USA ends its combat Mission in Iraq: Lessons and Implications.

by Dr Rifai Naleemi from London.

(September 04, London, Sri Lanka Guardian) USA has ended its combat mission in Iraq on 31/08/2010 and what are the achievements and benefits of this mission. Has it gained any thing out of this mission? What is the cost of this mission? Does this mission give any credit to united state’s foreign policy? These questions have been debated in the western Medias in recent days. People are divided in their opinions about this invasion and revealing fact is that majority of public are against this invasion in the west. People vehemently rejected western politicians’ justification for this war. Against the wishes of people USA and its allies went to war and what they have achieved is distraction and political misjudgement. War was a way of life in olden ages. Empires constantly engaged in wars for survival and history teaches us that until modern time Kings and Queens constantly engaged in ruthless wars fro their survival. From Stone Age unto modern time we have seen many disastrous wars. It is sad that western leaders with modern technological advancements in weaponry still inherent this sense of war mongering. Recent conflicts and wars justify this position.

What is the cost of Iraq invasion? US invaded Iraq in 2003 and since then USA has lost 4:400 soldiers and more than 34.000 soldiers are wounded and trillions of dollars are spent on this war. USA allies have also lost hundreds of soldiers and thousands of their soldiers were wounded. This is as far as USA and its allies are concerned. What about Iraq. More than 200.000 thousands Iraqis lost their life and more than 400.000 thousands people in Iraq wounded and what more is that more than two millions people are displaced. Most of them migrated from Iraq and now live in various countries. Iraq was one of most advanced countries in the Middle East. It was rich in human and natural resources. It had more academic and professional people than any other Middle East countries. Now most of academia and professional people have either left the countries or most of them are killed. It had a large number of highly qualified Islamic scholars and now most of them are killed or left the country .Iraq had stable government under Sadam’s dictatorship. He unified the country with its all different tribal and ethical groups. He controlled all insurgencies in the country and now Iraq does not have a strong Government even after elections. Politicians are divided in Iraq. There is a political vacuum in Iraq and any time political situation could deteriorate in Iraq. Future of Iraq is very much shaky and its people are divided politically, religiously, ideologically and ethnically. What will happen is every one’s guess. No one can predict any thing about this mess and chaos to come in Iraq. Moreover, military leadership waned American any rush military withdrawal of US forces could lead to chaos in Iraq and yet against this advice US rushed through its withdrawal plan and indeed, completed its combat mission. It has nearly 50. 000 forces in Iraq and it is unlikely that they will engage in any fighting once again. Against all this background let us see what World political leaders say about this invasion. Obama says that “Operation Iraq freedom is over and we met our responsibilities”. He further notes that Iraq people have to take responsibility for the security of their country. Ironically Tony Blair published his memoirs on the same day USA ends its combat mission in Iraq and he notes that he does not have any remorse or regret over Iraq war. These two leaders know well that Iraq invasion is a failure but they do have not courage and political will to accept that failure. Rather than accepting their misjudgement and political incorrectness they make all sorts of excuses for their actions. They should set good examples by accepting their mistakes and at least future politicians will learned a lesson from that. They will never accept their mistake and misjudgement for fear of repercussions.

One of the reasons for this sudden withdrawal is that US can not afford to maintain war machine in Iraq: it cost them millions of dollars every moth. So far it is reported 1.5 millions people have served in Iraq: if they continue to stay it Iraq it could cost them billions of dollars but they can not afford to do that forever. Economic lost of this war is huge: It is true that US has gained some economic benefits out of this war from reconstructions and oil yet in long term they need a lot of money and human resource to sustain this war. Moreover, support to this war is receding day by day in western nations: People do not want war they want peace in the world: During the anti war demonstration in London millions of people gathered in central London to protect against this war. It should be mentioned here that there is clear cut difference between opinions of politicians and Public on this matters: Late Robin Cook and many other politicians openly opposed Iraq invasions yet, due to political misjudgement labour Government in the UK went to war alongside US.

All rationales and logical reasons to go to war are unjustified. They argued that Sadam had weapons of mass destruction but they could trace any such weapons in Iraq and this is the first and foremost fabrication. Secondly they argued that Sadam collaborated with Bin Laden but they could not establish any link between Sadam and Bin Laden. They argued that Iraq is breeding ground for al-Qaida yet they could not completely wipe out them from Iraq. All other reasons for war are not justifiable at all yet they went to war without heeding to advice of experts of UN. Now they created anarchy and chaos in Iraq. Yet they do not want to take any responsibilities for this mess. What will happen in Iraq next once all Americans are out of the country? It could become one more Somalia of Middle East or social unrest and internal fighting could go for many years to come. Or Shia and Sunni fighting could erupt and it could go for many years. Moreover, one could see Iranian Influence in Iraq after withdrawal of Americans. Unlike Saudi Government Shia Iranian government is ideological and politically active and religiously zealous government. It could greatly influence its power not only in Iraq beyond its borders. This could trigger wider Shia and Sunni conflict in the region. It has been going on for many years but with American withdrawal Shia may wake up again in the region. I could argue one of the beneficiaries of this conflict is Iranians: American Liberated for them the Shrine of Imam Husain and other sacred places in Iraq. Iraq can be divided into three territories between Kurdish in the North and Sunnis and Shias in the south. Even it is not surprising If Iran eventually try to annex some parts of Iraq with Iran: It is one of possibilities in this conflict and No one can predict future and yet one could consider such possibilities. May be otherwise, Iraq needs a Man with calibre of Sadam to control Iraq and build Iraq once again? They have killed one Sadam but hundreds of Sadams may emerge in Iraq in next few years. Once G.Bush said world without Sadam would be better place and ironically Iraq without Sadam is not a better place as it was before. Ironically people argued that World without G.Bush would be better and safer place because he created most of the chaos in modern world. USA wanted to replace democracy in place of dictatorship in Iraq but instead of democracy they gave Iraqi people hell of anarchism and mayhem. One of the unfortunate realities of world politics is that world leaders do not have courage and guts to stand up against USA’s policy in the world today: No nation or No leader wants to stand up against US for fears of enormous US influence in the world today. Cuba leader and Malaysian leader did try to stand up against US but they could do little in front of huge American hegemony. All Arab and Muslims leaders have become political servants of US in modern world.

It is true that Sadam made many mistakes during his time. He killed thousands of innocent people and He murdered many scholars and scientists in the country and he invaded Kuwait and he made many mistakes but yet he is lesser of two evils compared to the situation of Iraq now. It is said he was initially created and trained by CIA and ironically he was hunted by FBI. It is true that Sadam invaded a country in his life time but UAS has invaded many countries but no one has courage to question it. It has invaded Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan and many other countries yet No one can Question it. It is true that Sadam invaded Kuwait but Israel has invaded four surrounding countries yet no one has courage to question its actions. This is a double standard of western nations: Notions of democracy, human rights and justice have been discriminately applied to countries to countries in the interest of western nations. Irony is that UAS and other western nations use UN and other international organizations to serve their national interests at the expense of other nations’ interests. In many occasions veto power is used to protect national interest of these countries and therefore one can say that we live in a self contradictory world. Western Nations are secular nations and they do not have any permanent friends or permanent enemies and as it is said that they only have permanent interests: They do whatever they could to protect their interests. This is what happened in case of Iraq: Its all about their national interests. It is their national interests that matters most: to achieve their national interests they dare to do whatever they want. This is the bottom-line of all about these wars. They do not care about innocent life and they do not care about invading and destroying other countries.

One question always comes to my mind. Will innocent people who are killed in these wars get justice one day? Will culprits of war crimes in all international wars get their punishment one day? Innocent people are being killed in this world without any reasons and yet they do not get justice in this world. Do not they deserve justice one day? But one thing is sure that people who make corruptions and mischief in this world may escape from worldly punishment in this temporal world yet they will definitely see consequences of their action one day: Holy Quran says “His effort in the land is to make mischief in the land and to destroy the crops and cattle, and God does likes not mischief and when it is said to him “Fear God” he is led by arrogance to more crime. So enough for him is Hell and worst indeed is that place to rest”. It is sad that when human beings are vested with power they forget all about their humanism and behave like totalitarian kings. In case of Iraq invasion US has behaved like a king in the world and it bypassed all UN resolutions and ignored outcry of international communities. It should take the responsibility for this mess and make public apology for the people of Iraq for its failure to bring law and order in the country: Moreover, US is legally obliged to support Iraq to rebuild it once again and moreover it would be moral duty of US to help Iraq people for its failure to bring peace and stability in the country. US may have learned many lessons from this war. That is why it has already considered withdrawing its forces from Afghanistan as well. War on terror gives huge economic burdens to these countries and what they need now is words of diplomacy and intelligence to enhance peace and harmony in the world today.