Joint Chiefs say Bush wrong on Iraq troop surge

Remember Gen. Ripper in DR STRANGELOVE, the crazy general who wanted to start a nuclear war? There has been a persistent theme in our popular culture about the trigger happy general, and there certainly have been cases of generals giving epically bad advice particularly in dealing with Cuba that could have started World War III. Most of the time though, the military itself has been apolitical and does the bidding of the guys in suits in Washington whose cronies are itching to fill their pockets with assets stolen on the public's dime, as Marine Corps general and double Medal of Honor winner Smedley Butler famously pointed out.

Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few – the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill.
http://www.hackvan.com/pub/stig/anti-govt/war-is-a-racket.htm

Today we are seeing the exact opposite of the STRANGELOVIAN stereotype--the itchy trigger fingers are in the White House, and the military is the voice of reason and is actually closer to the public consensus than our supposed representative in the White House and even closer to the public than Democratic leader Harry Reid who supports the idea of sending MORE troops to Iraq. Something similar happened in South America. For decades if not longer, their military supported the interests of the business community no matter what. If an election produced a government that discomfited business, the military would simply end democracy until the people were "mature" enough to handle it. Now most prominently in Venezuela, their militaries have gotten sick of being the Pinochet-like thugs who kill their own people to benefit a very few, and when the local and international financial elite wanted to remove Hugo Chavez, who got overwhelming majorities in a couple of internationally-monitored elections, the majority of the military stayed loyal to Chavez and the democratic will of the people and reversed the coup as it was happening.

It is a measure of the corruption and weakness of our democracy that our unelected military is more in tune with voters and reality than their elected civilian bosses. We need serious, fundamental change to our system and if the Democrats don't take aggressive, concrete steps toward that in the next two years instead of simply being the business party without religious nuts, the American people will do to Washington what Washington has been doing to us so openly the last six years.


KEY EXCERPTS:

washingtonpost.com

White House, Joint Chiefs At Odds on Adding Troops

By Robin Wright and Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, December 19, 2006; A01

The Bush administration is split over the idea of a surge in troops to Iraq, with White House officials aggressively promoting the concept over the unanimous disagreement of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, according to U.S. officials familiar with the intense debate.

***

At regular interagency meetings and in briefing President Bush last week, the Pentagon has warned that any short-term mission may only set up the United States for bigger problems when it ends. The service chiefs have warned that a short-term mission could give an enormous edge to virtually all the armed factions in Iraq -- including al-Qaeda's foreign fighters, Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias -- without giving an enduring boost to the U.S military mission or to the Iraqi army, the officials said.

The Pentagon has cautioned that a modest surge could lead to more attacks by al-Qaeda, provide more targets for Sunni insurgents and fuel the jihadist appeal for more foreign fighters to flock to Iraq to attack U.S. troops, the officials said.

The informal but well-armed Shiite militias, the Joint Chiefs have also warned, may simply melt back into society during a U.S. surge and wait until the troops are withdrawn -- then reemerge and retake the streets of Baghdad and other cities.

Even the announcement of a time frame and mission -- such as for six months to try to secure volatile Baghdad -- could play to armed factions by allowing them to game out the new U.S. strategy, the chiefs have warned the White House.

FULL TEXT:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/18/AR2006121801477.html



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president george w bush pentagon generals iraq war smedley butler dr strangelove oil hugo chavezcoup venezuela occupation chamber of commerce neoliberalism northwoods worst president ever

LETTER TO DEM: Iraq War & business first foreign policy

I got a nice campaign letter from Barbara Ann Radnofsky entitled "No More Iraqs," which was good as far as it went, but failed to get to the heart of the problem. My letter isn't meant as a criticism of her, but as a call for a real re-assessment of the core of our foreign policy that few Democrats seem willing to do (Byron Dorgan and a few others excepted).

Dear Ms. Radnofsky,

Thank you for the email on parallels to Vietnam, but in the case of Iraq, there is an even bigger issue than response to strategic threats, particularly since the Bush administration knowingly exaggerated the threat Iraq would pose to us even if they did have nukes. The issue is how much corporate and financial interests dictate our foreign policy, often to the detriment of the safety of the American people since it incites such resentment in the countries these policies target.

In the case of Iraq, the business interest was oil. Bush cancelled Iraq's oil contracts with Russia, France, and others and gave them to American corporations. Gen. Jay Garner the first guy we sent over to run Iraq said seizing the oil and the radical privatization of their economy would incite an insurgency. He was right, and immediately fired.

Saddam was a bad guy, but this business first approach also trumps democracy when democracy doesn't produce the results business likes. Bush vetoed the Iraqi parliament's first choice for prime minister, and backed a recall and even coup against Hugo Chavez, who has been elected and re-elected by wide majorities with international election monitors watching (in stark contrast to our own presidential elections). Chavez' primary sin seems to be driving a hard bargain with the oil companies and having the audacity to ask for the same royalties on his oil that the US gets on our oil--about 13-16%, and is actually using some of the money to improve the lives of his citizens. Far from suppressing freedom, I heard him take a question from a reporter whose paper's owner backed the coup against him. In the US, a reporter like Helen Thomas who merely says something critical about the president is ignored for years and in the case of Dan Rather, literally run out of his job.

Chavez is likewise popular in the rest of South America because our pro-corporate, pro-banking foreign policy, neoliberalism, has had such brutal effects there.

I like capitalism. I think I have better tennis shoes and computers because of it. But our foreign policy is not merely promoting capitalism, but giving a structural advantage to a few at the expense of the rest of the world and the average American.

If we stopped invading countries that elected leaders who stand up for their people, and stopped writing trade agreements that make the poor poorer, and create a race to the bottom for the lowest wages which is sucking American jobs out of the country, wages here would stabilize because they would be doing the same elsewhere. If we allowed people to choose their own government (without our troops guns in their faces or expectation of a military coup if they make the "wrong" choice) and run their own economies, they will be less likely to become terrorists who want to fly planes into our buildings.

The past few years it has become painfully clear that even our own democracy takes a back seat when oil companies see a prize like Iraq's trillions of dollars worth of oil. If the true goal of ensuring the profits from that oil went to American corporations were presented honestly to the American people, stripped of any talk of WMD, terrorist boogey men, spreading democracy, or even the less embarrassing lie that we need to invade to get access to the oil (which can be done far more cheaply through negotiating contracts as China and other countries are doing) few Americans would support the war apart from major shareholders in oil companies.

If the Democrats take over Congress, it would be nice if they changed things so the worst criticisms of our foreign policy are no longer true.

Links to sources on Iraq's oil & neoliberalism:
http://professorsmartass.blogspot.com/2006/09/iraq-oil-war-resources.html








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