Term Paper on "Military Should Leave Iraq"

Term Paper 4 pages (1497 words) Sources: 1+

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Military Should Leave Iraq and the Sooner the Better

Iraq has been Cheney's own personal piggy bank ever since he led the Pentagon during the Persian Gulf War in 1991. -- Amy Goodman and David Goodman, 2004

The year is 3056, and historians are shaking their heads in bewilderment. "How could this strange fellow, President Bush," they ask, "have responded to the destruction of a couple of big buildings with such an overwhelmingly inappropriate response? Didn't he know that the Muslim world would not tolerate such an attack on their fellows and rally to their aid?" This discourse, of course, is in Arabic, the entire world having converted to this language in 2021 following the downfall of the United States and its allies around the world at the hands of Islamic fundamentalists. While this grim eventuality may not play out in the future, it would seem that the world is hell-bent to get there and the events of the past 5 years in the war on terrorism suggest that unless something dramatically different is done soon, it may be too late to avoid this potential outcome. This paper provides a review of the relevant and peer-reviewed literature to determine how this state of affairs developed, what factors have kept the U.S. In a failed war in the Middle East and how American can fix things by getting the military out of Iraq today rather than tomorrow. A summary of the research and salient findings will be provided in the conclusion.

Review and Discussion

An old adage suggests that one of the best ways to understand a complex problem is to "follow the money." Indeed, the failed war in Iraq and Afghanistan has only been a failure in terms of the enormous toll is has exacted in human lives and national treasure, while the cronies at Halliburton et al. have gotten filthy rich in the process. By any measure, U.S. taxpayers deserve an explanation of how their money is being used to prosecute the war on terrorism today. In this regard, Hartung (2004) reports that:

Halliburton's role in Iraq has been deeply scrutinized in the past few months but its implications go far beyond one company or one conflict. The real issue at hand is determining how to best provide effective support for our men and women in uniform, at a reasonable cost, with transparency and accountability. That's true in Iraq, or Afghanistan, or the Philippines, or Colombia, or Kosovo, or Liberia, or anywhere else American military personnel are sent on short notice to face down tyrants or keep the peace. (p. 1).

The evidence is overwhelming, though, that the ground war in Iraq has been a ghastly mistake from the outset, but many observers might suggest that it was not really a mistake at all but rather a coldly calculated initiative designed to unjustly enrich the Cheney-Halliburton cabal while the getting was good. For example, in their book, the Exception to the Rulers: Exposing America's War Profiteers, the Media That Love Them and the Crackdown on Our Rights, Goodman and Goodman (2004) report that, "In an administration that has taken a pledge of allegiance to enrich its billionaire buddies, one crony capitalist trumps them all: Vice President Dick Cheney. Cheney, secretary of defense under Bush I, spent his years in the wilderness as CEO of Halliburton, one of the world's largest oil services and defense contractors" (p. 65). Although Cheney flatly stated on an edition of Meet the Press in September, 2003, that, "I have no financial interest in Halliburton of any kind and haven't had now for over three years," these authors suggest that Cheney was simply lying. "Halliburton is paying Cheney roughly $165,000 per year in deferred compensation through 2005, not to mention his more than $400,000 in stock options. All of which constitutes a clear financial interest" (Goodman & Goodman, 2004, p. 65). Furthermore, Cheney was paid more than $60 million in salary by Halliburton between 1995 and 2000 (Goodman & Goodman, 2004) and he received a $34 million severance package when he left (Anderson, 2004), but the company certainly got its money's worth out of this vice president. In fact, during his tenure as CEO at Halliburton, Cheney managed to swing more than $2.3 billion in contracts to the company, almost double what the company earned during the previous five-year period (Goodman & Goodman, 2004).

These authors also emphasize that at least one-third of the military-related expenditures in support of the war in Iraq… READ MORE

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