Bush pushes the panic button!
Throughout the world, the US led invasion of Iraq is extremely unpopular. The world knows that the war has cost hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives. It has cost thousands of American troops killed and injured. The people of the United States of America understand this now. There is no end to the war in sight. The elected government of Iraq has no authority. The country has erupted into civil war!
George Bush is a president faced with a hostile congress and Senate. Like Richard Nixon, Bush does not want to be seen as overseeing a major US military defeat. This is a strong possibility. So what does he propose? Send in another twenty thousand troops! This is the act of a desperate man!
The Iraqi resistance promise to send them back in coffins. That could well be their fate. The solution to the situation in Iraq is not military but political. The divisions in the country cannot be resolved by force. Even if the extra troops give America more military success it solves nothing!
Bush can gloat at the execution of Saddam Hussein. Saddam was given a fair trial. He was guilty of mass murder. The problem is his death actually exacerbates the situation. Though he was hated by the majority, sections of the population actually wanted him. Sunnis have used his death as a rallying point. They have made him a martyr and vow to fight the guerrilla war even harder � both against their Shia rivals and against the US occupiers. His death has intensified the civil war raging there.
There are many crimes which Saddam should have been made to account for. He should have been forced to account for the mass murder of the Kurdish minority and many other crimes against the Iraqi people. Now he has been assassinated this can�t happen.
There has been nothing progressive achieved by the US invasion. Instead of being one nation, Iraq is now divided along religious lines, fighting itself. There may be elections, but it is the US which controls the economy. It is stealing Iraqi oil! If its plans were successful, it would use Iraq as a military base to control the Middle East and rip off its oil.
Thanks to the Howard Government, Australia is up to its neck in the Iraqi invasion. It a situation which workers in this country must urgently change. Not just through speeches but through action. Workers� direct action against Australia�s military involvement is a matter of urgency and must begin now!