In an excellent article in this week's Nation, Naomi Klein notes that mutiny is the appropriate order of the day in Iraq:
Can we please stop calling it a quagmire? The United States isn't mired in a bog or a marsh in Iraq (quagmire's literal meaning); it is free-falling off a cliff. The only question now is: Who will follow the Bush clan off this precipice, and who will refuse to jump?
More and more are, thankfully, choosing the second option. The last month of inflammatory US aggression in Iraq has inspired what can only be described as a mutiny: Waves of soldiers, workers and politicians under the command of the US occupation authority are suddenly refusing to follow orders and abandoning their posts.
We can be thankful that more and more people are refusing to be part of the every-way disastrous course of action that the Supreme Idiot and his gang of handlers have set into play. But behind my gratitude at those whose conscience and intelligence has finally kicked into gear, is anger: anger that those few individuals in power that could have stopped the nightmare in its tracks---stopped it before it had killed tens of thousands of people and destroyed the lives of countless others---stood by, shut up, and let it happen.
First and foremost on this list of people who are in an important sense most to blame for the present war and the accompanying devastation is Colin Powell.
Powell, as discussed by Paul O'Neill in The Price of Loyalty, was selected to be Secretary of State not only or (in retrospect, it seems clear) even mainly because of his past highly-lauded experience and performance at the highest levels of military and government, but because of his character: Powell, by all accounts, was supposed to be a paragon of integrity and moderation. It was because of Powell's impeccable "profile" that, as Condi Rice finally admits to Wil Hylton in his GQ article 'Casualty of War', Powell was the clear choice to present the case for going to war to the U.N.:
"... Everybody said it would have to be Colin" [...] "We wanted to have enough of a profile. It was an important presentation. Extremely important presentation. So we wanted to have enough profile."
There you have it. As everyone knows by now, Powell had grave doubts about the claims being made in the U.N. presentation. More specifically, he knew the claims were trumped-up B.S., and he knew by then that the government, in Anthony Zinni's (former head of Central Command in the Middle East) words, had been "captured" by a band of maniacs hell-bent on invading Iraq on the flimsiest of pretexts, for various malignant reasons none of which had anything whatsoever to do with the presence of WMD.
Powell knew it, and those in power knew he knew it. At the time of his U.N. presentation, however, many Americans didn't know it. Here we have the press (and especially the despicable Judith Miller), and their complicit, kiss-ass kowtowing to power to thank. But one event could have stopped the whole damned pack of lies and lying liars in their tracks: Colin Powell refusing to go along with the plan.
If Colin Powell had resigned in protest, there is at least a live possibility that we would not be at war in Iraq right now. His power, his reputation, his integrity were such that his decisive resistance---his single, principled, 'No'---would have stripped the corporate neo-con dreams of war of their feeble semblance of plausibility. Press, public and politicos would have slapped their foreheads and said---My God, he's right! What are we thinking? What are we doing?
In a fond dream (and conversation with my mother), I imagine a different scenario at the U.N.. Powell has been introduced, and the U.N. representatives are waiting expectantly. He does not yet speak, however. Rather, he sits, head bent, looking down at the sheaf of lies that is the speech he is about to give. Finally, he lifts his head, squares his shoulders, and looks about him. And he says:
Mr. President and Mr. Secretary General, and distinguished colleagues. I came here with the aim of convincing you that Iraq's failure to disarm in accord with U.N. Security Council Resolution 1441 has given us all an overriding and compelling reason to impose the serious consequences that this resolution makes room for. But I find that I cannot, in good conscience, proceed with this aim. For in truth, having carefully considered the evidence, I do not think that there is sufficient ground for believing that Iraq is in material breach of this resolution. And as a military man, who is all too familiar with the terrible consequences of war, I cannot advocate for war against any country, unless I believe both that it is warranted on grounds of serious offense, and that all other options for eradicating said offense have been exhausted.
In truth, in my best judgement, an invasion of Iraq is neither warranted on grounds of imminent threat of WMD, nor to the extent that we require assurance as regards possible creation and implementation of such, is there reason to believe that we have arrived at the requisite position of last resort. My honor and integrity, not to mention the lives of those countless soldiers and civilians who will be irrevocably affected by the decision to invade, prevent me from participating any further in this administration's headstrong and---let us be frank---utterly foolhardy rush to war.
I hereby resign as Secretary of State. Thank you very much.
Silly, perhaps, but think about it. That's probably all it would have taken.
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