On The 10^th Anniversary Of The Iraq War-U.S./Allied Troops Out Of Afghanistan Now! 

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

[No this writer is not lost in a time warp, nor  is he suffering from a senior moment in noting the 10^th Anniversary of the ill-fated, ill-advised, ill, well, let’s just keep it as the previous two, start of the now seemingly completed fiasco in Iraq. However although American troops have mainly been withdrawn many thousand American bought and paid for “contract” soldiers are still operating in that theater. Moreover the wreckage from the huge American footprint (boot print, really) is still wreaking havoc on that benighted land from lack of electrical power to unexploded bombs to speak nothing of the current constant political turmoil between the myriad factions struggling for power. Then there is the question of those tens of thousands of soldiers switched over within a heartbeat from benighted Iraq to benighted Afghanistan. The call for immediate troop withdrawal from Afghanistan if not drawing much support in these back- burner concern days is still a necessary call. Finally, if there is a modern example  of the follies of war, of a needless imperial adventure, of flat-out American imperial hubris to do something explosive (in more ways than one) then the ill-famed Iraq invasion started on March 19, 2003 should be etched in every leftist militant, hell, every thoughtful citizen’s brain.]        

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Walking toward Union Square in his hometown of  New York City one brisk, blustery mid-March Saturday in 2006 Tim Reid was approached by an older man with a full grey-speckled beard and longish matching hair passing out leaflets for a  3rd anniversary of the Iraq war anti-war rally. As the older man tried to interest him in a leaflet Tim recognized him, Artie Feingold, as an old co-worker in the struggle against the first Iraq war under Bush’s father in an ad hoc anti-imperialist committee formed quickly to oppose that war. Tim sheepishly took the leaflet and as he did so out of some mist of time Artie also recognized him and started to engage in an effort to get Tim to stay for the rally.

The reason for Tim’s sheepishness and reluctance was that until very recently he had fully supported the Bush war policy. After a couple of years of being lied to from top to bottom by that administration, a couple of years of the whole damn U.S. military being unable to find any weapons of mass destructions that was the lynchpin to his support, the daily horrible carnage in the full-scale civil war going on in Iraq, and the increasing American casualty lists he had taken a few steps away from that support.   Tim was not sure that he wanted to engage Artie in his reasoning since he knew that Artie had moved from that ad hoc committee to one of the never-ending Marxoid groupings that canvassed the city and who reasons for separate existence (and in some cases existence at all) always evaded him. By the name of the organization on the leaflet he knew Artie was still a “believer” and that made him even more hesitant to enter a discussion. He at first moved away and then headed back to Artie not to argue so much since there now was less ground separating them but to explain his previous position a little.             

Artie, not having seen Tim in many years, was unaware that his politics had changed and so what Tim had to say startled him at first. Tim noted that his opposition to that first Iraq war, and if he recalled Artie’s too, had centered on opposition to a war fought for sheiks, one set of dictators , and oil against the acknowledged mad man Saddam Hussein. It was not our fight, not at all. Mercifully it was soon over and life continued on. This later war though Tim had thought had been fully justified in the new post 9/11world reality especially when the mad men were hitting New York City. Hitting, he admitted, the place where he and his kids were living, a fact that changed his view significantly since he felt he had to go to any lengths to protect his kids in a dangerous world. Besides he was sure that when, of all the Bush administration speakers, solid Colin Powell a man not easily to rattles and of sound judgment in military matters, had given the “green light” to those tales of weapons of mass destruction he was on board. After the initial “slam dunk” invasion Tim felt that the whole thing would be wrapped up and nation-building could go forward quickly. Then the whole thing turned to ashes, turned to ashes almost as quickly as the initial success. He felt sure though that that devious Hussein bastard’s hiding places would be found at some point.  Then nothing, nothing but casualty reports.    

Artie listened to Tim rather politely like in the intervening years he too had learned to be less hot-headed and argumentative and more thoughtful. He confessed that Tim’s story sounded very much like that of his parents who still lived over in Brooklyn and who had been early members of Students for Socialism in their youthful student days who went that extra mile with Bush on Iraq to save their beloved city. Then, naturally, Artie, good old Artie, tried to badger Tim a little into coming over to the rally for a little while anyway, maybe run into a few more old co-workers from the old days. Tim begged off, first using the excuse of having to deal with the kids and then, more truthfully, stated that he while he wasn’t on board the Bush bus any longer he was not sure that his opposition was deep enough to publicly express anti-wars sentiments. To Tim’s surprise Artie did not press the issue but left Tim with this-“Maybe next year for the fourth anniversary anti-war rally you will join us.” Tim did a double-take and then realized that what Artie had to say about another year of war might be very true. As he turned away toward home with the first chants of the day Immediate Unconditional Withdrawal Of U.S. Troops, Stop The War, and Bring The Troops Home burst into the old New York air some of the old juices began to flow in his veins…