Accompanying the Pentagon in the staged end to the war is the ever reliable U.S. corporate media. A media blitz by NBC News captured the mass movement of troops. But using television propaganda is an unusual way to signal the end of a war. In less Orwellian times, a country wouldn't declare a war finished months in advance, the war would end when the losses suffered by that country were too great for it to continue any military operations. See: the last days in Saigon in 1975. See: The British in America in 1783.
So far, America hasn't proven military superiority in Iraq. The Iraqi Resistance is either busying getting paid off by America to perform some other task, or resting to fight another day. They will decide when the war ends, and when America finally leaves. Washington's imperial arrogance will be checked one way or another.
The entire coverage of the Iraq War, from the first days of Shock & Awe, to today, is nothing short of an Orwellian nightmare. It's not that hard to keep aware of that fact, as we are reminded of it every day, and on some days more than others. The fact that the Iraq War has not ended but is claimed by U.S. political and military leaders to have ended is further proof of just how much the U.S. system is capable of lying. If people are not convinced that something is fishy about the official 9/11 story after hearing the public declaration by the U.S. government that the "Iraq War is over" then they will never be convinced. They will forever be attached to government leaders. Their gullibility will last way beyond to the end of the story - right up to the point of when the entire theater collapses, and every actor on the stage vanishes, or dies.
It is said a thousand times, but it needs to be repeated a thousand more times, that Orwell warned of our predicament with extraordinary insight in the middle of the last century. In 1942 he said; "If the Leader says of such and such an event, 'It never happened' - well, it never happened. If he says that two and two are five - well, two and two are five." Orwell said that this form of domination frightened him "much more than bombs." The destruction from is evident, nobody can miss it, but thought destruction is on another level of power. All states can control their populations with tanks, and goons, but it requires great technical expertise to control populations with language, media propaganda, and thought suppression. The American state has mastered the art of lying, and the American people have mastered the art of not seeing lies.
We don't have to look far into the past to retrieve official government statements that shows us what Orwell was talking about. There are many examples of "two and two are five" in the spin about the end of the Iraq war. P.J. Crowley, a spokesman for the State Department told MSNBC that, "We are ending the war ... but we are not ending our work in Iraq. We have a long-term commitment to Iraq."
America's "long-term commitment" to Iraq is like a serial murderer's commitment to a prized victim. Arthur Silber breaks down the U.S. government's relationship to the people of Afghanistan and Iraq, and the criminal logic behind all U.S. foreign policy in his essay, "The Missing Moral Center: Murdering the Innocent":
"If you have ever wondered how a serial murderer -- a murderer who is sane and fully aware of the acts he has committed -- can remain steadfastly convinced of his own moral superiority and show not even the slightest glimmer of remorse, you should not wonder any longer.No military leader worth his salt would've supported the Iraq war, or the war in Afghanistan. There can be no "military success" in either places because both military missions are not designed to defeat a beatable enemy. Even worse, both are crimes under international law. The best thing that can happen is immediate withdrawal by the U.S. military from the entire Middle East. And for that to be possible, the narrative about the "war on terror" needs to be turned on its head, and the truth about 9/11 exposed.
The United States government is such a murderer. It conducts its murders in full view of the entire world. It even boasts of them. Our government, and all our leading commentators, still maintain that the end justifies the means -- and that even the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocents is of no moral consequence, provided a sufficient number of people can delude themselves into believing the final result is a "success."
The characters behind the War on Terror have unattainable imperial objectives in mind. They conveniently label any resistance to their power as "terrorists," and "extremists." James Jay Carafano, a member of the Heritage Foundation, a neocon think tank, and author of, "Winning the Long War: Lessons from the Cold War for Defeating Terrorism and Preserving Freedom," has said that; "Transnational terrorism is the problem of the 21st century." If we go by his reasoning, and apply his solutions to the manufactured crisis of terrorism, then entire pockets of this beautiful planet will turn into big military-camps operated by the Pentagon.
In the "long war," the Middle East will be under U.S. military occupation for the foreseeable future, Americans will continue to be controlled by a police state owned by the U.S. plutocracy, and the state of international tension will crush any hope for a thriving global economy. Gen. John P. Abizaid, former Commander of U.S. Central Command, coined the term "long war," in 2004. It was quickly picked up by Bush administration officials, and the President used it in his State of the Union speech, saying, "our own generation is in a long war against a determined enemy."
Political activist Tom Hayden highlighted the incredible hubris of those few in the military establishment who think that it is right to fight a war with literally no end in sight in his LA Times article from March, 2010 called, "The 'Long War' quagmire." Hayden writes:
"Without public debate and without congressional hearings, a segment of the Pentagon and fellow travelers have embraced a doctrine known as the Long War, which projects an "arc of instability" caused by insurgent groups from Europe to South Asia that will last between 50 and 80 years. According to one of its architects, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan are just "small wars in the midst of a big one."
Consider the audacity of such an idea. An 80-year undeclared war would entangle 20 future presidential terms stretching far into the future of voters not yet born. The American death toll in Iraq and Afghanistan now approaches 5,000, with the number of wounded a multiple many times greater. Including the American dead from 9/11, that's 8,000 dead so far in the first decade of the Long War. And if the American armed forces are stretched thin today, try to conceive of seven more decades of combat."
Professor Andrew Bacevich has been one of the biggest critics of the Long War concept. In 2008, he wrote; "Bluntly, the Long War has proved to be a monumental flop." Considering the death of more than a million people, including 5,000 American soldiers, Bacevich should've said "crime" instead of "flop." It is a great mistake to minimize the guilt of the evil characters who created the War on Terror.
Towards the end of his article, Hayden says that the Long War must be critically examined by the media, the Congress, and the American people:
The vulgarity of the Long War is unmatched by any previous war in history. It is sheltered by clever lies. Men and women are dying for no reason in this war. Absolutely none. They are being wasted every single day. It hurts to think about it. I get so mad that I want to rip out Cheney's heart, and force-feed it to Bush so I can watch him choke on it."It's time the Long War strategy was put under a microscope and made the focus of congressional hearings and media scrutiny. The American people deserve a voice in the strategizing that will affect their future and that of their grandchildren. There are at least three important questions to address in public forums:
* What is the role of the Long War idea in United States' policy now? Can the Pentagon or president impose such war-making decisions without debate and congressional ratification?
* Who exactly is the enemy in a Long War? Is Al Qaeda (or "Islamic fundamentalism") considered to be a unitary enemy like the "international communist conspiracy" was supposed to be? Can a Long War be waged with only a blanket authorization against every decentralized group lodged in countries from Europe to South Asia?
* Above all, what will a Long War cost in terms of American tax dollars, American lives and American respect in the world? Is it sustainable? If not, what are the alternatives?"
In a year, or two, there could be another front in the Long War. If we do not stop this madness now, then we will surely regret it.
