The forgotten war in Iraq:

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

One thing that always puzzles me about reading about the lead-in to the 2003 war is that there is a complete absence of the issue of the No-Fly Zones in histories of the war written by people who were critics of the Bush Administration during the war at the time.
The thing is that these No-Fly Zones to me are at the same time raising a question of whether or not the first Bush Administration's war with Iraq ever actually needed. For those in need of a refresher on what the No-Fly Zones were, the Iraqi state shortly after the conclusion of Desert Storm faced a mass civilian uprising that happened in direct response to the GHWB Administration's appeal for an uprising. That Administration just sat stone-faced and watched Iraq use poison gas, the same gas it had said jack shit about when used on the Iranian army, used on Iraqi civilians. In response, however, the Administration did create No-Fly Zones in Iraq's north and south.

These regions were areas where the Iraqi Air Force was not allowed to fly its own combat air planes in Iraqi territory, and this was enforced by US military power. A discerning reader might at this point ask "if this is peace, what the Hell is a war?". The No-Fly Zones were a fairly transparent violation of international sovereignty in the case of Iraq, this following a war that at least in theory had been precisely about the right of nations to protect what was within their own borders. The thing is that these No-Fly Zones were not in actual fact abolished by Clinton's Administration.

Instead through the 1990s there were a sequence of crises over disarmament, and no less than three bombing raids, Desert Fox, Desert Strike, and Northern Watch, under Clinton. There was also the http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c105:H.R.4655.ENR: Iraq Liberation Act of 1998. Now, to me this all raises a few clear and present issues when it comes to the 2002-3 war (as counting the No-Fly Zones creates the further reality that the 2003 war was really going on for the fall of 2002 and into 2003, as books written in 2003 noted more than ones written about it now do).

The first such issue is that if people objected to Bush's invasion, where were the objections by these same people to the 1998 act, or to the three bombing raids in the 1990s? It doesn't seem to me that when Clinton authorized bombing that the magic initial in front of the President's name signifying party made the people killed by the Bombs any less dead, did it? It wasn't any less a clear and hostile military act because it was done by a Democrat instead of a Republican, was it? So why, then, is there a complete absence of mention of the Clinton Administration's three raids, and its continuing the policy of the first Bush Administration.

The second is again whether or not the mere survival of the No-Fly Zones means instead of two separate wars with Iraq, there hasn't instead been a Twenty-One Years' War in the Gulf since the USA got there. I mean it's an odd question to me how it is that the United States, which proclaimed itself to be acting somehow in peace could mistake Desert Strike, Desert Wind, and Northern Watch for peace. I'm fairly sure that most countries qualify the mere maintenance of No-Fly Zones as belligerent. So why, then, if 2003 was indeed the grave evil that it was, has Clinton gotten a complete free pass for the bombing raids and crises with Iraq under his Administration? Surely if the issue is Iraq, as opposed to which precise US Administration was presently chancing confrontation with it, there's not much moral difference between occupation with ground troops and occupation via No Fly Zones?

Finally, if there really is some moral evil with regard to the United States' actions in Iraq, why is it that the second Bush Administration's actions are seen as a difference in kind, as opposed to degree, with regard to the Saddam Hussein regime? Surely if the question is one of law or morality there really shouldn't be some kind of supposed gap between the three raids under Clinton and the Bush occupation treated as a matter of kind, that is that what Bush did was objectively worse than what Clinton did. The fundamental gap from boots on the ground or periodic bombing is not really one of such a great gulf as all that. It's simply replacing "soft" methods of war with much "harder" methods.


At least that's how I see it. What do you guys think?

Comments

[dwer.livejournal.com]

I think that there's a difference of at least degree between three bombing raids and an unnecessary invasion, but you're right -- people don't talk enough about what the Clinton administration did.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

The phrasing is one that indicates I would agree to a difference in degree, as the degree-difference *is* rather obvious: boots on the ground and maintaining them v. bombing raids is a night and day difference. However in kind, it's rather difficult to see any differentiation between a permanent No-Fly Zone reinforced by periodic bombing raids and an occupation with boots on the ground. One just seems the more filled-out version of another.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

horsepucky. There was significant opposition to Bush II's invasion long before it actually happened, while it was happening, and after it happened. This wasn't about losing, it was about doing the wrong thing. Note that Obama didn't have to invade Afghanistan to kill Bin Laden, which is all that Bush II really wanted to do with Hussein anyway.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

I have no doubt.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/February_15,_2003_anti-war_protest#United_States

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Why wasn't Clinton criticized? Because he didn't lose large quantities of American lives, treasure, and prestige.

No, Clinton wasn't criticized because he was a) a Democrat who b) wasn't viewed as ignoring the UN and/or international opinion. The Iraq War of 2003->2011 was comparatively cheap in terms of lives and treasure (Desert Storm cost $60b for one month, nearly $95b in today's dollar - the Iraq War cost about that much on average per year in comparison, and the 4500 troops who perished in Iraq is a very small percentage of the hundreds of thousands stationed there over the years), so it's mostly partisan and ideological in that sense.

If Al Gore had been elected in 2000 instead, we probably still would have ended up at war in Iraq, and we wouldn't be asking these questions.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

I don't buy the "He wasn't criticized because he was a Democrat" thing.

I don't know why not. War is fine when it's your side doing it or it's approved by groups you approve of, generally speaking - it's why Clinton in Iraq and Bosnia is kosher, it's why Obama's picking and choosing is fine, it's why a UN action lead by US forces in 1991 is fine, but when Bush gets an independent coalition, it's bad.

Also, I don't knowhow much Desert Storm cost, but even if it did cost significantly more than OIF on a daily basis, Desert Storm lasted months?

The estimates are $54-60b depending on where your Google search lands, and that's for the actual 6 week thing. The no-fly zone enforcement certainly carried costs as well, but my point was more that war costs money.

Besides that Desert Storm wasn't a Clinton war anyway.

No, but the UN gave its blessing, which absolves a lot. Although Bush 43 was irrationally hated so much that I don't even think that would have made a difference, either, so you may have a point there.

There are just too many holes in this response.

I think you woefully underestimate the blind partisanship that is in play with reactions to how we handled Iraq.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

If Al Gore had been elected in 2000 instead, we probably still would have ended up at war in Iraq, and we wouldn't be asking these questions.

Requires facts totally not in evidence. Al Gore Sr was not a target of Hussein assassins. Gore certainly would have gone to war in Afghanistan, but there was never any legitimate reason to go to war in Iraq, and Gore didn't need to create illegitimate ones.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Gore ran more hawkishly than Bush did (http://www.debates.org/index.php?page=october-11-2000-debate-transcript). The only difference would have been that Gore probably would have been more successful at the UN than Bush was, not that it should matter.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

I dunno, Gore might have resurrected the Iraq Liberation Act after another crisis over disarmament and found it easier to sell a prospect of occupation following the same kind of triumph in Afghanistan that Bush would have gotten (as both would have used Clinton's army to propel one side in a civil war to victory over the other side). Gore would not have linked it to 9/11, in all probability, because there was not one link between the two (however, by contrast, there were much greater links between Iraq and the PLO/Fatah movement going back to 1991). He could have easily built a different pretext for a different war, though in doing so his greater consultation of the American people as a whole would have in turn created a different climate for what would be a very different war (legalistically backed by claims of adhering to law, not quasi-religious idealistic shitstorms ala Woodrow Wilson).

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

I don't see Al Gore going into Iraq after 9/11 linking 2003 to 2001. I could see him doing it by linking it to the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998, but that would create a different rationale for the war than the quasi-religious overtones Woodrow Wilson II: Dumb and Dumberer put into *that* conflict.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Eh, I dunno. There *were* large-scale protests against the war before it started, and there were plenty of voices pointing out that the war would not in fact be a rapid, cheap matter of marching that would pay for itself that were ignored at the time. The thing is that a lot more people who disliked the 2003 war in the USA had said nothing about the 2001 war, indicating that the opposition to the former was about a little more than just Republicans launching wars in hellhole Third World countries.

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

It wasn't about morals or sovereignty. It was about losing.

It was about not allowing our sons and daughters to be used as cannon fodder for a rich mans war.

There was never any doubt we would defeat Saddam's military, crippled by sanctions.


Why wasn't Clinton criticized?

Because he didn't launch an invasion. And he was greatly criticized. Recall the republican moaning when Clinton tried to kill Bin Baden and instead shot a missile into an aspirin factory?

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

So what did the Republicans do about Northern Watch, Desert Strike, and Desert Fox? Was there moaning about that? As that, not the strike aimed at Al-Qaeda, is what's in question here.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

The second is again whether or not the mere survival of the No-Fly Zones means instead of two separate wars with Iraq, there hasn't instead been a Twenty-One Years' War in the Gulf since the USA got there.

Mostly this. The idea that we ever really stopped being engaged in a warlike state with Iraq to begin with is something really questionable if we had wanted to dig into it a bit more in 2002-2003.

There's also the issue of the Safwan Accords, which are what established those no-fly zones for the American forces under 686, which Iraq was clearly and repeatedly violating through the 1990s. That never got nearly enough play.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

It's true that Iraq was continually violating them, but at the same time from an Iraqi POV, if the USA never stopped fighting them, what was the reason for them to stop fighting us? This may also explain why Saddam got rid of his WMDs, as he may have attempted bluffing that he had them as a means to finally reverse the No-Fly Zones and boot the USA out through the UN, as opposed to by military means which he never had the capability to do even with the fourth-largest army in the world that had sustained the longest conventional war of the 20th Century.

I think, too, that Operation Southern Watch, starting in the fall of 2002 should really be seen as the "start" of the Iraq War, in which case the collapse in the land battles all of a sudden is far less surprising and less of a straightforward triumph of ground capability after an endless series of bombing raids dating back into October or sometime then in 2002 into March of 2003. Making Iraq after all in 2003 show much more in common with 1991 than propaganda made it out to have done.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

It's true that Iraq was continually violating them, but at the same time from an Iraqi POV, if the USA never stopped fighting them, what was the reason for them to stop fighting us?

When you lose a war, you don't get to whine about the agreements you make to end it. If they didn't want the no-fly zone enforced, maybe they should have stopped flying. If they didn't want to be bombed, why keep attacking? You have enough of a military history background to understand that.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

Narrative.

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

reading about the lead-in to the 2003 war is that there is a complete absence of the issue of the No-Fly Zones in histories of the war written by people who were critics of the Bush Administration during the war at the time.

Who were you reading?

At a media briefing before Operation Shock and Awe was unleashed, General Tommy Franks announced, “This campaign will be like no other in history.” Maybe he’s right. I’m no military historian, but when was the last time a war was fought like this? After using the “good offices” of UN diplomacy (economic sanctions and weapons inspections) to ensure that Iraq was brought to its knees, its people starved, half a million children dead, its infrastructure severely damaged, after making sure that most of its weapons had been destroyed, in an act of cowardice that must surely be unrivalled in history, the “Coalition of the Willing” (better known as the Coalition of the Bullied and Bought) – sent in an invading army! Operation Iraqi Freedom? I don’t think so. It was more like Operation Let’s Run a Race, but First Let Me Break Your Knees. - Arundhati Roy, May, 2003, "Buy one, get one free"

(as counting the No-Fly Zones creates the further reality that the 2003 war was really going on for the fall of 2002 and into 2003, as books written in 2003 noted more than ones written about it now do).

Oh, wait. Did I misunderstand your first paragraph? Is it that the NFZ's are now ignored but were not in 2003?


where were the objections by these same people to the 1998 act, or to the three bombing raids in the 1990s?

Personally I was patching up a friend who served in desert storm. But I did hear that lament among the veteran antiwar folks often enough during Clinton, and Anti-nam republicans joining in a bit even.


So why, then, is there a complete absence of mention of the Clinton Administration's three raids, and its continuing the policy of the first Bush Administration.

Well, its probably overshadowed. The war started in 1991 and has been going on for 22 years basically, I think we've agreed on this point before.


why, then, if 2003 was indeed the grave evil that it was, has Clinton gotten a complete free pass for the bombing raids and crises with Iraq under his Administration?

Inheriting a bad situation is more sympathetic than actively creating one. Though, there were Clinton critics, more at the time though.

For example, here's an antiwar song written during the no fly zone bombings, written and recorded before Bush, during Clinton:





The fundamental gap from boots on the ground or periodic bombing is not really one of such a great gulf as all that. It's simply replacing "soft" methods of war with much "harder" methods.


You have a point. Every mother who lost children in the NFZ bombings doesn't care if a D or R killed her child.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

1) US military analysis. I'm sure that the opponents of the war certainly mentioned them but only in a context that started 21 January 2001.

2) Yes, in that military analyses recorded Southern Watch as the direct precursor to the 2003 conflict, a point glossed over in subsequent propaganda. That you missed this nuance is not my fault.

3) Any actual citations of this beyond personal anecdotes? I give you credit for consistency, but you, unfortunately, are only one person. Where were the crowds protesting?

4) Or alternately it's not a matter of the war, it's a matter of who starts it, and it's also that same selective amnesia that led to the absence of the Sara Robinsons of the Left claiming that the Obama Administration's direct continuity with Bush's policies marks Democratic fascism.

5) Thank you for the song, it's the first actually germane response to what I asked in this comment.

6) I'm sure that the Iraqi people didn't really notice the difference either way given that the same bombs from the same air force were killing *their* kids in the same way.