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Pandora’s Box Opened in Iraq: Looking Backward, Forward, And
Beyond
By Daniel Jordan and Neil Wollman
02/21/06 "ICH"
-- -- “She opened it and out flew all the
terrible things like greed and envy, hatred and cruelty, poverty
and hunger, sickness and despair, and more .. .”
The fable of Pandora’s Box applies well to Iraq. War supporters
wish us to judge the invasion and war on the removal of the
brutal Saddam Hussein. A broad up-to-date analysis yields a
disturbingly more negative assessment, with implications
reaching far into the future.
Are the Iraqi people better off today? No. A 2004 Lancet study
based on U.S. approved research methods puts the war’s Iraqi
death toll at 100,000. However, Johns Hopkins epidemiologist Les
Roberts, who led the study, said that the results were based on
“conservative assumptions.” Deaths increased 1.5 times since the
invasion, mostly among women and children, and caused by diverse
factors, like U.S. air strikes and military interventions,
devastated water and health care systems, and militia or death
squad activities. International news sources cite studies
pointing “to about 250,000 excess deaths since the outbreak of
the U.S.-led war" when deaths in Falluja are included.
Surviving Iraqis confront multiplying tragedies: Poverty rose to
20%; A year-old UN report shows childhood malnutrition doubled;
Minority Rights Group International cites Iraq as the country
where minority rights are most under threat; the brain-drain of
professionals leaving Iraq takes away its future; a rampant
"kidnap-and-ransom" industry complicates security; inflation is
skyrocketing; the U.S. backed Iraqi constitution privatizes
State industries, expatriating profits into Western pockets; and
the budget for the highly touted U.S. Iraqi reconstruction has
dried up. Iraq is a deadly mess.
Even if Iraq overcomes internal maladies, effects reaching
beyond its borders make this war a disaster for the world and
the U.S.
Is the world (including the U.S.) safer? No. Ethnic cleansing in
Iraq is pushing the country closer to civil war, risking chaos
in the region. The International Institute for Strategic Studies
(London) stated “al-Qaeda's recruitment and fundraising was
greatly boosted by the U.S. invasion of Iraq.” Militants
expanded their influence across the region, be it the Muslim
Brotherhood in Egypt, the growing militant threat on Pakistan's
border with Afghanistan (New York Times), increased al-Qaeda
influence in Afghanistan (noted by its Defense Minister), the
recent success by Hamas in Palestine, and the hard-liners in
Iran (now also influencing Iraq).
Iraq is now a breeding ground for terrorism. An embarrassed
State Department discontinued its annual terrorism report
because international terrorist attacks are at the highest level
since the first report in 1984. The U.S. sponsored National
Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism counted 3,991
global terrorist attacks in 2005, up 51% from 2,639 in 2004.
Ironically, a war intended to produce freedom has, according to
Amnesty International, lead to an increase in worldwide human
rights violations. Tyrants can legitimately argue that since the
U.S. waged pre-emptive war, so can they. In 2003, North Korea
stated “preemptive attacks are not the exclusive right of the
U.S.”
U.S. foreign policy has also suffered, with our reputation at an
all time low. We found no WMDs. We just heard from a former CIA
chief for the Middle East that the Administration “cherry-
picked“ pre-war intelligence. Britain’s Downing Street memo
stated that U.S. “intelligence and facts were being fixed around
the policy” of invasion. Western Alliances are in tatters, while
our self-declared “New American Century” has us creating a world
empire, with Iraq being the first step.
John McCain understands that torturing Iraqi prisoners puts our
soldiers (and even vacationing citizens) at greater risk.
Besides the hazards of combat, American military members are
also at risk from health impacts caused by depleted uranium (a
UN declared WMD) and mental health disorders (with 100,000 such
diagnoses).
Domestically, the war has polarized the American public. Privacy
and democracy have also suffered In this so-called "War on
Terror," which the Administration irrelevantly centers In Iraq.
President Bush’s view of executive privilege makes Nixon’s
“Imperial Presidency” and COINTELPRO attacks on privacy and
democracy appear quaint. Language has devolved into Orwellian
lunacy with war opponents labeled traitors and the President and
media calling spying on American citizens a “terrorist
surveillance program.” Apparently everyone who questions
authority is a terrorist.
War expenses are diverting vast resources to corporate profits
under “starve the beast” economic policies that harm the needy
among us. Research by Nobel prize winner Joseph Stiglitz and
Linda Bilmes puts the eventual costs of the war at around two
trillion dollars. About $6,800 for every U.S. citizen is going
to corporations like Halliburton, whose stock and profits have
doubled since the war began.
This Pandora's Box has spread destruction around the world, and
the blowback will hit the U.S. We must demand our government
close this box and never open it again. We must call our
government, and ourselves, to account and understand that just
as empires rise, they also fall, brought down by their own
hubris. It is time to admit mistakes and ask the world to work
with us to rectify them.
Daniel Jordan, PhD; Instructor, Ventura College and research
consultant.
drdanj@adelphia.net. Neil Wollman; Ph. D.; Senior Fellow,
Peace Studies Institute; Professor of Psychology; Manchester
College, North Manchester, IN 46962;
njwollman@manchester.edu
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