Yesterday, White House obfuscaterTony Snow brought to light the news that our Great Leader, far from listening to the will of the majority of the people who may or may not have elected him, envisions his great Iraq war as something along the lines of Korea, where we fought to a standstill and had troops hanging around for half a century. If anyone acts surprised about this little nugget of news, feel free to tell them that it’s in fact old news–it’s even pre-9/11 news.
What we have here is a failure to communicate. A failure of the press to communicate that our neocon friends have never said anything different, not for a second.
This is the opening salvo of a new public relations campaign. If pinned down, I’ve been known to say that the founding of the first public relations firm is the date from which we should begin to chronicle our progress from democracy to faux democracy. This is a perfect example of why. We’ll be sold this new notion and taught to forget that there was ever a different notion. The product we’re now being prepared to buy, as if it was the plan all along (it was, as you’ll see below), is the plan to inhabit Iraq as a permanent base of operations from which to keep American interests, especially energy interests, safe. All that Hussein business, the WMD business, all of it was merely a matter of convenience.
Below is the plan, as spelled out in 2000 by the neocon organization Project for the New American Century. It’s clear, to the point, and coming to a nation very near you. These are the guys who became the architects of the war, from Donald Rumsfeld to Richard Perle and the big Dick Cheney hisself.
The plan, full of manly military tittilation terms like “forward-based forces” and “war-fighting powers,” should have come with a set of plastic Army men so the crusty old non-veterans planning how to deprive young Americans of life and limb in future wars could really get into the action. It’s much like watching the hot hardware of Dr. Strangelove, only this, friends is real.
Here’s what the report says about the Persian Gulf:
“While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein.”
“?elements of U.S. Army Europe should be redeployed to Southeast Europe, while a permanent unit should be based in the Persian Gulf region?”
It’s all right there. Go read it for yourself if you’d like to see the rest of what our neocon friends are planning to accomplish, regardless of the will of the mere voters of America. It’s been there for our perusal for seven years. At some point, perhaps it will be believed, but by then, it will probably be a fait accompli.
