The International Writers Magazine: Reality Check

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Iraq - The New Iran • James Campion General Petraeus Hands Baby Bush A Tehran Surprise Go find the young men never to fight again Bring up the banners from the days gone by Sweet moderation Heart of this nation Desert us not, we are Between the wars. - Billy Bragg

I've been thinking about Billy Bragg lately, his song about the cycle of international chess the Big Boys play, and how after five years of this military abortion in Iraq we are no closer to anything resembling an end; and don't think for ten seconds there will be one - whatever Bible-swearing caretaker is in charge - or how many speeches or hearings or investigations we're inundated with. It is all downtime to the next fisticuffs, really. Always was, is, and will be. Change the names and faces, and here we go again, mista.

    This week, General Petraeus, current commander of U.S. troops in Iraq and the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker spoke for nine long hours before congress. There was a great deal of publicity about their recommendations to halt the planned troop reduction this summer and loads of commentary on their assessment of The Surge's "continued success", whatever in the wide world that could mean. But the most important phrase uttered by either man was simply "malign influence", which both used when describing neighboring Evil Axis member, Iran's place in this increasing theater of the absurd our nifty State Department boobs have designed.
    Ah, Iran. Where have we heard that bauble before?
    Here, for one.
    Rifling through our archives, we stumbled on this gem from a column entitled, "Manifest Destiny Made Easier Through Modern Chemistry", dated late-December, 2004:
    "The American government is being duped by Iran, which now all but controls the fate of the coming January election. Not even what is left of the CIA can stop it. Any clear-thinking person without agenda or chemical dependency in the know understands this. Soon the Shiites will be in charge. They will take orders from Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei and ask the Americans to leave, thank you very much. And all of Saddam Hussein's nightmares will come true. He will be tried by the western infidels while the very same Iranians the United States paid him to keep at bay will run amok in his charred palaces, toasting his jailing.

People paid good money to practice journalism still possess the stones to ask why the hell Hussein kept refusing to reveal he had no weapons, even with the threat of U.S. aggression. The answer is simple: Either lie to the UN or risk letting the Iranians know he was a paper tiger and take him out. Americans seem to care about women and children and hospitals and taking prisoners. This is of little concern to Iranians. It was a fair trade off. Hussein knew, as did the CIA, that if it were the Iranians pouring over the border, the Grand Poobah's head would have been on a spike, instead of getting a lice exam on CNN.

Now the politicos, or whatever they call themselves in Tehran these days, see daylight with this hamstrung election next month, and soon the bloody paws of the American president will be asked to shake hands with the men who will plot 9/11 Part Deux and the United States will have to convince the rest of the planet how we have to gut the whole goddamned thing again.

And this will all be done legally through an election.
At least that is how it will appear. Elections are funny things. Sometimes they're on the up and up, and sometimes the dead walk and pistols are brandished. Sometimes candidates bug offices and other times their soup is poisoned. Sometimes there is 'The Night of Long Knives' and things go awry.

I see what is transpiring in Iraq right now, and although it resembles no real Euro-historical perspective outside the homogenized white-man's Bible being peddled in Alabama currently or the drive-by that offed Francis Ferdinand, I am reminded of old-time politics. Not Richard Daley strong-arm street-whipping kind of politics. I'm talking Aaron Burr unloading a fatal pistol shot into Alexander Hamilton to decide the fate of New York kind of politics. Old time, real hard, skull-cracking, back-door fighting, western world type of politics: George Bush's kind of politics. That is what will decide Iraq."

    It was clear-headed long-term thinking, well reasoned and stated without trepidation. It sings, papa, like Bragg at the Royal Albert Hall circa 1984, but I have to admit; I don't recall writing any of it. It seems like a dream now, 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007, the blurred years of occupation dressed up as war with all of our tax money (and the junk-loads lent by China) funneled east to rebuild, protect, and integrate a foreign nation ablaze in civil war. Our boy commander-in-chief as President of Iraq in bed with religious fanatics sold to the world as democracy.

     General Petraeus continued to reiterate his concerns over "Iranian-supported Special Groups" manipulating violent outbursts in a phalanx of cable news interviews following the congressional hearing, wherein he painted a gory picture of not only Iranian influence on the ground in Iraq, and behind the slaughter of American soldiers, but also a very real and present danger within the barely-cobbled Iraqi government.

    You might not believe the good general. The press might not believe him. The Iraqis might even be skeptical. But the only one who counts, George W. Bush, does. And so Captain Shoo-In took little time to announce to the world that he is on board with the whole deal, no shock to anyone who has paid attention to even the broadest details of this occupation for these five long years.

    And that means anything is possible now: Attacks on Iran? More spitfire rhetoric? A January surprise before the purveyors of this ill-conceived roustabout hit the road for good?
    It's all on the table.
    Eight and one half months of a lame duck wartime president and his gaggle of nation-builders ruminating over the chessboard.
    Rook takes Pawn.
    Your move.
© James Campion April 12th 2008
realitycheck@jamescampion.com

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