The War Goes on Forever (repeated from April 24, 2007)

Paul Craig Roberts has long been critical of the bush regime. This piece was recently put up at the counterpunch web site. Roberts says it all, leaving me with nothing to add.

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As bad as it is, the situation [in Iraq] could suddenly become much worse. Those in charge of US policy want to expand their targets from Sunni insurgents to Shiite militias. US forces have been unable to prevail over a lightly armed insurgency drawn from 20% of the population. The Shiite population is three times larger. Moreover, Shiites control southern Iraq, the territory through which US supplies must pass from Kuwait to Baghdad. If the Bush administration manages to get itself at war with 80% of the Iraqi population, US troops could be cut off and destroyed.

How would an unstable egomaniac such as President Bush deal with the humiliation?

The US dollar, already under pressure from large and growing trade deficits, has lost more of its value to the Bush administration's dependence on foreign borrowing to finance its war. With foreigners accumulating huge annual sums in US denominated assets, the US dollar's reserve currency role is jeopardized. If the dollar loses its reserve currency role, foreigners will not finance our wars or our trade and budget deficits.

The risks of Bush's war both to Iraqis and Americans is out of proportion to any conceivable gains. The war is all cost and no benefit. Iraqis have been made massively insecure, and their country has undergone tremendous destruction and turned into a training ground for terrorists.

(MG) it is all cost to the "American people", with no benefit to the "American people" but it DID enable Bush to get re-elected in 2004, and it has filled the coffers of the Oil industry and the various components of the War Machine, and whole lot of bush family buddies have increased their net worth, directly as a result of the war.

The entire Middle East has been put at risk of Sunni-Shiite conflict. Muslim hostility to US puppet regimes in Egypt, Jordan, and Pakistan is rising. The Saudis have warned Washington that the Iraq war is causing the ground to shake beneath their feet.

Bush claims that he invaded Iraq because he so highly values democracy that he desired to establish one in Iraq as an example for other Middle Eastern countries to follow. However, what Bush has demonstrated to Muslims is that American democracy is unresponsive to citizens and voters. Bush has demonstrated to the world that the US government is controlled by a small oligopoly of vested interests, the public be damned. Democracy means a government that follows the will of the people. Bush is ignoring public opinion and has made it clear that he will continue the practice.

(MG) and he is starting to demonstrate to Americans that American democracy is unresponsive to citizens and voters.

Bush has shown the world that the only difference between American dictatorship and other dictatorships is that, for now, Americans are permitted to remove their dictator after his term is served.

(MG) And perhaps, insha Allah, Americans will be permitted to remove their dictator WHILE his term is served.