Rhetoric Kills, Observe. . .Specifically War Rhetoric from the White House.

De La Toore summarizes the situation in Iraq and refutes the Bush
administration's rhetoric. - Richard

COLUMN
Rhetoric Kills

Miguel De La Torre
06-30-06

Rhetoric kills--specifically the war rhetoric emerging from
Washington D.C. to justify the invasion of a country which posed no
strategic threat to the United States. As we prepare to celebrate
the 4th of July, we can expect many politicians to throw around
slogans like "fighting for freedom," "protecting our liberties"
or "freedom isn't free."

The awful truth is that at no time were our liberties here in the
U.S. ever threatened by the nation of Iraq. Even the most diehard
supporter of Bush's War has to realize what the present
administration has admitted--Iraq had no connection to the 9/11
terrorist attacks, and no weapons of mass destruction existed.

For a while we even floated the idea that Saddam Hussein was a
monster that murdered his own population, and for this reason, to
protect vulnerable innocent life, we had to step in and take him
out. And while no one argues Hussein's tyrannical, brutal and bloody
rule, the fact remains that 10 years of U.S. sanctions killed more
Iraqis than Hussein ever did.

So, help me understand, how do you convince an Iraqi mother who
watched her baby die of a preventable illness due to U.S. sanctions
that our present military presence is in fact noble?

How do you convince Iraqis of our good intentions in protecting
basic human rights after the revelation of U.S. death squads killing
unarmed civilians, including women and children, in Hamdania and
Haditha came to light?

How can we claim any moral authority to teach Iraqis about securing
individual liberties after the exposure that torture was
systematically utilized by U.S. military personnel in prisons like
Abu Ghraib and Camp Nama?

Only rhetoric can gloss over the inconvenient truth about our
presence in Iraq.

Our rhetoric may not work in Iraq, but it surely works at the home
front. Nevertheless, rhetoric about the price of protecting our
freedoms, freedoms that were never threatened by Iraq, has only
brought early death to many of our nation's best and brightest who
exchanged life for romantic and misguided notions of patriotism.
They marched to war believing the rhetoric, fighting and dying in
vain. There is something morally reprehensible about asking our
young to die for empty slogans.

But aren't our troops bringing about democracy in Iraq? Isn't
democracy-building a tedious venture requiring great sacrifices?
Isn't the spilling of U.S. blood needed to water the seeds of
democracy in Iraq? Isn't this alone a noble reason to fight?

Claiming that the reason for the war is democracy building after the
original reasons to take up arms proved hollow is just as vacuous.
Iraqis determining their destiny through a democratic system is the
last thing the U.S. wants for Iraq. In fact, the U.S. will do
everything in its power to prevent open and fair elections from ever
taking place.

Why? Iraq's 60 percent Shiite majority has more in common with
Shiite Iran than the rest of the Sunni Arab region. Left to their
own devices, Iraq is more a natural religious ally with the anti-
Israel, anti-U.S. Iran. If an open and free election was held, Iraq
would cast their lot with Iran, forming a powerful counterbalance to
U.S. influence in the region. For this reason, Iraq can never be
allowed to determine its own destiny. Whatever democracy is
established must be a pro-U.S. corporation, and pro-Israel
democracy, whether the people want it or not.

To convince an American public who have a sense of their own
goodness that an aggressive war against a people who were never a
threat against us requires the misappropriation of rhetorical
phrases.

Bringing "stability" to the region really means establishing
security for U.S. companies, i.e. Halliburton and Bechtel, to profit
obscenely. Establishing "freedom" does not mean freedom to determine
one's destiny but the freedom of Iraqi markets to be penetrated by
U.S. corporations. Protecting our "national security" is coded
language for keeping open our access to Iraqi oil.

"Terrorist" or "supporters of terrorists" is understood to be anyone
who questions the U.S. political and economic hegemony. The previous
generation called them "communists."

And "fighting the war against terrorism" becomes cover for the
government participating in activities that undermine the same basic
freedoms we claim we are fighting for. Such activities include
illegal wiretapping, surveillance, and more recently, obtaining of
bank records.

But what if Iraq did have weapons of mass destruction? Wouldn't the
war have been worth it?

One thing is clear; the U.S. government knew Iraq had neither
weapons of mass destruction nor a delivery system for those weapons
prior to the invasion. In fact, it is precisely because they lacked
any form of defense that we invaded. If indeed they had such
weapons, or if we truly suspected that they were armed, we would
have never invaded.

How can we be sure of this? Look toward the other two members of the
so-called "axis of evil." Both Iran and North Korea do have weapons
of mass destruction, a powerful deterrent to U.S. invading those
countries. This is why we have done absolutely nothing except try to
find a diplomatic solution through compromises. If these countries
did not have weapons to deter our military, they would have by now
been invaded under the same precepts used to invade Iraq.

What then is the dangerous lesson learned by small countries who are
defensive before the military might of a rogue superpower? Quickly
obtain weapons of mass destruction for defensive purposes. Invading
Iraq has made the world more dangerous, in spite of all the rhetoric
to the contrary.

Miguel A. De La Torre is director of the Justice & Peace Institute
and associate professor of social ethics at Iliff School of Theology
in Denver.

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