James Astill

A disaster waiting to happen

issue 12 November 2005

A few days after Baghdad fell to American soldiers, CNN aired footage of a harassed marine wrestling to contain an unruly mob, and yelling, ‘We’re here for your fucking freedom! Now back up!’ The occupation was already in trouble. Looters had grabbed their freedom with greedy hands, ransacking almost every state building left unbombed, stripping them of police records, Babylonian antiquities and porcelain urinals. And America had no plan, and no clue, of what to do with the broken and bitter country. In words often quoted, yet still amazing, Donald Rumsfeld, the defense secretary nominally in charge of Iraq, saluted the madness: ‘Stuff happens and it’s untidy, and freedom’s untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things.’

That the marine should parrot Rumsfeld’s analysis was no coincidence. From its genesis in the minds of hawkish neo-conservatives to the absent-planning for the postwar, the conduct of the Iraq invasion directly reflected the views of a bickering and deluded Washington-based elite, little interested in the reality of the Baghdad street.

Comments

Join the debate for just $5 for 3 months

Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for $5.

Already a subscriber? Log in