We Are Many: a unique documentary about the Iraq war worldwide protests

Yesterday I went to watch the only screening in Montreal of the documentary about the worldwide protests against the Iraq war on February 15, 2003. The documentary is directed by Amir Amirani.  The main producers are Wael Kabbani & Omid Djalili.

I still don't understand why the producers chose to screen their documentary at the Montreal Just for Laughs festival, because one of the producers, Omid Djalili, is a comedian? It hurts the documentary more than anything else.

I have to admit I was looking forward and waiting to see this movie and think it is a necessary movie.

The documentary lasts one hour and 50 minutes.  It starts with 911 and ends in 2013 with the vote in the UK not to authorize war on Syria. It is well documented and edited.  It describes well the run up to the Iraq war and the social forces that brought us the protests on this unique day of Februray, 15, 2003.

The director and producer had access to the main protagonists in the anti-war movement and to many prominent experts and politicians who voiced their opposition to the war, some before, others, after the war. It has footage of parliamentary sessions about the Iraq war in the UK.

For someone who went to the protests, recalling this moment through the doucmentary can be quite emotional as the documentary succeeds in recreating the context.

The documentary is flawless as long as it stays within the main subject, but it does not stay within the limits of its main subject, and this is an error in my opinion because it misses on some aspects of the Iraq war and the anti-war movement that were not adressed.

The documentary does not adress the failure of the anti-war movement to act on the Libya invasion in particular and the failure of their movement in general.  It does not even mention Libya.

The documentary does not address Israel’s and the Neocons’ role in the push for the war on Iraq.  It even manages to show an Israeli flag in an anti-war protest at the end when Israel’s anti Iraq war protests were marginal.  Israel and its role in this war are totally absent from the movie.

The documentary rightly attributes the vote in UK not to go to war on Syria in 2013 as being a consequence of the changing public mood after the Iraq war. Although this is partial since it is Libya and its Islamist winter that were on the minds during this vote.

The documentary branches to the Arab Spring and the protests in Egypt and tries to establish a link between the Iraq war protests and the 2011 protests in Egypt.  This attempt is unconvincing and part of many attempts to own the Arab Spring. 

Highlights:

Footage of the protests on February 15, 2003.  Although they were insufficient in my opinion.

The resignation of Robin Cook in the house of parliament before the Iraq war vote.

John Le Carre saying about the Iraq war : This is a crime of a century

Bush jocking about Iraq’s WMD at the 2004 Correspondants' dinner association with the press hilarious is a sordid reminder of the complicity of the press in the Iraq war crime.

I recommend this documentary and hope it will gain a larger audience. 

Will Bush Pardon Himself ?

If you have watched the documentary 'taxi to the dark side' you realise that there is very serious ground to incriminate high officials in the Bush administration including Cheney and Rumsfeld, and probably Bush himself.
Consequently, there is very serious ground for a pardon and it will be, as Martin kettle from The Guardian puts it, a lawless outcome to a lawless war.

UPDATE: Report finds Rumsfeld behind detainee abuse

The Torture Files: Prosecuting the Torture Theorists.

It is still pretty much a whisper but the whisper may one day become louder and wider. First Obama promised to review potential war crimes committed by Bush adminstration officials. And now, a new book on torture techniques written and approved by Bush adminstration officials is prompting some name people who participated in the elaboration of the torture procedures at Guantanamo.

"Haynes, Feith, Yoo, Bybee, Gonzalez and - at the apex - Addington, should never travel outside the US, except perhaps to Saudi Arabia and Israel. They broke the law; they violated their professional ethical code. In future, some government may build the case necessary to prosecute them in a foreign court, or in an international court."

Did you notice which countries are heaven for war criminals and torturers ?

Want another Bushism? Bush says official intelligence on Iran doesn't reflect his views!

"But in private conversations with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert last week, the president all but disowned the document, said a senior administration official who accompanied Bush on his six-nation trip to the Mideast. "He told the Israelis that he can't control what the intelligence community says, but that [the NIE's] conclusions don't reflect his own views""
I can't resist. I am posting too much Steve Bell cartoons these days but the man has captured the essence of Bush's visit to the ME more than any journalist, columnist, analyst, etc...

Cartoon from Steve Bell, The Guardian

More on the Filipino Monkey

Al-Qaida attacks Annapolis peace conference

My first thought: Who cares ?
My second thought: that's too much honor for Annapolis.

My two thoughts pulled together: Everything Bush does is a failure and everything Al-Qaida does is a failure too, and each party's media appearances are meant to save the other from its repeated failures.

Thanks the media.

Annapolis Blues

Annapolis blues

For the time being, I am not inclined to post about Annapolis. The whole thing is a farce. Helena Cobban had a very good post yesterday on her blog discussing the Israeli-Palestinian versus the Israeli-Arab conflict, and the near absence of the second from Annapolis. I am only going to contemplate this picture of Abbas (from Reuters) shown escorted and in 'good' hands. The picture alone tells the story of what will happen to the Palestinians at Annapolis.

Uri Avnery delivers a very lucid analysis of the chances for peace resulting from the Annapolis conference.

UPDATE, December 1st, 2007:

From The New York Times: US pulls a UN resolution disliked by Israel.

US withdraws Mideast resolution at UN. Basically because Israel doesn't want to be bound by any UN resolution, and the US is not behaving as a peace broker by acting in compliance with Israel's interests first. Oh, and don't tell me they are concerned by the Palestinians because the Palestinians didn't read the resolution, as the article suggests. That's ridiculous because nobody speaks for the Palestinians at this conference.

Israël relance la construction d'une colonie controversée
LE MONDE | 05.12.07

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Picture found on Angry Arab.

Thousands protest in Jerusalem Against Annapolis

Annapolis is a very crowded conference and I wonder why it needed to be crowded. It looks like Bush, Rice, and Cheney are trying to build yet another coalition.

The greater middle east: the neo-cons' backyard and our graveyard

"This broader Middle East is an ill-defined area extending from Pakistan, through the Horn of Africa to Morocco. Since 9/11 it has become the main theatre for the deployment of US military power and the decisive, even the sole, battlefield in what the US sees as a global conflict. The region's oil resources and strategic position, and the presence of Israel, have made it a US priority, particularly since the French and British began to withdraw after 1956. As Philippe Croz-Vincent has pointed out in a subtle analysis of the "American moment", the Middle East has replaced Latin America as the US backyard (Vertiges de la puissance. Le moment américain au Moyen-Orient, La Découverte, Paris, 2007). But with a major difference: Latin America was never a crucial battlefield in a third world war."

Remembrance Day: Iraq

For Whom and for What soldiers and civilians are falling in Iraq ?

Read this and see for yourself how ugly was the comedy that is behind Iraq's tragedy.

Sarkusconi

Cartoon by Steve Bell (my preferred cartoonist)
"Nicolas Sarkozy may fast make a name for himself on the world stage. Just not the one he wants
Six months in office, and Nicolas Sarkozy has not ceased being an embarrassment on the world stage. From his first appearance at the G8 summit in Germany, where he foolishly called for more delay on Kosovo - a move that courtesy forced his new partners to support - to his fawning visit to Washington this week, France's president is making waves for the wrong reasons. Headstrong and unreflective, Sarkozy risks making an ass of himself."

September 11th, Bush, Petraeus, and The Spin From Iraq

"The general's campaign in the Senate will continue Tuesday, on the sixth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. He will appear in the morning before the foreign affairs committee, in the afternoon before the military committee, and finally Wednesday before the press. The talk in the White House is of "closing arguments."

The date for Tuesday's appearance was selected completely consciously. Bush's strategists probably know that each senator will refer to 9/11 today and thereby help to link the 2001 attacks and Iraq together in people's minds -- despite the lack of any proven connection."

Spiegel interview with US military historian Gabriel Kolko: "The US will loose war regardless what it does"

SPIEGEL: How would you describe the situation of the Bush White House today? What options does it have?

KOLKO: The Bush Administration suffers from a fatal dilemma. Its Iraq adventure is getting steadily worse, the American people very likely will vote the Republicans out of office because of it, and the war is extremely expensive at a time that the economy is beginning to present it with a major problem. The president's poll ratings are now the worst since 2001. Only 33 percent of the American public approve of his leadership and 58 percent want to decrease the number of American troops immediately or quickly. Fifty-five percent want legislation to set a withdrawal deadline. In Afghanistan, as well, the war against the Taliban is going badly, and the Bush Administration's dismal effort to use massive American military power to remake the world in a vague, inconsistent way is failing. The US has managed to increasingly alienate its former friends, who now fear its confusion and unpredictability. Above all, the American public is less ready than ever to tolerate Bush's idiosyncrasies.

SPIEGEL: What went wrong? Was the war doomed from the very beginning? How can the US military and the US government which is spending $3 billion per week in Iraq be losing the war?

KOLKO: ... Political conflicts are not solved by military interventions, and that they are often incapable of being resolved by political or peaceful means does not alter the fact that force is dysfunctional. This is truer today than ever with the spread of weapons technology. Washington refuses to heed this lesson of modern history.

Also, Juan Cole's lenghty analysis on how the present situation in Iraq will affect US politics for a long time to come and block any reasonable alternative to stagnation in a state of war or escalation.

Countdown To War On Iran

Probably many of you have already seen this article and read it but It is worth mentioning again for its clarity, objectivity, and Fact-Truth content. From Alain Gresh, Le Monde Diplomatique, June 2007.

Excerpts

Us foments unrest and spurns overtures

Faced with more US troops, many armed Iraqi groups have gone to ground ­ for the moment. Others manipulate US troops to do their dirty work for them. The US has failed to create a political settlement and appears to be blind to its own lack of progress

Silently, stealthily, unseen by cameras, the war on Iran has already begun. Many sources confirm that the United States, bent on destabilising the Islamic Republic, has increased its aid to armed movements among the Azeri, Baluchi, Arab and Kurdish ethnic minorities that make up about 40% of the Iranian population. ABC News reported in April that the US had secretly assisted the Baluchi group Jund al-Islam (Soldiers of Islam), responsible for a recent attack in which some 20 members of the Revolutionary Guard were killed. According to an American Foundation report (1), US commandos have operated inside Iran since 2004...

President George Bush categorised Iran, along with North Korea and Iraq, as the “axis of evil” in his State of the Union address in January 2002. Then in June 2003 he said the US and its allies should make it clear that they “would not tolerate” the construction of a nuclear weapon in Iran.

It is worth recalling the context in which these statements were made. President Mohammed Khatami had repeatedly called for “dialogue among civilisations”. Tehran had actively supported the US in Afghanistan, providing many contacts that Washington had used to facilitate the overthrow of the Taliban regime. At a meeting in Geneva on 2 May 2003 between Javad Zaraf, the Iranian ambassador, and Zalmay Khalilzad, Bush’s special envoy to Afghanistan, the Tehran government submitted a proposal to the White House for general negotiations on weapons of mass destruction, terrorism and security, and economic cooperation (2). The Islamic Republic said it was ready to support the Arab peace initiative tabled at the Beirut summit in 2002 and help to transform the Lebanese Hizbullah into a political party. Tehran signed the Additional Protocol to the Non-Proliferation Treaty on 18 December 2003, which considerably strengthens the supervisory powers of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) but which only a few countries have ratified.

The US administration swept all these overtures aside since its only objective is to overthrow the mullahs. To create the conditions for military intervention, it constantly brandishes “the nuclear threat”. Year after year US administrations have produced alarmist reports, always proved wrong. In January 1995 the director of the US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency said Iran could have the bomb by 2003, while the US defence secretary, William Perry, predicted it would have the bomb by 2000. These forecasts were repeated by Israel’s Shimon Peres a year later. Yet last month, despite Iran’s progress in uranium enrichment, the IAEA considered that it would be four to six years before Tehran had the capability to produce the bomb.

What is the truth? Since the 1960s, long before the Islamic revolution, Iran has sought to develop nuclear power in preparation for the post-oil era. Technological developments have made it easier to pass from civil to military applications once the processes have been mastered. Have Tehran’s leaders decided to do so? There is no evidence that they have. Is there a risk that they may? Yes, there is, for obvious reasons.

During the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, Saddam Hussein’s regime, in breach of every international treaty, used chemical weapons against Iran, but there was no outcry in the US, or in France, against these weapons of mass destruction, which had a traumatic effect on the Iranian people. US troops are deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Iran is surrounded by a network of foreign military bases. Two neighbouring countries, Pakistan and Israel, have nuclear weapons. No Iranian political leader could fail to be aware of this situation.

How to prevent escalation?
...Contrary to common assumptions, the main obstacle is not Tehran’s determination to enrich uranium. Iran has a right to do so under the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty but it has always said it was prepared to impose voluntary restrictions on that right and to agree to increased IAEA inspections to prevent any possible use of enriched uranium for military purposes.

The Islamic Republic’s fundamental concern lies elsewhere. Witness the agreement signed on 14 November 2004 with France, Britain and Germany, under which Iran agreed to suspend uranium enrichment temporarily on the understanding that a long-term agreement would “provide firm commitments on security issues”. Washington refused to give any such commitments and Iran resumed its enrichment programme.

The European Union chose not to pursue an independent line but to follow Washington’s lead. The new proposals produced by the five members of the Security Council and Germany in June 2006 contained no guarantee of non-intervention in Iranian affairs. In Tehran’s reply to the proposals, delivered in August, it again “suggest[ed] that the western parties who want to participate in the negotiation team announce on behalf of their own and other European countries, to set aside the policy of intimidation, pressure and sanctions against Iran”. Only if such a commitment was made could negotiations be resumed.

If not, escalation is inevitable. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s election as president in June 2005 has not made dialogue any easier, given his taste for provocative statements, particularly about the Holocaust and Israel. But Iran is a big country rich in history and there is more to it than its president. There is much tension within the government and Ahmadinejad had severe setbacks both in the local elections and in elections to the Assembly of Experts in December 2006. There are substantial challenges, economic and social, and forceful demands for more freedom, especially among women and young people. Iranians refuse to be regimented and the only strong card the regime has to win their loyalty is nationalism, a refusal to accept the kind of foreign interference suffered throughout the 20th century.

Despite the disaster in Iraq, there is no indication that Bush has given up the idea of attacking Iran. This is part of his vision of a “third world war” against “Islamic fascism”, an ideological war that can end only in complete victory...

Archives:
Ali Akbar Velayati: 'Iran Strives Only for Security'

The Mandchurian candidate: Who is Nicolas Sarkozy ?

According to Le Monde, the video below has been circulating since November 2006 on the French blogosphere. French bloggers have even edited the video because they were not able to verify the highly incriminating passages concerning Sarkozy's past. The fact that his parents were Nazi collaborators. There is mention of this suspicion on this magyar website.
Sarkozy comes from an aristocratic Hungarian family who fled Hungary for France, probably to escape persecutions for collaborating with the nazi regime. Among other corpses unburied from sarkozy's past is his direct responsibility in hiding the radioactive pollution in France during the Tchernobyl catastrophe. I remember very well this episode. At the time we were living in France and my daughter was 18 months old. There was some worry for children's food like cow milk and cheese. The French government issued a statement denying any pollution. My husband and I visited his cousin in Italy during the same period and in Italy there was a ban on fresh milk. We wondered why in France it was all O.K. when over the border there was a ban ? We were really worried for our baby daughter. My husband joked at the time by telling me that the radioactive cloud stopped at the French border.

Sarkozy was responsible at the time for chemical and radioactive pollution and threat, and it was he who decided that the truth must be hidden from the French people. Of course later, it was officially aknowledged that there was pollution in the vegetation and consequently the cattle in eastern and southern France.

As for Sarkozy's parents collaboration with nazis, I find it ironic that Politicians whose parents collaborated with the Nazis are the most submissive to the Israel lobby. Bush's grandfather is known to have breached an official US ban on commercial dealings with nazi Germany and he could have been tried for treason. There is actually a law suit from holocaust survivors, at least two families, against the Bush family. It is also known that the Bush family fortune was made this way. In the 'Inside Man', director Spike Lee shows us the picture of the Bush family in the bakground of the final scene when the New York financier is forced to reveal to the policeman his dealings with the nazis, as well as illegal possession of diamonds having belonged to deported Jewish families. Sarkozy, despite being catholic, says that his mother was a jew converted to catholicism. I am surprised by the number of people who compete for the high office and who reveal during their campaign that one of their parents was actually Jew. Remember John Kerry ?

What is more ironic is that this kind of people, along with fundamentalist Christians who prefigure the end of the Jewsih people in the Apocalypse, provide now the strongest support for the state of Israel. And the state of Israel, since its foundation, has never refused a fruitful collaboration with nazis and ex-nazis. Now, I don't really know if Sarkozy de Nagy Bosca's (his real name) family were really Nazi collaborators but given the kind of servile support of Sarko for Israel, I will not be surprised that this kind of support is actually the only choice left for Sarkozy if he wants to have a high profile political career. This means that the US before, and now as France probably will, have presidents who can easily be blackmailed by zionists. This is not to excuse Bush and Sarkozy for their families past dealings with nazis but to highlight that citizens must not choose for the high office someone who is already doomed and whose only choice is servility toward a foreign power. We are ruled by Mandchurian candidates.

Bilan de 5 ans de Sarkozy
Uploaded by sarkophage

Random Thoughts on Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq

I was feeling some blog fatigue and wasn't going to blog for a while. Then I read that Bush wanted more time for his 'new strategy' in Iraq. It reminded me of Israel last summer when it was asking the US, UK and the international community for more time to crush Hezbollah. Instead, it crushed Lebanon's economy, seashore, half of its roads, bridges, houses, buildings, and orchards, killed thousand civilians, made refugees of about 30% of the population and went home leaving Lebanon with postdated cluster bombs, profound divisions, and Hezbollah with a 'divine victory'. Both Bush and Olmert remind me of failing students, you know those ones who, having prepared badly for the exam, sit in front of their white paper the last five minutes when everybody else is done, hoping to deliver !

While Bush, not recognising his defeat, is staying hopeful, Olmert is engaging his countrymen and women in byzantine discussions about the lost war in Lebanon, whose only virtue is to divert Israeli citizens attention from the real issues facing Israel after this war.
What are the issues facing Israel immediately ?
The failure of its leadership in war;
The failure of its leadership in peace (Israel declared it will not discuss with the new Palestinian unity government when most European countries and the US have shown their will to engage).
What are the questions debated in Israel right now ?
Was the attack on Lebanon an operation or a war ?
Giving a name to this war.
Protecting Darfur refugees and pointing out Human rights violations in Darfur.

And as Raptors always hunt in pair, Israel is supported in this Darfur effort by US and French zionists (Nicholas Kristof in the US and BHL in France are leading the efforts). In France, Bernard-Henri Lévy (BHL), who has just embarked, courageousely and bare chested, on his latest humanitarian cause, is leading a pack summoning French presidential candidates to sign an engagement for action in the Darfur crisis.

And because we are becoming numb to HUman rights violations, not only in Darfur, but everywhere, the main result of the Darfur media frenzy will be to divert the world's attention from noticing one more effort, in a long list of political compromises and progresses made by the Palestinians to stop the economic embargo from achieving a total isolation, erosion and disintegration of their lands, people and society. The new Palestinian unity government, in addition to being a unity (Fatah-Hamas) government, has given 25% of minsteries to independants from neither parties including four key ministeries, Interior, Information, Finance, and Foreign Affairs. But once again, BHL and other zionists will fail to notice, and once again, Israel won't talk to this government and will be hiding from reprieve behind a good cause; Darfur. Every time the Palestinians show their good will, Israel finds an excuse to look Elsewhere by instigating, through its zionist allies, a media frenzy about where the west should look and what its priorities should be . Israel and zionists are in an active state of denial.

There is a civil war in Darfur and the western media and Israel want us to believe that the Muslims are waging this war against the southern sudanese populations with the implicit blessing of the government for ethnic reasons. But there is another narrative to this story, Sudanese oil. Sudan, like the Middle East, is blessed with oil and cursed with oil.

And as long as I will be reading this kind of news everyday, my indignation at USrael's criminal wars against the people of Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq, and the entire Middle East, will never fade. There is no room for blog fatigue on this blog.

Watch here a video on the children of Baghdad, Iraq (not of interest to Mr BHL's humanitarian preoccupations because their misery results from Mr. BHL's friends policies in the ME)

Good Night and Good Luck.

George Bush demande "plus de temps" pour sa nouvelle stratégie en Irak
LE MONDE | 20.03.07

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Israël-Hezbollah : la guerre qui ne dit pas son nom
LE MONDE | 20.03.07

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You have to excuse Le Monde, they don't know that Israel's war was on Lebanon and not on Hezbollah ! Another subject for my indignation, the western press's pro-zionist biases.

Les Occidentaux renouent le contact avec le gouvernement palestinien
LEMONDE.FR | 21.03.07

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Le premier ministre palestinien a présenté son gouvernement au président Abbas
LEMONDE.FR | 15.03.07

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Composition du nouveau gouvernement d'union palestinien
LEMONDE.FR | 15.03.07

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Palestine : des indépendants aux ministères-clés
LE MONDE | 15.03.07

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Un meeting à Paris pour interpeller les présidentiables sur le Darfour
LEMONDE.FR | 20.03.07

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Iraq's Oil: The Leaked Document

Via Angry Arab

Find the link to the document at Raed Jarrar's website as well as Raed's comments on the new law for Iraqi oil and other resourceful links. In a nutshell, the law gives Iraqi oil to private foreign compagnies and strips the country from its main and much needed revenue, in addition to institutionnalising the inequalities and the division of Iraq along oil related geographical sectarian lines,therefore fueling poverty, anger, and terrorism...

How The Israel Lobby Operates in the US: A Practical Example

I found this link on Angry Arab this morning. I was just telling my husband over a breakfast made of Chocolat chaud aztèque and Lebanese pastries (Maamoul)* that one thing is puzzling me in the Bush presidency: not once the citizens of the US or their representatives asked this man what has he done for his country and for its citizens during his six year presidency ? The answer is Nothing. Nada.

But when I read this article I understood a little better why Bush has done nothing for his country. The Bush presidency, more than any other, and because of the influence of the Neocons, was dedicated to Israel and its colonialist hegemonic policies in the ME at the expense of the citizens of the US. It has always been like that but Bush really forgot that there are citizens after all in the country he presides over, except when it comes to sending troops to attack a country that never posed any threat to the US. I was dismayed to read how the Israel lobby operates inside washington in ways not even accessible to US citizens, except big money of course.

I mean how could elected representatives sell themselves to a foreign power and feed its greed on the expense of their own citizens ?

''The pro-Israel lobby does most of its work without publicity. But every member of Congress and every would-be candidate for Congress comes to quickly understand a basic lesson. Money needed to run for office can come with great ease from supporters of Israel, provided that the candidate makes certain promises, in writing, to vote favorably on issues considered important to Israel. What drives much of congressional support for Israel is fear – fear that the pro-Israel lobby will either withhold campaign contributions or give money to one's opponent.''

*Not a breakfast recommended for dieting but it is minus 18 here in Canada, felt as minus 27 with the windshill, it gives some extra calories to go outside.

Francis Fukuyama: 2008 And the End of NeoCons History

In an interview with Le Monde's Daniel Vernet, Francis Fukuyama, the Author of 'The End of History', contends that forces of moderation and realists inside the Republican and the Democratic parties are already operating center stage in Washington and that the only obstacle to a real change in policy concerning Iraq is in the American constitution that gives full power to the president when it comes to foreign policy. The only way opponents to Bush's foreign policy can act is through a vote on the budget but here again, Fukuyama explains, politicians are reluctant to vote against sending support to the army out of fear of being labeled as anti-patriotic. And he concludes that we must wait until 2008 in order to see a real foreign policy change in Washington.
Here is an excerpt from the interview translated from French:

Q: Is the ''New Strategy'' of president Bush for Iraq really new or is it just the same old policy in a different form ?
F.F: It is the old strategy applied, this time, to a new situation. This is why it is not going to work. The assumption that drives this strategy is that we have in Baghdad a democratic government, beyond religious sectarianism, which is being attacked by forces representing the diverging interests of diverse religious sects. The official objective is that we have to militaryly support this government. One can see that this line of thinking is erroneous. Maliki's government is part of the religious sectarian conflict. It represents communities struggling to achieve domination in the balance of power in Iraq. The hidden objective of the new plan for Iraq is to defeat the clan of Moqtada Al-Sadr. Here again the problem is that Al-Sadr clan represents the most powerful community in Iraq. It is very difficult to inflict a military defeat on a sizeable part of the population.

Q: Do you consider what is going on in Iraq as a civil war ?
F.F: There is a stupid debate going in the US on the technical definition of a civil war. I believe that what we have in Iraq is a multidimensional conflict, a struggle to size power along sectarian religious and ethnic lines.

Q: How do you explain that the president and his advisors seem not to understand the real nature of the conflict ?
F.F: Despite the results of last elections and the critiques targeting this administration, there is an incapacity to recognise reality as it is. One of the most significant moments in this regard was a declaration made by president Bush during a farewell reception given for Rumsfeld's departure from the Pentagon. Bush said at the reception that the invasion of Iraq represented a formidable surge in the history of human freedom. That gives the impression that the president lives in a different world.

Q: Is it ideological blindness ?
F.F: In Bush's last speech, we have all this rethoric taken from WWII like ''There are there democratic forces who are waiting for our help...''

Q: Senator Kennedy said that Iraq was George Bush's Vietnam. Is he right ?
F.F: Yes, in a certain way. Iraq is, without any doubt, the biggest foreign policy disaster since Vietnam.

Q: Liberals, including some American liberals, are making comparisons between Muslim fundamentalism and Communiusm, between the present War on Terror and the Cold War...
F.F: I believe that we have exaggerated the strategic threat of 9/11 and that this was an error. After 9/11, there was only some two to three dozen persons in the whole world capable of conducting terror operations inside the US and ready to do so. The result of our poor management of the aftermath of 9/11 is a self fulfilling prophecy. The parallel made between the present situation and the cold war is dubious. Islam is not comparable to Communism and Muslim fundamentalism is a more complex issue. It is more of a cultural issue than an ideological threat. The political discourse making parallels between Muslim fundamentalism and the Communist threat during the cold war is tailored to mobilise opinions around president Bush's projects and vision, but it represents, at the same time, an obstacle to understand the problems this kind of vision is tackling.

Q: What is the measure of the responsibility of your old friends, the NeoCons, in this vision ? What went wrong in Iraq ? Was it the war itself or the way it was done ? Your last book is titled 'Where the NeoCons come from' but my question is what will become of them ?
F.F: They are still around. They have followers. They also have an influence in this administration. The president consulted with them before announcing his new plan for Iraq to the nation on January 10th. However, I believe that after 2008, their time will be gone. The problem is the war itself. It was certainly poorly managed but the concept in itself is flawed. I am outraged by the fact that this flawed policy is being applied to Lebanon and Iran in the absence of any will to learn from the Iraqi adventure. The NeoCons are pushing for the bombardment of Iran's nuclear sites. This is simply madness.

Q: Do you think the president is going to take the decision to bomb Iran ?
F.F: I heard that Bush is going to do it just to show his determination, despite and against the public opinion.

In the same interview Fukuyama said that only Bush and Lieberman think that the US must bomb Iran's nuclear facilities.

On Bush and reality read The Osterley Times: 'Bush continues to think that he can create his own reality'.

Zbigniew Brzezinski on Bush's New plan for Iraq

''The decision to escalate the level of the U.S. military involvement while imposing "benchmarks" on the "sovereign" Iraqi regime, and to emphasize the external threat posed by Syria and Iran, leaves the administration with two options once it becomes clear -- as it almost certainly will -- that the benchmarks are not being met. One option is to adopt the policy of "blame and run": i.e., to withdraw because the Iraqi government failed to deliver. That would not provide a remedy for the dubious "falling dominoes" scenario, which the president so often has outlined as the inevitable, horrific consequence of U.S. withdrawal. The other alternative, perhaps already lurking in the back of Bush's mind, is to widen the conflict by taking military action against Syria or Iran. It is a safe bet that some of the neocons around the president and outside the White House will be pushing for that. Others, such as Sen. Joseph Lieberman, may also favor it.''

Bush's latest plan for Iraq

More of the same, writes Pierre Tristam in his Candide's Notebooks, and even worse. As time goes by, the problems of the occupied and the occupiers are becoming inextricable, and the political landscape deprived from real alternatives.

''The question now is what to do with a pair of broken nations—ours as well as Iraq, and whether it will be possible to extricate one from the other without blazing up more conflagrations than we’ll put out. The mere fact that the president is being given prime-time deference is indication that even now, the nation is more complicit in his crime than willing to prosecute it, let alone prosecute him. We keep expecting a miracle, although even a resignation speech would not do. Look at what would replace him.''

Well, actually, Bush's new plan is not exactly quite more of the same. In addition to the 20000 US soldiers who will be sent to Baghdad to 'consolidate' security there, Bush wants schools to be painted in Iraq. School painting ! Don't you find this bizarre when we know that Iraqi children have nothing to eat.

Well, it is not that bizarre as a project, Bush must have picked this up at MSN Home.
''Paint is by far the easiest and fastest way to perk up a tired house. Nothing will please you or your neighbors more than a well-chosen (and well-applied) coat of fresh color. A full exterior paint job isn't exactly the easiest project, but just about anyone can do it, and the rewards are immediate and dramatic.''

Yes, paint Iraq's schools, and Iraqis, and their neighbors, will feel less miserable. Bush also will feel less miserable. By now he might be already busy consulting this site trying out the colours. That's a difficult decision to take; the colours of the New Iraq ! And he's got a serious problem on his hands trying out the colours. Nothing will be strong enough to hide the colour Red, the present colour of Iraq, the colour of the blood running out from the veins of those who are slaughtered daily. Unless Bush chooses Black, the colour of mourning. Definitely, the only way for Bush to fix things in Iraq is to leave it alone, and to mourn, with his neo-con friends, the few glorious days of CNN and Fox news coverage of Operation Iraqi Freedom in march 2003 before hell broke out, and before Iraq became everybody's nightmare...

Slavoj Zizek on Bush, Saddam, and Other Murderous Dictators

Read Slavoj Zizek at his best in 'Denying the Facts, Finding the Truth'.

''The violent outbursts of the recent Bush politics are thus not exercises in power, but rather exercises in panic.''

''...why was there little talk of delivering Saddam Hussein or, say, Manuel Noriega to The Hague? Why was the only trial against Mr. Noriega for drug trafficking, rather than for his murderous abuses as a dictator? Was it because he would have disclosed his past ties with the C.I.A.?
In a similar way, Saddam Hussein’s regime was an abominable authoritarian state, guilty of many crimes, mostly toward its own people. However, one should note the strange but key fact that, when the United States representatives and the Iraqi prosecutors were enumerating his evil deeds, they systematically omitted what was undoubtedly his greatest crime in terms of human suffering and of violating international justice: his invasion of Iran. Why? Because the United States and the majority of foreign states were actively helping Iraq in this aggression. ''