Neoconservativism and Deification

We know that the Iraq Conflict was predicated on false intelligence. What we ignore is the neoconservative attitude toward illegal military invasion: international market and civil supremacy. It is the exercising of the tremendous military advantage that the U.S. has over the globe. It is the display of intense and incredible might. They suggested that we would go into Iraq, be worshiped as a deity*, and our other enemies would cower in fear of our awesome power. It is the savior/messiah-complex writ large.

[*The ‘welcome us with open arms’ line of reasoning was intended to evoke memories of post-WWII liberations of concentration camps and Nazi occupied France. We were supposed to imagine the U.S. soldiers being given flowers freshly picked and pies freshly baked. We were to imagine the bowing down and the awestruck faces of the Iraqi people.]

So what happens? We’re clearly nobody’s messiah. Our ‘saving’ of the Iraqi people has been proven to be about greed and strategic international military position. It is also more about jump-starting the domestic economy in the U.S. than it was about jump-starting democracy in Iraq. It is not only an utter failure, but it is evoking the potentially greatest disaster: it is creating instability out of stability.

And what of that vaunted military might? Check this out.

soldiers say one of the enemy's weapons has blown their confidence more than all the others. So called EFPs, or Explosively Formed Penetrators, have become the weapon du jour among the Shi'ite fighters. The devices cap a tube or pipe full of explosives with a solid copper disk that, due to the force and heat of the blast, transforms itself into an armor-piercing slug. EFPs can destroy Humvees and disable even the Abrams tank.

For a fraction of the cost of one of our tanks, Humvees, or missiles, the Iraqi rebels are able to destroy any of our practical assets. If anyone in the world still believes in the awesome might of the U.S. military and its superiority over the world, it is because they are delusional—and therefore not worthy of our trust.

So here it is. The neo-cons’ rationalizations for war have proven to be universally wrong, and worse, intentionally misrepresented. Their behavior in maintaining the failed strategy is motivated by self-interest and personal gain, not out of strategic advantage. The attitude with which they brought this conflict to us and continue to argue for it is not blind optimism but an irrational messiah-complex for themselves and the inexcusably outdated belief in manifest destiny. To spell it out even more plainly, the neo-cons are, at best, lying, greedy, delusional, egotistical cowards who show no diplomatic or strategic planning skill, rational judgment, or foresight. In fact, the most important aspects of leadership are beyond lacking in these individuals—they are the Barney Fifes of politics. We have let them have free reign to bumble our foreign and domestic policies. We have let their pundits and think tanks, such as the American Enterprise Institute, the Project for the New American Century, and the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs. feed us improbable and ridiculous excuses for bad policies. We have allowed the likes of frequent Daily Show guest, William Kristol, former Bush administration officials Paul Wolfowitz and Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney speak from credible authority and a position of respect. Unfortunately, their policies prove they deserve neither.