Yasmine Zaki's commentary about the war in Iraq was loaded withmistakes, half-truths, and outright lies.
It started in the very first sentence- "Bush ignored the UnitedNations and unilaterally invaded Iraq." This idea of unilateralinvasion is repeated so often, people have come to accept it asfact. Actually, it was not unilateral at all, because 48 countriesparticipated or supported the invasion. Soldiers, sailors, airmenand marines from England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland,Australia, Poland, Spain and Italy all fought in the war. There aretroops from 19 countries in Iraq today. The total population of thecountries that supported Bush's "unilateral" invasion was 1.17billion people, spread across every inhabited continent in theworld.
Ms. Zaki then moves on to talk about how there has been noprogress in Iraq. Eighty five percent of Iraqi towns have agoverning council, and Baghdad has established a central governmentcouncil representing the entire country. The first Iraqi armybattalion will be created this month. The Iraqi police force has32,000 members, and it is expected to grow to twice that size inthe next 18 months. Most of the top 55 most wanted loyalists havebeen captured or killed. Water and electricity has been restored toprewar levels in most of the country, and in some parts, aboveprewar levels. Iraqi hospitals are up and running, and healthcare,is now available to all Iraqis. We do have much to do, but muchprogress is still being made.
The commentary also says we should have gotten the cooperationof the EU and Arab League. We tried. The EU, who has membercountries that profited from Saddam's regime, would not havesupported the war no matter how much recruiting Bush did. And thelast thing the Arabs want is a democracy, that is friendly toAmerica, next door. It is true the Arab League supported us in thefirst Gulf War, but that is because Saddam posed a threat to themas well. But, since that war, he posed no threat to other ArabCountries, so they had no reason to aid us. The President's "lackof diplomacy" was nothing of the sorts-The countries that wanted tosupport us did so, and many Europeans and Arabs, who had much tolose if the US won, did not.
The last paragraph says "cooperation amongst nations is neededto solve international complications." Bush knows this. This is whyhe enlisted the support and the aid of those 19 other countriesthat are in Iraq today. It is not the administration's fault theUN, dominated by anti-American sentiment, refused to cooperate. Toinvade Iraq was not a unilateral move of arrogance on Bush's part,so please stop making it sound as if it was.
Brandon Maas
Sophomore
History Major
