By Daniel Johnson-Kim, Sports Editor
One day before the sixth anniversary of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the head of United States forces in Iraq declared progress was being made on the war front.
Gen. David H. Petraeus released his report on the result of President George W. Bush’s troop surge and promised congress the additional 30,000 forces added earlier this year could slowly be pulled out by next summer. But Petraeus warned against a sudden pull out, stating it could result in “devastating consequences.”
Has this war not been one devastating consequence after another?
Has this country and the Iraqi people not felt the devastating consequences of faulty intelligence, a “shoot first” president and his administration that has used the deaths of Sept. 11 to justify a war that should never have been waged?
Six years removed from the terrorist attacks that shaped the world we live in and four years into this war, little has changed.
According to a poll of Iraqis collected by ABC News, the BBC and a Japanese network, 61 percent of Iraqis said security in the past six months has worsened overall. The Iraqi people do not feel safer after Saddam Hussein was hanged. In fact, 2006 was declared by the media and military as the deadliest year in Iraq.
According to the Associated Press, Al Qaeda is as powerful as it was before Sept. 11 and Osama Bin Laden is still on the loose.
There is still no evidence linking Hussein to the attacks of Sept. 11, and there is no evidence that Hussein was harboring weapons of mass destruction-the two main reasons Bush and his cronies used to invade Iraq.
Meanwhile, we remain in this war while 2008 presidential candidates offer ambiguous solutions to the Iraq problem most Americans are fed up with, and daily American and Iraqi death reports have become yesterday’s news.
Simply put, this country is stuck.
No matter how many politicians, journalists or public figures address the obvious reasons against the 2003 invasion of Iraq, we cannot go back. We cannot un-declare this war, and we cannot force our Commander and Chief to tell us the real reasons behind our occupation of Iraq.
What we can do though is learn from our mistakes.
Long after President Bush leaves the White House, the United States will feel the effect of this invasion and ongoing occupation. The Iraq problem will continue to plague this nation and the problems of the Middle East will be passed from one generation to the next.
The Iraq war has proved that nation building and preemptive war are not the solutions to the ancient conflicts in the Middle East. What is? Who knows, but diplomacy can’t be that bad.
So after the anniversary of Sept. 11, remember the sixyear-old tragedy, but, more importantly, remember the tragedy this country is in because of decisions that should never have been made, decisions with devastating consequences.
