What to do about Iraq? Do we stay and, if so, for how long? Will Iraq be like Korea, as Sen. Hillary Clinton noted upon her return from Iraq recently? Sen. Clinton told the American people to relax, “We’ve been in Korea for the last 50 years,” she said. How many more American servicemen and women will be lost? On Sunday, July 17 we have our chance to speak and listen to others about it. See the information below on Congressman Allen’s Town Hall Meeting on Iraq.
The Bush administration is now saying we’ll be in Iraq about two more years, but insists that there will be no timetable for withdrawal. The UK’s Tony Blair recently told his nation that we’d be there 10 more years. The U.S. military is building 14 “enduring bases” in Iraq right now.
The flood of information now available about the circumstances of the US pre-emptive strike against Iraq leads me to a confident conclusion that Bush invaded Iraq for oil, and not WMD. It’s clear now there was no connection between Saddam Hussein and Sept. 11, either. It makes sense to me that the oil corporations would want to stay in Iraq for a long time. With dwindling supplies of oil in the world these days, and oil consumption going up globally, it appears to me that this endless war will be an endless struggle for oil. It won’t matter one bit what is best for the Iraqi people. And as much as we need the oil, I, for one, would rather pay more and use less oil, than to have one more person, American or Iraqi, die over it.
Some in the U.S. say that if we leave Iraq there will be a civil war there. How could things there get much worse than they are now? In recent days 82 members of the new Iraqi national assembly signed a petition calling for a speedy withdrawal of “coalition” forces from Iraq. Many unions, religious, and secular organizations in Iraq are also calling for a scheduled withdrawal, asap, from their battered country.
Within two weeks after the fall of Baghdad, millions of Iraqis converged on Karbala chanting (No to America, No to Saddam) as Sunni and Shia were united in their desire to take back control of their country. But by a policy of divide and conquer, the Bush and Blair team slowly helped to create internal dissention in Iraq. Britain is good at divide and conquer. Their once great empire, which included Iraq, used this very tactic to control the population. Our occupation of Iraq is worsening the growth of terrorism, not solving it.
Sami Ramadani, a political refugee from Saddam Hussein’s regime, is a senior lecturer at London Metropolitan University. Mr. Ramadani, in an article recently published in the UK’s Guardian newspaper, states “Every day the occupation increases tension and makes people’s lives worse, fueling the violence. Creating a client regime in Baghdad, backed by permanent bases, is the route that U.S. strategists followed in Vietnam. As in Vietnam, popular resistance in Iraq and the wider Middle East will not go away but will grow stronger, until it eventually unites to force a U.S.-British withdrawal.”
It is not our responsibility to create peace in the Middle East by occupying Iraq. And what we’re doing is making it worse.
How many more lives (on all sides) must be lost in Iraq? How much more of our tax dollars will be wasted in Iraq (over $200 billion already) when we have a growing fiscal crisis in the U.S. and right here in Maine? The time has come for the people to speak up for a responsibly planned withdrawal.
Our US Congressman Tom Allen has scheduled a Town Meeting on Iraq and is inviting all of us to come together to have this discussion. I hope many from our area will show up, voice their opinions and concerns, and, much more importantly, listen to each other on this crucial topic. The Town Meeting will be on Sunday, July 17 from 2-4 p.m. at the Portland High School Auditorium. Parking is available on the streets and in the parking garage near the Portland Public Market and the Library.
Lu Bauer
Standish
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