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5th anniversary of the war in Iraq |
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TO THE EDITOR:
This week marks the fifth anniversary of our invasion of Iraq, making it one of the longest wars in our history and one with no end in sight. The cost of the war has increased from $100 billion a year to almost $200 billion with the surge, an amount that could have provided health care coverage to all 47 million Americans without health care coverage.
Since the war began, nearly 4,000 American soldiers have died and nearly 30,000 American soldiers have been wounded, according to official U.S. sources. An estimated 500,000 civilians in Iraq have been killed as well.
Bush lied to us to get us into this war. There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, no active Al-Qaeda cells, and no links to 9-11. There were such links with Saudi Arabia, including funding of Al-Qaeda and actual involvement in the terrorist attack. Did we attack the Saudis?
Bush declared, “mission accomplished” on May 1, 2003. Since then more than 3,950 American soldiers have died. Bush “handed-over” control of Iraq in June 29, 2004; since then more than 3,100 US troops have been killed. Bush declared that the “surge” has been successful on January 23, 2007. In May 2007, 126 American soldiers were killed; making it the third deadliest month since the war began. Bush then refused to establish “benchmarks” to measure the success of the surge and later used the decline in military and civilian deaths in the last quarter of 2007 as proof the surge worked. Bush also repeatedly stated that we must listen to the Generals in the field, but when the Generals tell him things he doesn’t want to hear, he replaces them as he did earlier this month with Adm. William Fallon, the top commander in the Middle East. Now we have a Republican candidate for president, McCain, saying that he would continue the war 100 years rather than admit “defeat.” Enough military madness!
Just this past week we learned that Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho, leader of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Iraq was killed. The Catholic Church has said over and over again “this is not a just war.” On this the fifth anniversary of the war, we must end this war and seek a political solution where no military solution is possible. We also need to focus on domestic issues such as the recession and how our children will have to pay trillions for Bush’s follies that have made us less safe at home and around the world. If we want peace and security, then we must work for justice.
Robert G. Walz
North Branch
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