The origination of the Iraq war
Writing by abuhatem on Saturday, 27 of October , 2007 at 12:37 am
How did the war in Iraq originate?
It originated, unapologetically, the way most U.S. foreign policies originate - through policy think tanks composed of intellectual policy makers. Our government works through these policy think-tanks.
The neo-conservative movement is the major ideology behind the American Enterprise Institute - the policy institute which formulated the Iraq war. The head intellectuals which crafted Iraq policy were Richard Perle, Norman Podhorentz, Irving Kristol, and Robert Kagan were three of many intellectuals who signed a letter to President Bush in 2002 urging war with Iraq. In fact, Robert Kagan, an intellectual who’s father is a Yale professor and brother is a professor of International Relations, spoke to President Bush this past January when advising him about the surge strategy - and the Washington Post reported that it was Kagan who finally got Bush’s ear. Thus, it is important to know these people.
Now, “neoconservativism,” is not necessarily the devil. Democracies obviously consist of different people joining different political ideologies and advancing them in what they believe is for the public’s good and benefit. However, one must understand what exactly the neo-Conservative ideology stands on. You cannot dumb yourself down to only relying on the arguments of political pundits and ideologies whose shallowness rarely consists of the scholarly substance of those who really make our policy. Those who really make our policy are intellectuals in think-tanks who Congress and the President borrow when attempting to create legislation and policy based on their political ideologies.
International relations scholar John J. Mearsheimer does a good job in describing the neo-Conservative ideology in terms of foreign policy in this article while comparing it to the another theoretical perspective of international relations called “realism,” which Mearsheimer subscribes to. Mearsheimer in his recent work, the controversial The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy places the intellectual neoconservatives of the AEI as part of the “Israel lobby,” which they say is made up of Israeli lobbying organizations, neoconservatives, and Christian zionists (such as the CUFI group lead by John Hagee, conservative Christian minister). All of these groups agree on two things: the need for immense U.S. support of Israel, and support for the war in Iraq (one major reason of which was to support Israel’s interests - as well as to spread Democracy to the Middle East (as par the neoconservative belief in the Democratic Peace Theory especially highlighted in its chief intellectual - Francis Fukayama’s concept of the end of history), the so-called claim of Weapons of Mass Destruction and American security (which, even if you give the benefit of the doubt was not the only or even central reason for the war - as even top officials in the administration claimed after the war began), and the possibility of the oft-repeated mantra of “oil,” which is usually raised by the cooky and radical left, but who knows… (hey! if Alan Greenspan can mention it, then who knows!)
An interesting book to show people how public policy is actually made in the United States is Top Down Policy Making by Professor Thomas Dye, one of the most important public intellectuals of the past fifty years. Due to constitutional restraints of government through checks and balances our policy is made up through compromise between the major institutions of the government: the President and Executive Bureaucracy, the Congress, the courts, and state and local governments - with major influence from major institutions such as corporations, Lobbies, scientists, researchers and think-tanks. Think-tanks take the role of actually formulating a smart policy which will work.
The major think-tanks in Washington are The Council on Foreign Relations, one which is so aligned with the government that Dwight Eisenhour chaired one of its groups, policy-mastermind George Kennan - the formulator of anti-Soviet foreign policy during the Cold War - was one of its members, and Henry Kissinger - former U.S. Secretary of State - was also a member. Another major policy think tank, the moderate Brookings Institute, was crucial in formulating many of Bill Clinton’s policy iniatives. The other two think-tanks: The Heritage Foundation and The American Enterprise Institute hail from the conservative perspective, the AEI being from the neoconservative perspective in particular.
Another major factor in pushing the Iraq war was the media, something that American journalist and former Lyndon Johnson staffer Bill Moyers illustrated in his documentary, Buying the War. The media barely asked any questions in the entire run-up to the Iraq conflict basically giving the university a “blank check,” in going to war and shaping public opinion to be remarkable pro-war.
However, I do not believe this was a media conspiracy, contrary to the whisperings of the shallow in intellect - but instead a falling out on the media’s part. This is something that Dan Rather, and others in the media have stated. The administration also used and manipulated the media, especially after 9/11, to push these stories - but I will leave the explanation of all of this to Moyers.
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