Iraq Special: When a War is Not Over (Bacevich)

Andrew Bacevich writes for The Daily Beast:

Within hours of the much ballyhooed withdrawal of the last U.S. combat brigade from Iraq, Wikipediadeclared that the Iraq war had “ended on August 19, 2010.” Although no doubt reflecting the fondest hopes of the Obama administration and of the American soldiers who have for so many years fought in Iraq, that judgment is unlikely to stand.

The Anglo-American forces that invaded Iraq in March 2003 did so for the purpose of deposing Saddam Hussein. The war’s architects expected this to be an easy and straightforward task, one that they approached with a surgeon’s expectations: They planned to cut open the diseased organ, remove the cancer, close, pat the patient on the head, and be done, moving on to the next sickly Muslim nation requiring Washington’s saving ministrations.

Iraq Special: Obama Declares Victory. Sort Of. Depends How You Look at It. (The Onion)
Iraq Special: When a Withdrawal Is Not a Withdrawal (Alaaldin)
Iraq: The Political Worries Beyond the US “Withdrawal” (Shadid)

They miscalculated badly. In fact, once exposed to the elements, the organ became the site of virulent infections. As chief surgeon, George W. Bush—not especially adept to begin with—ended up with a much bigger problem than he had bargained for.

The war launched to achieve regime change in Baghdad metastasized into three wars. First there was the war to replace Saddam Hussein, imposing a pro-Western Iraqi government in his place. Second was the Iraq civil war, touched off as a result of Saddam’s overthrow, Iraqi tribes, sects, and ethnic groups vying for power in the resulting vacuum and more than happy to use violence to achieve their ends. Finally was the jihadi war, radicals from across the Islamic world seizing on the chaos created by the Americans to convert Iraq into a new battlefield in their campaign to purge the umma of occupying Western infidels.

Seven and a half years later, what can we say of these three wars?

The war to replace Saddam with a legitimate, pro-Western government remains, to be generous, a work in progress....

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Comments

[Catherine]

Does that mean that after the end of this month all further casualties in Iraq, whether American or Iraqi, will no longer be added to the ongoing count of killed and wounded in the Iraq War?