Last Straw

Saddam’s regime is on the brink, a joy­ous occa­sion to be sure, after years of tyranny, sup­por­ted by the U.S., UK and other West­ern gov­ern­ments while com­mit­ting his worst crimes, and then 12 years of sanc­tions, mak­ing his regime stronger and ordin­ary Iraqi people weaker. Sadly it means noth­ing to the thou­sands killed by U.S. and UK bomb­ing cam­paigns, the hun­dreds of thou­sands killed by sanc­tions and, if we take a curs­ory look at his­tory we know, des­pite what you’ll be told by cor­por­ate media, that it doesn’t mean much for the future of those left alive either.

Since the Second World War the United States Gov­ern­ment has bombed 21 coun­tries. None of these bomb­ing cam­paigns led to the estab­lish­ment of humane demo­cra­cies in the coun­tries involved. What most of them did lead to was the crush­ing of any semb­lance of a chal­lenge to North Amer­ican dom­in­ance and cap­it­al­ism, and demo­cracy in most cases.

• China (1945 – 46 & 1950 – 53)
• Korea (1950 – 53)
• Guatem­ala (1954, 1960, 1967 – 69)
• Indone­sia (1958)
• Cuba (1959 – 61)
• Congo (1964)
• Peru (1965)
• Laos (1964 – 73)
• Viet­nam (1961 – 73)
• Cam­bodia (1969 – 70)
• Lebanon (1983 – 84)
• Gren­ada (1983)
• Libya (1986)
• El Sal­vador (right through the 1980s)
• Nicaragua (right through the 1980s)
• Panama (1989)
• Bos­nia (1995)
• Iraq (1991 – 2003)
• Sudan (1998)
• Former Yugoslavia (1999)
• Afgh­anistan (2001 – 02)

How many more are they plan­ning to bomb? Bush’s advisers say Iraq is just a “battle in the wider war.” They have named North Korea, Iran, and even Syria, Cuba and Libya as pos­sible future tar­gets. They call it a war without end.

The images you see on your TV will sub­side. The people cel­eb­rat­ing on your screens, mostly of the Shiite major­ity will be for­got­ten just as those in Afgh­anistan and many other coun­tries have been for­got­ten, while the U.S. Gov­ern­ment moves onto the next tar­get. The U.S. Gov­ern­ment won’t for a minute enter­tain the idea of Shiite (Islamic) self-determination in Iraq. Pre­pare now for the install­a­tion of a U.S. pup­pet regime in place to ensure demo­cracy does not ensue, to ensure “unin­ter­rup­ted, secure U.S./Allied access to Gulf oil.” Pre­pare now for U.S. mil­it­ary occu­pa­tion. Pre­pare now for U.S. Evan­gel­ical Chris­tian mis­sion­ar­ies (“relief work­ers”). Pre­pare now for asset strip­ping of oil reserves by U.S. cor­por­a­tions and luc­rat­ive recon­struc­tion con­tracts awar­ded to U.S. cor­por­a­tions, all of which have close ties to the U.S. Gov­ern­ment. Pre­pare now for Iraqi res­ist­ance to U.S. occupation.

The Star-Spangled Blind­fold draped over the head of a Sad­dam Hus­sein statue by a young U.S. mar­ine pretty much sums up the hid­den imper­ial nature of North Amer­ican motives. Pre­pare now for the next tar­get. What will the pre­text be? Another ter­ror­ist attack?

The les­son learnt by those on the U.S. Gov­ern­ment hit list? Arm your­self and arm your­self to the hilt with nuc­lear weapons because — judging by the dif­fer­ent ways in which North Korea and Iraq have been dealt with — that’s, iron­ic­ally, the only way you might avoid a U.S. lead inva­sion in the short term.

External links:

• U.S. Mil­it­ary Occu­pa­tion and Iraqi Resistance

14 “endur­ing bases” set in Iraq | 23 March, 2004
Wiki­pe­dia: Iraqi res­ist­ance
Wiki­pe­dia: Islamic Front of Iraqi Res­ist­ance

• U.S. Reli­gious Occu­pa­tion and Zealotory

Iraqi pat­ri­arch slams US evan­gel­ic­als | 21 May, 2005

• Iraqi Death Toll

Study Claims Iraq’s ‘Excess’ Death Toll Has Reached 655 000 | 11 Octo­ber, 2006
Co-Author of Med­ical Study Estim­at­ing 650,000 Iraqi Deaths Defends Research in the Face of White House Dis­missal | 12 Octo­ber, 2006

• U.S. Eco­nomic Occu­pa­tion & Thievery

Eco­nomic Occu­pa­tion: The World Bank and IMF in Iraq | 17 March, 2006
Iraq for Sale: The War Prof­it­eers | A Robert Gre­en­wald film
Oily Truth Emerges in Iraq | 23 Feb­ru­ary, 2007

Under the pro­posed law, Iraq’s immense oil reserves would not simply be opened to for­eign oil explor­a­tion, as many had expec­ted. Amaz­ingly, exec­ut­ives from those com­pan­ies would actu­ally be given seats on a new Fed­eral Oil and Gas Coun­cil that would con­trol all of Iraq’s reserves.

Oil Grab in Iraq | 22 Feb­ru­ary, 2007

While debate rages in the United States about the mil­it­ary in Iraq, an equally import­ant decision is being made inside of Iraq — the future of Iraq’s oil. A new Iraqi law pro­poses to open the country’s cur­rently nation­al­ized oil sys­tem to for­eign cor­por­ate con­trol. But emblem­atic of the flawed pro­mo­tion of “democracy” by the Bush admin­is­tra­tion, this new law is news to most Iraqi politicians.

What Con­gress Really Approved: Bench­mark No. 1: Privat­iz­ing Iraq’s Oil for US Com­pan­ies | 26 May, 2007

Now they have Con­gress black­mail­ing the Iraqi Par­lia­ment and the Iraqi people: no privat­iz­a­tion of Iraqi oil, no recon­struc­tion funds.