Denver was buried under a few feet of snow in a blizzard that shut the city down for a few days. The restaurant that I worked at through college and a couple of years beyond was open, though. Cabin fever, hunger, and beer inspired me to traverse the white landscape and walk to Reiver's. When I arrived, Reiver's was hopping, having a record day since few places were open, and not having to work the following day was a foregone conclusion for many. I had eaten my dinner and was working on a beer when the music was abruptly shut off and the TVs were turned up. George W. Bush occupied the screens, one American flag on his lapel, another behind a picture of his daughters. He began:
My fellow citizens, at this hour, American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq, to free its people, and to defend the world from grave danger.
On my orders, coalition forces have begun striking selected targets of military importance to undermine Saddam Hussein's ability to wage war... (read the rest of the speech
here)
The bar erupted in cheers. My heart dropped to the pit of my stomach. I knew I was right, Bush was wrong, and that the lead-up to war was a lie. Admittedly, I had come to believe that Iraq posessed WMD, which turned out to be false, but I knew that they posed no imminent threat to American security. I also knew that Iraq had nothing to do with the attacks of 9/11/01, a pairing Bush liked to make every chance he got. And ultimately, I knew that the war had begun, I was powerless against the machinations of war, and that being right was no comfort when the only certainties in the future were Iraqi civilian and American military deaths. I had no idea how many it would turn out to be, but one death is too many when predicated on a web of lies.
But the propaganda was well orchestrated and disseminated; so much so that there I was, sitting alone in a crowded bar that was electric with blood lust. Someone had to pay for 9/11, regardless of actual, you know, involvement.
So five years on and no end in sight. Baghdad is a dangerous, broken shell of the grand city it once was. Clean drinking water is a hot commodity, and electricity is available roughly one-quarter of the time. Nearly 4,000 American soldiers have died, and almost the same number of American children are being raised with one less parent due to this misguided, unnecessary war. At the same time, CBS news reported tonight that over 85,000 Iraqi civilians have died. While I'm sure that number is conservative, even if it isn't, what a heart wrenching number to ponder. Eighty-five thousand! Entire families wiped out; mothers, fathers, sons and daughters, cousins, aunts and uncles. And for what?
Thousands or millions have been displaced, moved out of their homes, neighborhoods, cities, and homeland. Fleeing the violence and lawlessness America unleashed on them in the name of "liberty", to Jordan, Syria, the EU, and some to the United States. Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds, who had a fragile truce under Saddam are now killing each other in droves when they aren't being adequately policed by American military forces.
"But the surge is working!"
Is it? Is it really? I suppose if you base your historical perspective on a year-to-year basis, yes, it is. Violence is down from a year ago. Bravo. The civil war is no longer boiling, just simmering. There's still violence, just
not as much.
And in the process, we've become torturers, rapists, murderers--all things George Bush derided Saddam Hussein and his sons for being. No, I haven't raped, tortured, or murdered any Iraqis with my own hands, but my government has generously done so in my absentia. Money has been taken out of American schools and the American economy to wage this war. Money has been taken out of the future of this country, and I still don't know what constitutes victory. Victory has been a moving, morphing goal from the outset--WMD, Democracy, Liberty, Saddam was a bad man. Now we're doing a good job when we aren't doing a bad job; our expectations have gotten so low that our former hope for a better, more prosperous beacon of liberty and Democracy in the Middle East has become, "well, it's not
technically a civil war."
And yet, the
victory drums beat on.
Five years on, and I'm still against this war. Five years later and I'm still powerless to reverse this tide. Five years have passed since I sat in that bar on that snowy day in Denver, and I would love to have been on the wrong side of the war debate this whole time. I would love to wake up tomorrow to Iraq being a democratic beacon of hope in the Middle East. I would love to be able to remember the Iraqis 'greeting us as liberators'. But the events of the past five years will not be silenced by pipe dreams, wishful thinking, and delusions. The events of the past five years, the nightmare that we can't seem to wake up from, happened whether we like it or not. This nightmare must end... we must end this war. The path to defeat is the one we've been on since March 19, 2003. We must change course drastically, immediately, and completely.
