DEEP REASONS AND OTHER REASONS FOR BUSH'S WAR ON IRAQ

DEEP REASONS AND OTHER REASONS FOR BUSH'S WAR ON IRAQ
SOURCE W/LINKS:

The deep reasons for Bush's Iraq war (i.e. the unacknowledged or suppressed reasons: notably oil and the defense of the dollar) are not the only ones. There are also other reasons which to a greater or lesser degree are overt, and need to be addressed, above all by those opposed to the war.

The most overt reason given is to deter terrorism. This reason has lost credibility with the public, because of the Administration's repeated attempts to construct a direct link between Iraq and 911, based on dubious reports, some apparently obtained from witnesses who were tortured. I doubt that these dubious reports existed when the Administration (as the Guardian and others have pointed out) considered an invasion of Iraq in 2001, in retaliation for the 911 attacks. The thinking was not that Iraq itself was responsible, but rather that an overwhelming illustration of US strength and determination would deter anyone anywhere from attacking again.

US geostrategists, such as Stratfor.com, 2/26/03, also believe that a subsequent US military presence in Central Asia could have a deterrent effect on neighboring countries, notably Saudi Arabia, which have been unwilling to crack down on their citizens who, for whatever reason, have been giving financial support directly or indirectly to terrorist organizations.

The same belief in the efficacy of overwhelming response underlay the US attack on Libya in 1986. I was then and remain opposed to that attack, partly because there was considerable evidence that Libya was not responsible for the terrorist incidents which gave rise to it. It was however my subjective impression over the next few years that the US attack on Libya, justified or not, was followed by a temporary decline in terrorist incidents against the West.

Equally overt is the doctrine that the US, as the world's dominant superpower, should now assert its strength unilaterally over residual nations, such as Iraq, that plot against US hegemony. As I wrote here in 2001 Wolfowitz first articulated his vision of the US as a great power which should tolerate no competitors in a draft Defense Policy Guidance statement [for Donald Rumsfeld] ten years ago. The draft explicitly called for the US to exercise its power unilaterally, adding that it "must sufficiently account for the interests of the advanced industrial nations to discourage them from challenging our leadership" (New York Times, 3/8/92). This unilateralist doctrine has since been echoed and emphasized by a number of neocons inside and outside the present administration, such as William Kristol and Robert Kagan. The Democrat Zbigniew Brzezinski has voiced similar views in his book The Grand Chessboard (see my Drugs, Oil, and War, due out March 2003).

The neocon case for unilateralism is often linked, by both proponents and opponents, to the defense of Israel. I am myself in favor of seeing Israel abandon the settlements, return to its pre-1967 borders (possibly renegotiated by mutual consent), and give reparations to those Palestinians dispossessed of their land (the Tikkun position). But opponents of violence in the Middle East, from whatever side, must recognize that Saddam's policy of rewarding the families of suicide bombers has involved him conspicuously in the subsidization of terrorism. If war is not the solution, we must help encourage another.

The internal thinking of the Bush administration along unilateralist, neocon, and pro-Israel lines, and also the domestic political reasons for it, are astutely analyzed by Ed Vulliamy, "Two Men Driving Bush into War," Observer, 2/23/03. This article helps explain why the US heartland, traditionally isolationist, has supplied the core of support for Bush's hegemonism; and also, more importantly, why the antiwar movement of the coastal states must speak to this heartland in language that will persuade rather than alienate.

The Vulliamy article also points to the quiet role of Enron and other petro-corporations in assembling and financing this new heartland coalition. Vulliamy focuses on the organizing genius of Karl Rove, backed by the financial power of Enron, to redirect the political energies of the Christian right.

The following passage is particularly germane:

"By the time George W. became President, Rove was the hub of a Texan wheel connecting the family, the party, the Christian Right and the energy industry. A single episode serves as metaphor: during the Enron scandal last year, a shadow was cast over Rove when it was revealed that he had sold $100,000 of Enron stock just before the firm went bankrupt.

"More intriguing, however, was the fact that Rove had personally arranged for the former leader of the Christian Coalition, Ralph Reed, to take up a consultancy at Enron - Bush's biggest single financial backer - worth between $10,000 and $20,000 a month.

"This was the machine of perpetual motion that Rove built. His accomplishment was the 'Texanisation' of the national Republican Party under the leadership of the Bush family and to take that party back to presidential office after eight years. Rove is unquestionably the most powerful policy adviser in the White House."

Thus, as is always the case in deep politics, the deep and overt reasons for the Iraq war are complexly interwoven. To give just one prominent example, the unilateralist case for a permanent US base in Iraq has been made overtly, without reference to the obvious significance this would have for US dominance over Middle Eastern oil. Because of the plurality of reasons and constituencies for this war, no one should make the mistake of attributing the pressures for war uniquely to oil or any other single cause.
DEEP REASONS AND OTHER REASONS FOR BUSH'S WAR ON IRAQ

The deep reasons for Bush's Iraq war (i.e. the unacknowledged or suppressed reasons: notably oil and the defense of the dollar) are not the only ones. There are also other reasons which to a greater or lesser degree are overt, and need to be addressed, above all by those opposed to the war.

The most overt reason given is to deter terrorism. This reason has lost credibility with the public, because of the Administration's repeated attempts to construct a direct link between Iraq and 911, based on dubious reports, some apparently obtained from witnesses who were tortured. I doubt that these dubious reports existed when the Administration (as the Guardian and others have pointed out) considered an invasion of Iraq in 2001, in retaliation for the 911 attacks. The thinking was not that Iraq itself was responsible, but rather that an overwhelming illustration of US strength and determination would deter anyone anywhere from attacking again.

US geostrategists, such as Stratfor.com, 2/26/03, also believe that a subsequent US military presence in Central Asia could have a deterrent effect on neighboring countries, notably Saudi Arabia, which have been unwilling to crack down on their citizens who, for whatever reason, have been giving financial support directly or indirectly to terrorist organizations.

The same belief in the efficacy of overwhelming response underlay the US attack on Libya in 1986. I was then and remain opposed to that attack, partly because there was considerable evidence that Libya was not responsible for the terrorist incidents which gave rise to it. It was however my subjective impression over the next few years that the US attack on Libya, justified or not, was followed by a temporary decline in terrorist incidents against the West.

Equally overt is the doctrine that the US, as the world's dominant superpower, should now assert its strength unilaterally over residual nations, such as Iraq, that plot against US hegemony. As I wrote here in 2001 Wolfowitz first articulated his vision of the US as a great power which should tolerate no competitors in a draft Defense Policy Guidance statement [for Donald Rumsfeld] ten years ago. The draft explicitly called for the US to exercise its power unilaterally, adding that it "must sufficiently account for the interests of the advanced industrial nations to discourage them from challenging our leadership" (New York Times, 3/8/92). This unilateralist doctrine has since been echoed and emphasized by a number of neocons inside and outside the present administration, such as William Kristol and Robert Kagan. The Democrat Zbigniew Brzezinski has voiced similar views in his book The Grand Chessboard (see my Drugs, Oil, and War, due out March 2003).

The neocon case for unilateralism is often linked, by both proponents and opponents, to the defense of Israel. I am myself in favor of seeing Israel abandon the settlements, return to its pre-1967 borders (possibly renegotiated by mutual consent), and give reparations to those Palestinians dispossessed of their land (the Tikkun position). But opponents of violence in the Middle East, from whatever side, must recognize that Saddam's policy of rewarding the families of suicide bombers has involved him conspicuously in the subsidization of terrorism. If war is not the solution, we must help encourage another.

The internal thinking of the Bush administration along unilateralist, neocon, and pro-Israel lines, and also the domestic political reasons for it, are astutely analyzed by Ed Vulliamy, "Two Men Driving Bush into War," Observer, 2/23/03. This article helps explain why the US heartland, traditionally isolationist, has supplied the core of support for Bush's hegemonism; and also, more importantly, why the antiwar movement of the coastal states must speak to this heartland in language that will persuade rather than alienate.

The Vulliamy article also points to the quiet role of Enron and other petro-corporations in assembling and financing this new heartland coalition. Vulliamy focuses on the organizing genius of Karl Rove, backed by the financial power of Enron, to redirect the political energies of the Christian right.

The following passage is particularly germane:

"By the time George W. became President, Rove was the hub of a Texan wheel connecting the family, the party, the Christian Right and the energy industry. A single episode serves as metaphor: during the Enron scandal last year, a shadow was cast over Rove when it was revealed that he had sold $100,000 of Enron stock just before the firm went bankrupt.

"More intriguing, however, was the fact that Rove had personally arranged for the former leader of the Christian Coalition, Ralph Reed, to take up a consultancy at Enron - Bush's biggest single financial backer - worth between $10,000 and $20,000 a month.

"This was the machine of perpetual motion that Rove built. His accomplishment was the 'Texanisation' of the national Republican Party under the leadership of the Bush family and to take that party back to presidential office after eight years. Rove is unquestionably the most powerful policy adviser in the White House."

Thus, as is always the case in deep politics, the deep and overt reasons for the Iraq war are complexly interwoven. To give just one prominent example, the unilateralist case for a permanent US base in Iraq has been made overtly, without reference to the obvious significance this would have for US dominance over Middle Eastern oil. Because of the plurality of reasons and constituencies for this war, no one should make the mistake of attributing the pressures for war uniquely to oil or any other single cause.
http://ist-socrates.berkeley.edu/~pdscott/iraq2.html

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Enron, a Bush role model

Posted by lakshmi on May 14, 2003 @ 4:50PM

Harold Meyerson asks in the American Prospect, "So whose books were more cooked – Enron's accounts of its financial doings or the administration's prewar reports on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction?" The company's accounting was every bit as detailed and fictitious as the Colin Powell's speech at the U.N. Maybe that's why the Bushies are no longer looking for actual stocks of WMDs but "documentary evidence" – so much easier to fake.
http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/2003/05/000866.html

==================
For a list of who in both parties benefitted from Enron's
political donations, check the Center for Responsive Politics
Web site:
http://www.opensecrets.org/alerts/v6/enron_cong.asp

http://www.opensecrets.org/alerts/v6/enron_totals.asp

Enron Contributions to Current Senators, 1989-2001*
http://www.opensecrets.org/alerts/v6/enron_cong_senate.asp

Enron Contributions to Current Members of the
House of Representatives, 1989-2001*

http://www.opensecrets.org/alerts/v6/enron_cong_house.asp

Top Presidential Recipients of Enron Contributions, 1989-2001*
http://www.opensecrets.org/alerts/v6/enron_pres.asp

SPECIAL COUNSEL REQUIRED FOR ENRON
http://www.judicialwatch.org/press_release.asp?pr_id=2079

Meet Enron, Bush's Biggest Contributor.
http://www.findarticles.com/m1295/9_64/65014758/p1/article.jhtml

BUSH'S ENRONGATE
http://www.apfn.org/enron/enrongate.htm

Enron Fallout
http://www.dyncorp-sucks.com/enron.htm

Enron (NYSE:ENE) Sued In Class Action Suit
on Behalf of Employees and Former Employees
http://www.enronerisa.com/news/news112101-3.html

Enron Oil & Gas names President
and CEO and board-members
http://www.apfn.org/enron/CEO.htm

Enron Prize for Distinguished Public Service
http://www.apfn.org/enron/prize.htm

Cheney Led Halliburton To Feast at Federal Trough State Department Questioned Deal With Firm Linked to Russian Mob
http://www.apfn.org/enron/halliburton.htm

WHO PROFITS FROM A LONG WAR?
FLASHBACK: Halliburton Profits from War Without End 2/24
http://www.halliburton.com/KBR/KBRNWS/KBRNWS_121701.asp

Dick Cheney's Halliburton Also Profits from the Permanent War 2/23
http://www.southernstudies.org/issmain.shtml#Commentary1

United Defense gets $1.8 billion Army contract
WASHINGTON, Feb 1 (Reuters) - United Defense LP, a unit of United Defense Industries Inc. (NYSE:UDI - news), has been awarded a $1.8 billon contract for further development of the Army's next-generation self-propelled Crusader artillery system, the service said Friday.

The award, which had been expected based on a sole-source contract initiated in July 1994, calls for work to be completed by April 30, 2003. The Pentagon projects Crusader purchases rising to $1 billion by 2007.

United Defense's largest backer is Carlyle Group Inc., an investment firm whose chairman is Frank Carlucci, a secretary of defense under President Ronald Reagan.

The Army ultimately plans to spend $11.1 billion developing, buying and supporting 480 Crusaders -- a 155mm howitzer operated by a three-person crew that will operate with another three-person vehicle carrying spare shells and fuel.
http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/020201/n01166761_1.html
----

HOW TO CREATE A PHONY POWER CRISIS: THE BUSH-ENRON CONNECTION
http://www.apfn.org/enron/phoney.htm

Enron as "Bush’s Whitewater"; And "Worse" Than Whitewater; To CNN,
Arafat is the Victim; Kinsley Insulted Goldberg as "Dense"

http://www.mrc.org/news/cyberalert/2002/cyb20020111.asp

Henry A. Waxman | GAO v. Cheney
"Everyone in our government--even the Vice President--should be
accountable to the American people..."
http://www.truthout.com/02.24B.Waxman.Responds.htm

"THE ENRON BLACK MAGIC, PART ONE"
by Sherman H. Skolnick 12/02/01
http://www.skolnicksreport.com/tebm1.html

Connect the Enron Dots to Bush
by Robert Scheer
http://www.zmag.org/scheerenron.htm

THE STORY OF ENRON - Sightings from The Catbird Seat.
http://www.the-catbird-seat.net/ENRON.htm

The Roots of the Bush-Cheney's Oil Government
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/bush-cheney.htm

Billy Jack.com
Peoples Investigative Committee
http://www.billyjack.com/index.php?menuID=Page&pid=94

Peoples Open Televised Hearing
http://www.billyjack.com/index.php?menuID=Page&pid=69

The Smoking Gun: The Downing Street Memo (Minutes)
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1593607,00.html
http://www.downingstreetmemo.com/memo.html
http://www.afterdowningstre