Warham
08-23-2005, 03:17 PM
THE HUTCHINSON REPORT: Sheehan Won’t Sink Bush on Iraq – At Least Yet
By Earl Ofari Hutchinson
(August 23, 2005)
The same week Cindy Sheehan took her grieving mother antiwar crusade to President Bush’s gate, newspapers flashed the grim headline that American deaths in Iraq neared the 2000 mark. That, and Sheehan’s nerve touching protest, should’ve mortally wounded Bush’s flawed, failed, and politically divisive Iraq war policy. But it hasn’t. According to a late July survey by the authoritative Pew Research Center, more than half of Americans still back the war. But even more puzzling, support for the war has actually jumped several percentage points since May 2004. A significant number of Democrats also think the war is going well.
Though Bush’s war policy has stirred justifiable passion, anger and carnage, why do so many people still back it? War casualties have never been a good indicator of the public’s approval or disapproval of wars. At the end of World War II, the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey assessed the effectiveness of the air war against Germany. The monumental destruction, and piles of civilian casualties the bombing inflicted did drive German morale down. But it did not spur Germans to rise against Hitler and demand an end to the war. The bombing had the opposite effect. It steeled German resolve to resist the Allies.
The massive anti-war protests, escalating battlefield casualties, and Congressional unease over the Vietnam War did not ignite wholesale public revolt against the Johnson administration’s failed war policies. As late as summer 1967, polls showed that more than 60 percent of Americans still supported the war. The 1968 TET offensive by Vietnamese insurgents exposed the U.S. war policy as hopelessly muddled, ineffectual, and ultimately self-defeating. Yet, a narrow majority of Americans still doggedly supported the war.
For a time, Lyndon Johnson staved off damaging public outrage over the war by depicting it as a grand crusade against communism. He snatched a page from the half-century old U.S. military and foreign policy playbook in which America’s leaders contend that waging wars to preserve freedom and democracy is America’s divine mission. World War I was fought to make the world safe for democracy. World War II was fought to smash Nazi and Japanese fascism. The Korean War was fought to stop Chinese and Soviet expansion in Asia.
While the Cold War cost Americans billions, triggered an insane arms race that brought the world close to nuclear holocaust, and required the maintenance of tens of thousands of U.S troops in Europe, Korea and Japan. The public bought the policy maker’s rationale that it was fought to stop the spread of communism and to insure global peace and security.
In 1990, Bush Sr. boasted that Americans had finally kicked the Vietnam Syndrome in stopping Iraq’s aggression against Kuwait. But many regarded the war as a failure because it did not topple Hussein. This stirred public anxiety that with Hussein still in power the dark forces of global evil still threatened democracy and put American lives in mortal peril. The September 11 terror attacks further fueled public fear that America was the perennial target of these evil forces. Though Bush-2’s clumsy attempt to link Hussein and the September 11 terror attacks has been discredited, it reinforced the belief that the world is a dangerous place, and that only American military can guarantee peace and security.
In his speech at the Republican National Convention in 2004, Bush repackaged the Pax Americana theme and depicted Iraq as part of the larger fight for global security. The war was not about the tyranny of one man, Hussein, or the hunt for phantom WMD. The mounting American battlefield casualties, Iraqi civilian suffering, and the billions spent on the war were the steep price America has to pay to win the crusade against the enemies of peace and freedom. Bush’s second rationale for the war is that America’s partners and new allies, France, Russia, China, Japan, and the United Nations are weak, vacillating, and openly hostile to U.S. efforts in Iraq. Their resistance and failure to support U.S. aims imperils the global fight against tyranny. Therefore, as in wars past, the U.S. must use its military muscle, resources, and will to wage an effective long-term struggle to preserve democracy and secure world peace, even if that means going it alone. Bush repeatedly claims that during the World Wars, and Korean War it was U.S. intervention that tilted the scales toward victory in the war against tyranny, and it will do it again in Iraq, if his policy prevails, and the Iraqis can get their house in order.
Bush has recycled the theme that America is the world’s paramount noble crusader in the fight against global evil to justify the Iraq War. It has struck a responsive chord with much of the public. While Sheehan should be applauded for her courageous stand, it won’t sink Bush on Iraq – at least yet.
Earl Ofari Hutchinson is a political analyst and social issues commentator, and the author of The Crisis in Black and Black (Middle Passage Press). Hutchinsonreport@aol.com
http://eurweb.com/story.cfm?id=21957
By Earl Ofari Hutchinson
(August 23, 2005)
The same week Cindy Sheehan took her grieving mother antiwar crusade to President Bush’s gate, newspapers flashed the grim headline that American deaths in Iraq neared the 2000 mark. That, and Sheehan’s nerve touching protest, should’ve mortally wounded Bush’s flawed, failed, and politically divisive Iraq war policy. But it hasn’t. According to a late July survey by the authoritative Pew Research Center, more than half of Americans still back the war. But even more puzzling, support for the war has actually jumped several percentage points since May 2004. A significant number of Democrats also think the war is going well.
Though Bush’s war policy has stirred justifiable passion, anger and carnage, why do so many people still back it? War casualties have never been a good indicator of the public’s approval or disapproval of wars. At the end of World War II, the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey assessed the effectiveness of the air war against Germany. The monumental destruction, and piles of civilian casualties the bombing inflicted did drive German morale down. But it did not spur Germans to rise against Hitler and demand an end to the war. The bombing had the opposite effect. It steeled German resolve to resist the Allies.
The massive anti-war protests, escalating battlefield casualties, and Congressional unease over the Vietnam War did not ignite wholesale public revolt against the Johnson administration’s failed war policies. As late as summer 1967, polls showed that more than 60 percent of Americans still supported the war. The 1968 TET offensive by Vietnamese insurgents exposed the U.S. war policy as hopelessly muddled, ineffectual, and ultimately self-defeating. Yet, a narrow majority of Americans still doggedly supported the war.
For a time, Lyndon Johnson staved off damaging public outrage over the war by depicting it as a grand crusade against communism. He snatched a page from the half-century old U.S. military and foreign policy playbook in which America’s leaders contend that waging wars to preserve freedom and democracy is America’s divine mission. World War I was fought to make the world safe for democracy. World War II was fought to smash Nazi and Japanese fascism. The Korean War was fought to stop Chinese and Soviet expansion in Asia.
While the Cold War cost Americans billions, triggered an insane arms race that brought the world close to nuclear holocaust, and required the maintenance of tens of thousands of U.S troops in Europe, Korea and Japan. The public bought the policy maker’s rationale that it was fought to stop the spread of communism and to insure global peace and security.
In 1990, Bush Sr. boasted that Americans had finally kicked the Vietnam Syndrome in stopping Iraq’s aggression against Kuwait. But many regarded the war as a failure because it did not topple Hussein. This stirred public anxiety that with Hussein still in power the dark forces of global evil still threatened democracy and put American lives in mortal peril. The September 11 terror attacks further fueled public fear that America was the perennial target of these evil forces. Though Bush-2’s clumsy attempt to link Hussein and the September 11 terror attacks has been discredited, it reinforced the belief that the world is a dangerous place, and that only American military can guarantee peace and security.
In his speech at the Republican National Convention in 2004, Bush repackaged the Pax Americana theme and depicted Iraq as part of the larger fight for global security. The war was not about the tyranny of one man, Hussein, or the hunt for phantom WMD. The mounting American battlefield casualties, Iraqi civilian suffering, and the billions spent on the war were the steep price America has to pay to win the crusade against the enemies of peace and freedom. Bush’s second rationale for the war is that America’s partners and new allies, France, Russia, China, Japan, and the United Nations are weak, vacillating, and openly hostile to U.S. efforts in Iraq. Their resistance and failure to support U.S. aims imperils the global fight against tyranny. Therefore, as in wars past, the U.S. must use its military muscle, resources, and will to wage an effective long-term struggle to preserve democracy and secure world peace, even if that means going it alone. Bush repeatedly claims that during the World Wars, and Korean War it was U.S. intervention that tilted the scales toward victory in the war against tyranny, and it will do it again in Iraq, if his policy prevails, and the Iraqis can get their house in order.
Bush has recycled the theme that America is the world’s paramount noble crusader in the fight against global evil to justify the Iraq War. It has struck a responsive chord with much of the public. While Sheehan should be applauded for her courageous stand, it won’t sink Bush on Iraq – at least yet.
Earl Ofari Hutchinson is a political analyst and social issues commentator, and the author of The Crisis in Black and Black (Middle Passage Press). Hutchinsonreport@aol.com
http://eurweb.com/story.cfm?id=21957