King George & 'The New Bloody Reality'

Of all the smoke and mirrors that King George has used in defense of his failed war policy, it's hard to top his mantra of the moment that the U.S. needs to stay the course because Iraq has become a hotbed of international terrorism.

It is impossible to dispute this contention, of course, but what is so outrageous is the fact that Iraq has become a hotbed of international terrorism, as well as a recruiting tool for jihadist wannabes, because of the U.S.

Saddam Hussein was nobody's fool except his own and would not have allowed terrorists to operate in Iraq. Ever.

Many of the fighters in Saddam's paramilitary Fedayeen were from Syria, Egypt and Sudan, among other countries, but they were not terrorists. In fact, the arrival of the first terrorists in Itaq coincided with the emergence of sectarian militias as power players in the second year of the war.

Writes Andrew Cockburn in The Independent:

Yesterday was another black day in the War on Terror. Wave upon wave of violence engulfed the region and paid testament to the new, bloody reality five years on from 11 September. . . .

To Tony Blair, due to visit Israel next weekend, the problem is very straightforward. Speaking in Los Angeles last month he produced a terrifyingly over- simple view of the Middle East saying "the Iraqi and Afghan fight for democracy is our fight. Same values. Same enemy." He claimed that "we have to empower Moderate, Mainstream Islam to defeat Reactionary Islam". The American and British governments will apparently decide in future just who belongs to the latter strand of Islam and go to war with them. They will have their work cut out. The Britons who were killed yesterday in attacks across the Middle East died at the hands of very different people. The suicide bomber in Kabul was almost certainly sent on his mission by the Taliban, who are fundamentalist Sunni Muslims. The Taliban might not even recognise as Muslim the men, almost certainly Shia in the south of Iraq, who planted the roadside bomb that killed two British soldiers north of Basra. . . .

The real reason of the increasing violence in the Middle East is the return to imperial control and foreign occupation half a century after the European colonial empires were broken up. This is the fuel for Islamic militancy. This is why fanatical but isolated Islamic groups can suddenly win broader support. Governments allied to the US and Britain have no legitimacy. The attempts by America and Britain to crush Islamic militancy across the Middle East are making sure it will become stronger.

'EMPTY RHETORICAL PLATITUDES'

King George's latest bamboozlement coincided with release of the National Strategy for Combating Terrorism, which promises a strategy for combating international terrorism but merely offers bromides.

Worse yet, the report conflates all terrorist groups. Glenn Greenwald writes at Unclaimed Territory that:

By sloppily grouping in Hezbollah, Hamas and other Palestinian groups with Al Qaeda, there is clearly an attempt to conflate all of these groups together even though they have completely different aims. It may be true that Iran (and, as the report states, Syria) is involved in the "state sponsorship of international terrorism" -- but, for Iran and Syria, that terrorism is directed against Israel, not against the U.S. That may or may not be a distinction that matters to some people, but the factual lines should be not be allowed to be blurred this way, because that is exactly what allows war advocates to mislead people.

UPDATE ON RUMMY

The Democrats have been inept in going after King George on Iraq, but finally seem to have seized on an effective way of calling attention to Donald Rumsfeld, the architect of the war, in announcing that they will call for a no-confidence vote on the defense secretary in Congress.

This follows an over-the-top speech that Rumsfeld gave in Utah in which he compared war critics to appeasers of Nazism before World War II.

Republicans vow to block the vote and probably have the horses to do that, but the maneuvering may force some Republicans who face tough re-election fights to go public on where they stand on Rumsfeld and the war.

More here.