[Peace-discuss] Victory in Iraq?

[C. G. Estabrook]

[The admirable Chris Floyd has what seem to me one of the better
prognoses for the Iraq war. --CGE]

   Why Bush Smiles: Victory is at Hand in Iraq
   By Chris Floyd
   10/17/06 "Information Clearing House"

Despite George W. Bush's ostentatious bucking up of the Iraqi government 
yesterday, it is very likely that there will indeed be an 
American-engineered coup ousting Maliki and installing some sort of 
strongman-led "national unity government" in Baghdad soon, probably 
before the end of the year.

(Indeed, the very showiness of Bush's pledge of support – in a phone
call supposedly initiated by Bush, then announced to the media – is a
good indication of the decapitation to come. As JFK once told Gore
Vidal: "When a politician says to you, 'Jack, if there's anything I can
do for you, just let me know,' that means you're dead." And Maliki –
installed in a Bush-backed internal party coup that toppled the previous
prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, who was himself once a recipient of
similar pledges of staunch White House support – is a dead man walking.)

The chief reason why Maliki and his government will be ousted is not the
hell-storm of death and violence that is now devouring the country. The
fact that every new day sees a hundred or more mutilated bodies dumped
on the nation's streets, and pitched battles between sectarian militias,
and multiple deaths of American troops, and mass flights of anguished
Iraqi civilians running in fear for their lives is not a matter of any
urgent concern to Bush and his warmakers. Indeed, there is much evidence
that one of the prime instigators of the wanton killing is a group
created and long nurtured by the Bush Administration itself: the
Facilities Protection Service, an army of uniformed freebooters nearly
150,000 strong. (I'll be writing more on this later.) Of course, the
violence is a political headache for the Bushists, because it generates
bad press; but they don't care about it – it has no intrinsic meaning or
emotional impact on those who are already responsible for the deaths of
more than half a million Iraqis and more than 2,700 Americans.

No, what will likely bring on the coup is the December deadline for
crafting a new oil law, which was imposed on Iraq by the International
Monetary Fund, as part of the deal to write off some – but by no means
all – of the nation's crushing debt. Given the current level of intense
anti-American feeling in Iraq, and the overwhelming majority support
among every sector of society for ending the occupation, and the
overwhelming belief among Iraqis that the chief reason behind the
invasion was to steal their oil, it is almost inconceivable that Maliki
will be able to sign the new law, which essentially opens up Iraq's oil
wealth to decades of despoliation by U.S. and European energy
conglomerates. The Maliki government – already weak, incompetent and
despised, as are all puppet regimes – could not possibly survive the
political backlash that such a move would provoke.

Therefore, Maliki will either refuse to sign the law – in which case he
would doubtless be removed immediately one way or another; perhaps even
by some act of "terrorist violence" – or else he will seek to postpone
the deadline and buy himself a little more time. If it's the latter
case, then he and his government might last out the year after all,
assuming the Potomac Potentate deigns to extend his temporary mercy. But
sooner or later the law will be signed: it is the reason for the war, it
is why all of these people have died, it is the sign and substance of
the true victory that Bush has been working for all these years.

Indeed, once it is signed, we may in fact see a partial withdrawal of
occupation troops begin, under the cover of the recommendations of the
"bipartisan" panel headed by Bush Family consigliere James Baker. It
will look like Bush has finally "listened to reason," that he has wisely
"changed course;" but if it happens, it will only be because he has
gotten what he came for: crony control of Iraq's vast oil reserves.
Baker meanwhile will have accomplished his own multi-faceted mission:
keeping Iraq in IMF bondage by holding the whip of the remaining debt
over its head, while simultaneously ensuring that Iraq continues its
onerous, back-breaking payments of arrears and "reparations" to Baker's
private lobbying clients (and longtime Bush Family business partners),
the Saudi and Kuwaiti royals.

For as Joshua Holland of Alternet.com points out, the new Iraqi oil law
will lock in succeeding governments, while the "sovereign debt" will
also stay on the books no matter what kind of state follows the
inevitable demise of the puppet regime installed by Bush. Holland has
laid out the details of this remarkable – yet almost unremarked –
situation in two excellent articles: Bush's Petro-Cartel Almost Has
Iraq's Oil and The U.S. Takeover of Iraqi Oil. I've been writing
piecemeal about many of these issues for years, (e.g., Dubya Indemnity:
Bush Barons Beyond the Reach of Law), but Holland has provided a
succinct yet in-depth overview, drawing on his own research and
interviews with some of the leading muckrakers of Bush's
war-profiteering bloodbath. He is especially good on the backstory of
the debt deal, another unheralded "victory" by the Bush Faction.

Yes, victory. You wonder why Bush and his minions maintain the seemingly
irrational belief that "things are going well" in Iraq, that "we're
making progress," etc.? That's because things are going well in the war
they are fighting: the war for money and power. What happens to the
human beings caught up in this war – Iraqi civilians, or American
citizens at ever-greater risk from the terrorism spawned by the war –
is, again, no concern of the Bush gang. In fact, the worse things are
from that standpoint, the better it is for the Bushists. The war profits
(and stolen swag) they and their corporate cronies have accrued from the
Iraq War (and the "War on Terror" as well) have given them unimaginable
wealth with which to continue their overall dominance of American
society – no matter who wins the elections in 2006 or 2008, or for
decades beyond. As I've stated often before, no matter what happens,
Bush and his cronies have already won the war.

They've won even if Iraq collapses into perpetual anarchy, or becomes an
extremist religious state; they've won even if the whole region goes up
in flames, and terrorism flares to unprecedented heights – because this
will just mean more war-profiteering, more fear-profiteering. And yes,
they've won even if they lose their majority next month or the
presidency in 2008, because war and fear will still fill their coffers,
buying them continuing influence and power as they bide their time
through another interregnum of a Democratic "centrist" – who will, at
best, only nibble at the edges of the militarist state – until they are
back in the saddle again. The only way they can lose the Iraq War is if
they are actually arrested and imprisoned for their war crimes. And you
know and I know that's not going to happen.

So that confident strut of the Bush gang, their incessant upbeat
pronouncements about the war, their complacent smirks, their callous
indifference to the unspeakable horror they have unleashed upon the
world – these are not the hallmarks of self-delusion, or wilful
ignorance, or a disassociation from reality. They know full well what
the reality is – and they like it.

Chris Floyd is an American journalist. He is the author of the book,
Empire Burlesque: The Secret History of the Bush Regime. Visit his
website www.chris-floyd.com