And here's a Chomsky interview conducted by MADRE on April 29, 2003, describing the meaning of the US invasion of Iraq in the context of overall US imperial ambitions:
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Quote:
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MADRE: Why did the US invade Iraq?
Well, the official reasons have been riddled with contradictions. One
day the issue was whether Iraq would disarm, even though the UN weapons
inspectors were already virtually disarming Iraq, and could have
continued, if that were really the goal. But one day after the
administration said that disarmament was the "single question," they
changed their minds: disarmament was not enough. The goal was now
"regime change." Then at the Azores summit that Bush and Blair held just
before the invasion, they said that they would invade even if Saddam and
his gang left the country. So "regime change" was not enough either.
Then we heard that the goal was "democracy" in the world. No sane person
could take this charade seriously.
Beyond the charade, however, lies a plausible explanation for the
invasion, connected to the National Security Strategy that the
administration published in September 2002. In that document, the US
basically announced that it intends to rule the world by force forever,
and that it will crush any potential challenge it might perceive. This
is being called Bush’s doctrine of pre-emption, or preventive war. We’ve
seen elements of this before, but the “right” of preventive war has
never been so brazenly claimed. And it’s not enough to announce a
doctrine, you need to establish it, too. That way, people know that you
are serious. Iraq is meant to be an example, a credible threat to the
rest of the world.
MADRE: Why did the Administration choose Iraq as a test case for its new
military doctrine?
Iraq was chosen for two reasons. First, because it was militarily
defenseless, so that the administration could be relatively sure that
there would be few US casualties to sour public opinion on the
operation. In fact, what we’ve seen is less than 150 US military deaths,
compared to thousands of Iraqi soldiers and civilian killed. The US
would have never attacked Iraq if they thought they had any possibility
of defending themselves, just as they won’t attack North Korea because
it has a credible deterrent, namely massed artillery aimed at Seoul.
And secondly, Iraq was chosen because it is important: it has the second
largest proven reserves of oil in the world.
But the main point we have to understand is that Iraq was a trial run.
Iraq was attacked as an experiment, to try to establish a new norm of
preventative war. That means it will be the first - not the last - in a
series of attacks. The next one could be Iran. They might go after
another easy target like Syria or they might go straight after the ones
they are really concerned with because they are independent, meaning
they are not totally under US control. Take the Andean region, for
example. It would take nothing for a public relations firm to build up
a claim that the guerillas in the Andean region are about to destroy the
United States, and therefore in self-defense we have to go in and
establish democracy there.
MADRE: What do you see as the main consequences of this attack?
For months, US intelligence and international affairs specialists have
been informing anyone who wanted to listen that the policies Washington
is pursuing are likely to lead to an increase in terror and the
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, for revenge or simply
deterrence. The US has told the world very frankly that if you want to
prevent us from attacking you, you’d better have a deterrent of some
kind. The deterrent can be terror, it can be weapons of mass
destruction, it can be mass conventional forces as the North Koreans
have, but you better have something. Well, Iraq had nothing, so it was a
fair target for attack. The US was able to just walk in and take it over
after a lot of pretense about how powerful Iraq was. Thanks to the US
stance, we can expect to see a rapid and intense build-up of military
force around the world that will make us all less secure.
There are two ways for Washington to respond to the threats engendered
by its actions and startling proclamations. One way is to try to
alleviate the threats by paying some attention to legitimate grievances,
and by agreeing to become a civilized member of the world community,
with some respect for world order and its institutions. The other way
is to construct even more awesome engines of destruction and domination,
so that any perceived challenge, however remote, can be crushed.
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