes you politically. This is in violation of our civil liberties as Americans and should not be tolerated. Republicans who deny that this is a big deal would certainly feel differently if Bill Clinton had done the same. This is exactly why we have laws. So that some things are wrong regardless of who does it or why they do it. If laws did not apply to everyone then people would take the law into their own hands all the time. If someone abused your daughter would you be allowed to go kill him or torture him? That would be a good reason to kill or torture someone yet it is still against the law. If you think your neighbor took your favorite hammer should you be allowed to break into his house to look for it? That would be illegal because you need more than just a good reason.

Americans need to pay attention and pay attention now. Fight’m over there is a bumper sticker and a lie. Fight’m over there is nothing more than the U.S. poking a hornets nest with a big stick. It is not working and it will not work. It makes the U.S. weaker by taking away our allies, our moral authority, our military strength, our peace keeping capabilities and our civil rights. Fight’m over there is a myth that needs to be busted just as the myth of Iran’s nuclear weapons was busted. The U.S. intelligence agencies knew that if they did not come out with the truth their leader would start a war. It is time for us, as Americans, to stand up and say “No more lies.” Americans need to stop believing the myth and instead seek the truth before the most beloved and strongest nation in the world becomes the most hated and weakest nation.