3 Good Reasons Why You Should Be Against Bombing Iraq

As the media breaks into full war propaganda mode, airing the likes of Dick Cheney all across the headlines as if he still had any credibility, it seems like they will stop at no length to get the US military back into a brutal civil war again in the Middle East. The media has even invoked the all too familiar WMD threat that was played the second time we went into Iraq. Just like Ol’ G.W.’s famous quote, “Fool me once shame on…shame on you”, the media may be trying to fool us for a third time into another quixotic mission to fix a dangerous regional upheaval, much of which is of our own making. Many have speculated about why our government really wanted to go into Iraq in the first place: oil, resources, pipelines and the military-industrial-complex.

Besides the reasons they may have started these wars, here are three good reasons why we shouldn’t bomb Iraq:

1. We’ve been in Iraq for over 30 years

You read that right: 30 years if not longer. Many people don’t know that we were backing the brutal dictator Saddam Hussein shortly after he came to power in 1979. In fact, new documents show that the US government helped Saddam use chemical weapons against Iran and his own citizens in the 1980s.

Then, once our foreign policy failed, US-Iraq tension in the region grew until it culminated in the Persian Gulf War in the early 90s. A war which America ‘won’ but that ultimately accomplished nothing, as another war was on the horizon for the US and Iraq.

This brings us to our current situation: a post ‘Iraqi Liberated’ Levant, one that’s been so destabilized by Western backed corporate imperialism that it’s hard to tell who’s our friend and who’s our enemy. In fact, before ISIS(L) militants began attacking targets in Iraq, they were on the US side of the civil war in Syria, benefiting from training and equipment (weapons) from Western backed sources.

The puppet regime that was propped up by the US has shown to be yet another undemocratic dictatorship, causing much of the sectarian tension that is currently fueling the rebel’s advance and momentum.

Then we have to ask ourselves: how have we, in any way, made Iraq better? Well besides securing oil fields for ‘Big Oil’ and several billion for Dick Cheney’s Halliburton and friends who made at least $128 billion from the Iraq War, the situation in Iraq –as evidenced by the current upheaval– has gotten nothing but worse since the US began it’s nation building and meddling 30 years ago. Maybe it’s time to learn our lesson and sit this one out.

2. For less than the $2.2 trillion+ the Iraq War has cost us, we could have solved world hunger many times over.

“Virtually no one is talking about the very realistic expense of literally solving world hunger. An overall expense that has been calculated to be about $30 billion per year. To put that into perspective for you, the US military spent $737 billion on ‘military defense’ in 2012.” –Story Leak

Activist and comedian Lee Camp explains it rather well:

3. Detroit is crumbling, yet we have money to engage in another war?

The quiet but numerically powerful anti-war movement has slowly become the mainstream American opinion on foreign policy. Recent polling shows that Americans at large want the military to pull back from engagements overseas in favor of spending the money to rebuild our failing infrastructure back at home. Graph via Pew Research Center And there are reasons to be concerned, 150,000 Detroit residents are literally about to have their water shut off because they can’t afford to pay their bills. The U.N. has even said this mass shut-off of water in Detroit “violates human rights”. In some cases children are even removed from their parents after having the water shut-off in this disaster that could be solved.

Yet –at the same time– the US has increased it’s military aid to Iraq, sent billions to the brand new ‘democracy’ in Ukraine, and President Obama has just asked for 500 billion to send to rebel fighters in Syria (who are coincidentally aligned with ISIS fighters in the region). The total amount owed in Detroit for overdue water bills is $90 million. For about .0001% of America’s $737 billion defense budget, all of Detroit’s overdue water bills could be paid.

Detroit is just an example of the bleak picture of the country overall though, as our economy continues to be raided for corporate imperialism around the world and banker bailout are still the name of the game. 1 in 6 goes hungry in America, while billions are sent off to fight wars with no end or feasible objective. Do you think the government may have its priorities confused?

About the Author:

Nick Bernabe is the owner and lead editor of the website TheAntiMedia.org, an activist, blogger, and the original founder and spokesman of the March Against Monsanto movement. He is also a guest contributor to The Mind Unleashed. Please follow his Facebook page by clicking here.

Featured image credits: imgur.com