NATO stands at a crossroads: the 26-member alliance is simultaneously engaged in the most difficult military mission it has ever undertaken – its first ever ground war – while also undergoing pressure to transform itself in an uncertain world. In particular, NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan is being widely held up as the ultimate test of the Alliance in its post-Cold War incarnation. Success in Afghanistan, it is claimed, will also secure the future of the alliance, while failure could lead to a muted 60th anniversary next year and even an end to NATO itself.
Five years on, and still we have not learnt. With each anniversary, the steps crumble beneath our feet, the stones ever more cracked, the sand ever finer. Five years of catastrophe in Iraq and I think of Churchill, who in the end called Palestine a "hell-disaster".
Let's face it - we were conned. Iraq had no WMDs and no links to Al Qaeda. Saddam Hussein never tried to purchase uranium from Niger or steel rods for centrifuges. There was no threat - and the Bush administration and its allies knew it. They were clever, though. In the months preceding the invasion, we were drenched with drip-drip propaganda from the White House, the State Department and the Pentagon.
Devastation on the ground and largely held Iraqi opinion contradicts claims by U.S. officials that the situation in Iraq has improved towards the fifth anniversary of the invasion Mar. 20. U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney, during a surprise visit to Iraq on Monday declared the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq a "successful endeavour".
The following speech was delivered by Chomsky in Massachussetts at an event sponsored by Bikes Not Bombs: Not very long ago, as you all recall, it was taken for granted that the Iraq war would be the central issue in the 2008 election, as it was in the midterm election two years ago. However, it's virtually disappeared off the radar screen, which has solicited some puzzlement among the punditry.
