[Peace-discuss] The Bush-Obama wars: opportunities for liars

[C. G. Estabrook]

"In 2001 reports of the Afghan war gave the impression that the Taliban had been beaten decisively even though there had been very little fighting. In 2003 there was a belief in the West that Saddam Hussein’s forces had been crushed when in fact the Iraqi army, including the units of the elite Special Republican Guard, had simply disbanded and gone home. In Libya in 2011 the rebel militiamen, so often shown on television firing truck-mounted heavy machine-guns in the general direction of the enemy, had only a limited role in the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi, which was mostly brought about by Nato air strikes. In Syria in 2011 and 2012 foreign leaders and journalists repeatedly and vainly predicted the imminent defeat of Bashar al-Assad ... ‘Did it ever occur to you, sir, what an opportunity a battlefield affords liars?’ the Confederate general Stonewall Jackson once remarked to an aide."

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v35/n19/patrick-cockburn/diary