Goodbye, Iraq

United States combat troops are going home, leaving behind over 4,000 dead comrades and the devastation of 100,000 Iraqi cadavers, along with a country in chaos, which has not been able to form a government and where the unemployment index reaches 60 percent.

Some clueless sub-official, happy for the return, said before television cameras, “We’re going home. We won the war!” Is that so? What war? What objectives did it have? Where are the weapons of mass destruction that were the cause of the invasion of Iraq?

Left behind is a lot pain and many new problems generated by the U.S. presence in Iraq. Of course, left behind is the death by hanging of Saddam Hussein, the torture in Abu Dhabi prison and the bloody battle of Fallujah in 2004. But also left behind is the unchangeable division between Sunnis and Shiites, Kurdish separatism, the lack of an economic fabric and an Iraqi government that can take care of the deplorable situation.

Although it is true that violence has decreased and the capacity of the local security forces has risen, the suicide bombing on Tuesday in Baghdad, killing 59 people, shows that the situation is far from normal. In addition, al-Qaida did not exist before the invasion; it used anti-American interests in the troubled country to constitute a serious threat to the future.

Everything is confusing. For the majority of the civilians interviewed in the international arena, the retirement of the troops is a “blessing,” but for General Bebaker Zebari, Iraqi armed forces commander, it’s “premature,” and he thinks that the U.S. armed forces should stay until 2020.

More serious: Much of the responsibility assumed by the U.S. troops will be passed over to private security companies. According to Hillary Clinton, these contracts in Iraq will increase in number from 2,700 to 6,000-7,000. The country will be invaded by mercenaries, who, in general, show less respect for human rights than the military government. Also left behind will be dozens of armored vehicles and helicopters with advanced technology.

But the most sensitive issue is that after the elections of March 7, the majority force has failed to form a government. The country is in the interim, and the troops are handling themselves. It even seems that the most possible option is to form a government with the Shiite Muqtada al-Sadr, a foe of the U.S. and a friend to the Iranian government.

It seems that the only thing the U.S. won was a good lesson: The use of force should be of last resort; moreover, it should not be done without the consensus of the international community. Today, the “policemen of the world” have no place. And on the other hand, despite military power, they end up trapped as they did in Afghanistan and Iraq, where people resist any kind of invasion and are justified in the fight against terrorism.

The U.S. did not win, and neither did Iraq. No war, no peace. There exists nothing worse.