OPED ON IRAQ

by
By Jim Garrison
President, State of the World Forum and
Author of the forthcoming book, America as Empire

As President Bush and the world go into the final end game with Saddam Hussein, it is important that the impending invasion of Iraq be understood in its deep historical significance. The invasion of Iraq will as dramatically change the global landscape as did 9/11. If 9/11 reframed everything within the context of national security and the war on terrorism, the invasion of Iraq will recontextualize the world yet again within the new reality of overwhelming U.S. power in the world. The U.S. is choosing to do this by seizing the most strategic point in the Middle East, possibly in the entire world.

This is the area along the Tigris-Euphrates river basin where the Neolithic Revolution began 10,000 years ago; where the first human civilization developed 6,000 years ago; where the first empire held sway 5,000 years ago; and where Judaism and Christianity had their origins, with Islam originating just to the south. There is no point on the entire planet more steeped in history, more complex in its politics, more charged in its religious fervor than the Tigris Euphrates river basin. For the United States to take control of this region at America’s moment of power is profound. It will be seizing the most sacred and fought over soil in the history of the world.

A strong U.S. presence along the Tigris Euphrates will make starkly clear that history has moved from an era of multipolarity, where there is a balance of power between nations, to a unipolar world, in which the Untied States holds global dominion. The consequences of this will be enormous and will raise many questions, one of the most profound of which is how the U.S. intends to act in the new unipolar world.

The question of critical importance therefore is how the U.S. will transact regime change in Iraq, for this will signal America’s intentions for the future. In seizing something as historic as the cradle of civilization, the U.S. must represent its totality, not just its military might; its commitment to democracy, not just its precision with missiles. The U.S. has the chance to transform this area into a new cradle of civilization, one in which freedom, human rights and democracy are rooted and allowed to blossom. If all the U.S. does is orchestrate a regime change and then cobble together a fractious democracy comprised of different ethnic and religious groups but without serious and long term support, it will lose an opportunity of historic dimension. This was what happened in Afghanistan where President Bush announced a Marshall Plan but never came up with the money to pay for it, spending over $12 billion during 2002 on military matters and only $250 million on reconstruction aid. It was left for the EU and the UN to bear the brunt of the reconstruction effort. Afghanistan today, while better than under the Taliban, is crippled by lack of serious and sustained international attention.

In Iraq much more is at stake, particularly in the court of world public opinion which is almost universally skeptical and uneasy of both invasion and regime change. The U.S. must match its military force with a commensurate demonstration of magnaminity reminiscent of U.S. actions at the end of World War II. If it remains content with simply destroying the Baathist regime it will breed a new generation of terrorists that will make Osama bin Laden proud. If it rebuilds Iraq like the U.S. rebuilt Germany and Japan after World War II, it will do more to eliminate terrorism than anything the Americans will do on the battlefield and possibly open up new avenues for peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

With Iraq, a new America will emerge on the world stage. Let it be as much a builder of democracy as destroyer of terrorism, as much about light as it will be about power.