The American Withdrawal from Iraq: The Changing Picture and the Reversal of the Balance

In Iraq, it has been announced that the date for the withdrawal of the last American soldiers from the country will be at the end of this year, and the day has been called “the day of fulfillment,” which is a good thing. However, I was surprised to hear that this name refers to the fact that the governments in Baghdad and Washington kept to a date after reaching an agreement for withdrawal. Firstly, the U.S. is not withdrawing its troops to comply with the deadline, but is being forced to do so, and Obama’s administration is exploiting this to achieve political objectives. Secondly, all of the information leaked confirms that the Americans will be staying in Iraq for a long time, as there are still a large number of advisors and trainers, as well as a vast network of CIA agents in the country. Many of the Americans will now exchange their military uniforms for those of the employees of the American Ministry of Foreign Affairs and other U.S. government departments.

It is likely that another round of talks will start about the possibility of an American army presence in Iraq as mercenaries, and not as military. The main event has already happened and Obama has applied salt to the wound of failure during the American forces’ most difficult period, and during the happiest time for Iraqis, because of their collective desire for the future that “when the troops pull out, the war will be over.” We saw that in the midst of global public concern about numerous crises, at the forefront of which were the popular uprisings in the region which have been referred to as the Arab Spring, the American president announced the decision to withdraw all American troops from Iraq before the end of 2011.

“As promised,” President Obama ordered the withdrawal of all American troops from Iraq. saying that “after nearly nine years, America's war in Iraq will be over.” Some observers believe that this time frame was chosen because other events allowed this announcement to be made quietly. The existence of confusion in the American position concerning this decision is clear to anyone. The first hint of this was the defeat of a shameful policy of occupation in Iraq, even though occupation had been highly praised before the start of the operation and still during the first years of the occupation, because of claims that it would turn Iraq into a shining example in the region and that it would guarantee stability. The Russian expert and analyst Mikhail Dorfman, who wrote for the agency Novosti, said that he was waiting for an analyst or observer to answer the question concerning the outcome of all of this.

It is appropriate to ask this question after almost 30 years; I do not remember where I first heard the Arabic saying which states, “The Romans, Byzantines, Crusaders, Turks and British were all here and they are here no longer; as for us, we have remained.” Life has proved this to be true, but the Americans ended their time in Iraq long before their effective withdrawal from the country. The principle of the “domino effect” didn’t work as the neoconservatives promised, and the Arab dictators did not fall one after the other; it became clear that dictators are toppled in the squares of cities and not on battlefields.

Because the American administration, run by a succession of neoconservatives and by the Democrats who came after them, has failed miserably in its claims after the occupation of Afghanistan on the pretext of fighting terrorism, and after the occupation of Iraq on the pretext of finding weapons of mass destruction, they have gradually turned to huge campaigns such as “democratization” and “state building,” in addition to a great many other campaigns. In Iraq, the Americans installed a few expensive electrical power stations, but they paid no attention to connecting them to the electricity networks. They also built expensive water refining stations without pipes to allow them to be connected to the water utilities. But the effective functioning of these installations, given the conditions of the infrastructure in Iraq, cannot be maintained.

In the same way in which the U.S. failed to provide anything for the Iraqis within Iraq, it also failed in keeping its promise to the American voters, amongst them, the companies who are expecting a lot in exchange for what they put into this war. Billions of dollars have been pumped into the pockets of weapons manufacturers, which has not led to growth in the American economy as economic experts and the free market doctrine promised. Shortly after the war, it became clear that these expenses would not be compensated, as had been promised to the American people, and the failure in Iraq led to the defeat of the Republican Party in the 2006 and 2008 elections.

Despite the fact that the most important objective of the occupation of Iraq was “to control the sources of oil,” the American citizens did not notice any military spoils at the gas station. The American administration’s plan after the occupation of Baghdad was to immediately privatize the Iraqi oil industry in order to carry out the desires of monopolizing corporations. However, the Americans didn’t even manage to achieve this goal, as they found themselves drowning in the mud of a country whose reality they had not studied diligently, like the British did when they planned to occupy Iraq. This is confirmed by reports from neutral experts about this aspect of the myth of energy sources as an engine for world politics, suitable to be advertised. They are incapable of explaining what is happening in terms of real events and processes. One thing that is clear to the entire world is that the current American administration, which is suffering from one economic crisis after another and is withdrawing in recognition of the failure of its wars both in Iraq and then in Afghanistan, cannot market any projects for a new war to the American people, particularly not at this stage.

The Republicans’ response has been announced, as shown in publications stating that John McCain made a statement concerning the decision. He said that this is a political decision taken against the opinion of authoritative military leaders. Meanwhile, Michele Bachmann, former candidate for the presidency for the Republicans, took a more extreme stance. She accused the White House of allowing politics to take precedence over rational military thought, and she emphasized the need to demand that the Iraqi people pay for the war. She said, "If you look at every time we have deposed a dictator, the United States has always left troops behind to enforce the fragile peace."

However, interest in the issue is waning to the extent that the withdrawal from Iraq disappeared from the media the day after the withdrawal. In any case, the picture in which Obama appeared at the time chosen by his administration to make this announcement, leads us to the truth that America’s attempt to continue appearing to be a country that supports democracy and the amount of publicity it gets for its defense of human rights in the region, even after its miserable failure in Iraq, is difficult to believe, but the changing picture and the reversal of balance have certainly become clear.