Failure In Falluja
By Thomas Riggins
21 July, 2005
Politicalaffairs.net
It
is impossible to read the daily press reports coming out of Iraq without
feeling that the Bush/Cheney war for oil is going nowhere. Here is an
update on what is going on in one city, courtesy of the New York Times
of 7-15-05 (8 Months After U.S.-Led Siege, Insurgents Rise Again
in Falluja by Edward Wong.)
Wong begins his
article by saying since the US has turned Falluja in a police
state it should be the safest city in Iraq. After
all we killed over a thousand people, mostly civilians, to bring freedom
to the Fallujans, so what does it mean to say the insurgency is back?
How could this be? Dont the Iraqis appreciate Bushs
bombing and machine gunning them into democracy?
It would appear
not. One of the rules of guerrilla warfare is that it cannot succeed
without the support of the people. The guerrillas mix with the civilian
population like fish in the sea. This seems to be what is happening
in Falluja, as Wong reports, the insurgency is back in operation
car bombs are going off again, American and Iraqi troops are being killed
and innocent civilians are being killed by both sides.
What is most telling
is the attitude of the people that originally were supportive of the
US that is, people who did not support the insurgency. Wong quotes
as widespread the following attitude expressed by a typical Fallujan,
after the unfairness and injustice with which the citys
residents have been treated by the American and Iraqi [puppet] forces,
they now prefer the resistance, just so they wont be humiliated.
In other words, Falluja is more like Paris under the German occupation
than under the allied liberation. Once you lose the people the game
is up.
Falluja is in many ways symbolic of the Bush/Cheney war against the
Iraqi people. They cant even control one city let alone the country.
They have created a true quagmire exposing everyone, including their
own troops, to a meaningless bloody slaughter since you cannot, in the
world of today, impose your will on other nations by force of arms and
expect to get away with it (unless you are a tiny little country like
Grenada or Panama).
As Wong points out,
anti-Americanism was fanned throughout the Middle East by
the attack on the civilian population of this city. It is not a stretch
to say the US attack on this city was state terrorism against the civilian
population the figures speak for themselves. When Bush ordered
the invasion the city had 300,000 residents last January the
population was 30,000. Ninety per cent of the people had been driven
out of their homes! If unleashing a modern army against civilians doesnt
constitute a war crime then the word is meaningless. Today, as people
have slowly begun to return, the population is up to 140,000
still less than half of the original number of inhabitants.
The US is maintaining
order by a perpetual lockdown of the city, according
to Wong. The US imposes a 10 PM curfew and has check points scattered
about the city to keep tabs on the population. The usual unnamed American
official source admitted that Were starting to see friction
[starting ?], and were starting to see the insurgents try to rebound.
So far the insurgents have set off four car bombs, killed six US troops,
and fire bombed forty per cent of the new police forts.
This is supposed to be a secure zone. It only shows that
you cant play Blitzkrieg in the Middle East.
We destroyed half
of the city, as they say, in order to save it. Once known as the City
of Mosques, the US endeared itself to the Muslim inhabitants by
blowing up minarets, which now punctuate the landscape according
to the Times. Wong says much of the city remains in ruins.
The US is not unmindful
of the problems. It knows it has to try and get the Fallujans on its
side but the contradiction is, as in Vietnam, that the material
interests of the US we do want to control that oil and
those of the majority of the Iraqi people are in basic conflict. This
means we cannot succeed in attaining our goals (passive acceptance of
long term domination) in that country.
The newly elected
government is not being too helpful either. It was estimated that at
least 500 million dollars was required to get rebuilding really underway
in the city. Under the old interim government of Ayad Allawi about 20%
of that money was sent into Falluja but the new Shiite government
has not provided any more money. This is a provocation to people who
are living in rubble.
Wongs article
tries not to be all gloom and doom, but even his positive
evaluations can be seen as really going against US plans. He quotes
Sunni leaders who say, more or less, what the Americans want to hear
about wanting to take part in future elections, etc., but this
can be dismissed as the typical type of cant a people under occupation
gives to the occupier to relieve some of the pressure put upon it.
Wong says a sign
of political engagement is a recent manifesto drawn up to
give to the US forces. Its main demand, however, is absolutely incompatible
with the Bush/Cheney plans to make Iraq a perpetual US satellite. That
demand is, of course, setting a timetable for the withdrawal of
American-led forces. The reason Bush wont give a timetable
is that the major problem of post war Iraq has not be resolved
how will we control the oil without a permanent military presence in
the region. We are building long term bases in Iraq and it looks like
we intend to have some presence, as in South Korea, for the long term.
Meanwhile, in lockdowned
Falluja a US military spokesman stated marines and Iraqi forces
found or were attacked with homemade bombs almost every day. Some
lock- down!
What is true of
Falluja is also true for the country itself. Falluja is a microcosm
of Iraq. How long will our supine Congress and lied to citizens (Bush
lied, soldiers died and not only soldiers) put up with
this tragic farce in the Middle East. It is time to demand the troops
be brought home now they are not the private army of Halliburton.
-Thomas Riggins is the book review editor of Political Affairs and can
be reached at [email protected]