{"id":14769,"date":"2012-04-24T11:39:52","date_gmt":"2012-04-24T19:39:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=14769"},"modified":"2012-04-24T11:40:49","modified_gmt":"2012-04-24T19:40:49","slug":"lasting-pride-for-the-hell-we-left-in-iraq","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2012\/04\/24\/lasting-pride-for-the-hell-we-left-in-iraq\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Lasting Pride’ For the Hell We Left in Iraq"},"content":{"rendered":"

“We’re leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq, with a representative government that was elected by its people.” – President Barack Obama,\u00a0Fort Bragg, N.C., December 2011<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cYou will leave with great pride \u2013 lasting pride.\u201d – Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta to U.S. troops, December 2011<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I’ve written<\/a> repeatedly<\/a> about the terrible dictatorship<\/a> and lasting sectarian violence<\/a> Washington left in Iraq after the troop withdrawal of December 2011. Contrary to the lies of these indecent politicians, the enduring effects of the illegal U.S. war in Iraq are still causing havoc and bloodshed throughout the country. Iraq is neither secure, nor is it a democracy as was promised by warmongers in Washington.<\/p>\n

A new Congressional Research Service report<\/a> takes a look at post-withdrawal Iraq and at one point lists the most high-profile incidents of sectarian violence:<\/p>\n

On February 7, 2012, the AQ-I affiliate Islamic State of Iraq claimed responsibility for two of the\u00a0deadliest attacks on Shiites since the U.S. withdrawal\u2014on January 5 and January 14, 2012, which\u00a0killed 78 and 53 Shiite pilgrims, respectively. In one of the most complex attacks in recent\u00a0months, on February 23, 2012, bombings in 12 Iraqi cities killed over 50 persons; based on the\u00a0method and scope of the attacks, Iraqi observers attributed the attacks to AQ-I. AQ-I claimed\u00a0responsibility for a broad series of attacks\u2014encompassing six cities\u2014on March 20, 2012; over\u00a040 persons were killed. Another spate of attacks took place in Baghdad and Kirkuk on April 19,\u00a02012, killing about 36 persons.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As for the record of the government (other than what’s included in the above hyperlinks), the report had this to say:<\/p>\n

The\u00a0State Department\u2019s report on human rights for 2010 released April 8, 2011, largely repeated the\u00a0previous year\u2019s characterizations of Iraq\u2019s human rights record as follows: \u201cExtremist violence,\u00a0coupled with weak government performance in upholding the rule of law, resulted in widespread\u00a0and severe human rights abuses.\u201d The State Department report cited a wide range of human\u00a0rights problems committed by Iraqi government security and law enforcement personnel,\u00a0including some unlawful killings; torture and other cruel punishments; poor conditions in prison\u00a0facilities; denial of fair public trials; arbitrary arrest; arbitrary interference with privacy and\u00a0home; limits on freedoms of speech, assembly, and association due to sectarianism and extremist\u00a0threats; lack of protection of stateless persons; wide scale governmental corruption; human\u00a0trafficking; and limited exercise of labor rights.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

All this, as America continues to give<\/a> money and weapons to the Maliki government. What exactly do U.S. troops have to be proud about?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“We’re leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq, with a representative government that was elected by its people.” – President Barack Obama,\u00a0Fort Bragg, N.C., December 2011 \u201cYou will leave with great pride \u2013 lasting pride.\u201d – Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta to U.S. troops, December 2011 I’ve written repeatedly about the terrible dictatorship and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":86,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-14769","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14769","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/86"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14769"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14769\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14771,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14769\/revisions\/14771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14769"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14769"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14769"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=14769"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}