About 200 protesters gathered outside the American Petroleum Institute headquarters in Washington Wednesday, March 19, some carrying signs reading "No Blood for Oil."
Wednesday was the fifth anniversary of the start of the war in Iraq. Close to 4,000 US troops have been killed, more than 29,000 wounded, and tens of thousand Iraqi civilians have been killed. [Four US soldiers were killed March 23, bringing the total to 4,000]. The Pentagon says the direct financial cost of military operations thus far is $600 billion. Other estimates put the ultimate cost of the war at $2 trillion or more. Among the many self-serving calculations by administration officials was former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld's estimate that the war would cost the US $50-60 billion.
"Beyond that, there are a million or more Iraqis living as refugees in neighboring Arab countries, and the pitiful toll of fear and deprivation on Iraqi streets," wrote John Burns, of the New York Times, who reported from Iraq for five years. "At the fifth anniversary, the conflict's staggering burden is a rebuke to any who hoped [Saddam Hussein's] removal might be accomplished at acceptable cost."
The Bush administration's stated justification for war was to rid Iraq of a brutal dictator, and to plant the seeds of democracy in Iraq that would flower and spread throughout the Middle East. Well, Saddam is gone...
But was this a "war for oil?" The administration keeps its secrets, and it will likely be many years -- long after the responsible parties have passed from the scene -- before historians and journalists gain access to the documents, minutes of meetings and email exchanges that drove the administration's war-making decisions.
Steven Mufson, writing in the Washington Post, cites two conspiracy theories:
--President Bush and Vice President Cheney "wanted to help their friends in the oil world. They sought to install a pro-Western government that would invite the major oil companies into Iraq."
--A "neo-conservative cabal" with the goal of ramping up Iraqi production and driving the price down to $15/barrel. That would stimulate the US economy, finally destroy OPEC, and wreck the economies of rogue states such as Iran and Venezuela.
Conspiracy theories aside, Mufson notes that the war failed to boost Iraq production, and in the absence of Iraqi supplies prices soared-three-and-a-half fold since the US invasion. The profits of the five biggest Western oil companies jumped from $40 billion to $121 billion; and while the US rid itself of Saddam Hussein, "oil revenues have filled the treasuries of petro-autocrats in Iran, Venezuela and Russia, emboldening those regimes and complicating US diplomacy in new ways," Mufson writes.
Administration officials are confident in the belief that history will favorably judge them and their war. And few would argue against the ouster of Saddam and his murderous regime. However, after five years of bloodletting, sectarian violence, the establishment of an al-Qaeda terrorist network in Iraq, and the failures of Iraq's political leadership, the signs of progress amid the ruins are hardly commensurate with the price paid.
"It is small credit to the invasion, after all it has cost, that Iraqis should arrive at a point where all they want from America is a return to something, stability, that they had under Saddam," Burns wrote. "For America, too, it is a deeply dispiriting prospect, promising no early end to the bleeding in Iraq."
You falsely state, "The Bush administration's stated justification for war was to rid Iraq of a brutal dictator, and to plant the seeds of democracy in Iraq that would flower and spread throughout the Middle East. Well, Saddam is gone..." Bush and gang claimed that Iraq had WMD and was a danger to the USA. Later they changed the reason. Why are you dishonest about this? Amvet
I realized after posting the blog that I jumped ahead in the story. You're right, Hugh, first came the fiction about WMD. Thanks for pointing that out. And if Amvet means what I think it does, thank you for your service.