Acerbic Politics

Name That War

From the Los Angeles Times

P.W. Singer claims that no one knows what to call the war in Iraq, even though everyone calls it "the war in Iraq." He then says: "My own take is that history will probably call the war by its spark — 9/11." Let's get this straight: Iraq did not — repeat, not — participate in 9/11.

This is the most often repeated lie told since 9/11. According to the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi nationals. They crashed those planes into the World Trade Center towers in New York. And, by the way, we did not invade Saudi Arabia.

If you're looking for an accurate name for this war, it should be called "the phony mushroom-cloud war." Why? Before the invasion of Iraq, Bush/Cheney traveled around the country saying we could not afford to wait for a mushroom cloud. Having scared everyone to death, they then invaded Iraq and, as most of us now know, did not find any nuclear weapons. Afterward, Bush/Cheney claimed that they invaded Iraq to depose Saddam Hussein. The problem with that lie is that the American people would never have allowed them to invade Iraq if the real reason for invading was to depose Hussein. The reason to invade was to prevent the mushroom cloud, except that the nuclear weapons did not exist. But we are still mired in the "phony mushroom-cloud war."