Modus Operandi

Fareed Zakaria’s last article in Newsweek should be a requirement for all who is interested in the past and future of Iraqi War. The brief history he gives of the war in this article is excellent. The narrative is of course familiar to all—the step by step decent into deadly chaos as soon as the mission was declared accomplished. How this article differs from others is Zakaria’s memory and vision of the reason of failure. Most journalist and commentators register the reason of failure on physical things—the inability to rebuild the infrastructure, the incompetence of the Iraqi government, Iranian agents, etc.—and not look at the fundamental reasoning of the decisions. Zakaria’s delineation of the reason is very revealing. None of these mistaken reasoning are new. Take trusting the exiled opposition too much for example, no less of a ‘great’ president as Kennedy did just that when committing to the invasion at the Bay of Pigs. And is ideologically driven policies not the signature of the international financial doctrine of the United States? And most glaringly, has any military forces that U.S. built in foreign soil not resulted in a dictatorial force? These are not unique to this war; they are the modus operandi of the U.S. government. And that is perhaps the most worrisome.