President Barack Obama in his State of the Union address predicted that some Muslim countries, especially Afghanistan and Pakistan, would continue to face chaos and instability for decades to come. Other countries that, according to him, would share the same fate were Iraq and Libya. However, Sartaj Aziz quickly rejected Obama’s predictions and considered them irrelevant to ground realities.
But did Obama reveal something we didn’t already know?
The outgoing US president unveiled nothing the Muslim countries in the Middle East were not already aware of. The footprints of the imperial forces – call them by any name: coalition of the willing etc – are fresh in the collective memory of those who suffered, lost their dear ones or were rendered homeless.
Ask the Iraqi nation, which has so far lost about 1.5 million of its citizens, women and children among them. Ask the Syrian nation that lost more than 3, 50,758 of its citizens, according to the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights. The US-led war of ‘regime change’ uprooted more than four million in Syria who now live as refugees in other countries. Their fault? None. They only fell victim to the hegemonic designs of imperial powers.
Isn’t it heart wrenching to see the once settled citizens of Syria go begging for asylum in the West? Fleeing from war, Syrian families travel in boats, with those boats also capsizing in frigid waters. Children, clinging to their mothers, asking for mercy from the same Western powers that are the perpetrators of tyranny on their land. And, what’s more, the much moral West refusing to take them in. One would need some heart not to bleed on seeing such human tragedy unfold.
Typically, before embarking on the sinister plan of ‘regime change’ in any defenceless country, Western media first demonises the leader of that country. The leader is portrayed a ruthless despot who subjects his hapless and innocent people to untold cruelties to perpetuate his repressive rule. The Western corporate media portrayed Bashar al-Assad in the same light.
The so-called civil war in Syria is not indigenous, but imposed from outside – thanks to the abetment of some of the Muslim countries in the region. As a result, Muslims are killing Muslims, employing arsenals provided by the West.
Peter van Buren, a former US Foreign Service official, who had been involved in the Iraq war, recently wrote how Iraq has now become “an ungoverned, failed state, a killing field on the scale of genocide. The horrors are directly caused by the 2003 US invasion of Iraq and subsequent occupation.”
Buren is also the author of the book, ‘We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People.’
One of the objectives of attacking Iraq, according to the Western media, was to rid the Iraqi people of Saddam Hussein’s tyrannical rule and win their hearts and minds. Perhaps for the same reason came Libya’s turn soon after Iraq. US-led Nato forces, including European partners – Britain, France, Holland, Italy, Norway and Denmark – bombed Libya for seven months and decimated the once prosperous and developed African country before Gaddafi was deposed, sodomised and lynched.
Hillary Clinton, a leading campaigner for the bombing campaign against Libya, had famously commented on Gaddafi’s lynching: “We came, we saw, he died.” It reflected well the mind-set of the civilised world that she represents. Madam Clinton also happens to be one of the US presidential hopefuls.
But have the hearts and minds of the Iraqi and Libyan people been won by the occupation forces? Not yet. Obama recently acceded to the Pentagon’s demand to once again plant boots on ground in Iraq and Libya. According to the New York Times, “the White House and the Pentagon have taken pains to avoid describing the combat troops, instead calling them special operators, trainers and advisers.”
Nobody can refute Obama’s prediction that Iraq, Libya, and some other Muslim countries will remain embroiled in chaos and mayhem for decades.
The writer is a freelance columnist based in Lahore. Email: pinecitygmail.com