Chirac Blasts U.S.-Led Invasion of Iraq

When Chirac refused to join Bush's military intervention in Iraq, the American right went crazy. French Fries were renamed Freedom Fries in an act of inane banality that only the right could muster. We heard the term "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" dripping from rabid lips and attempts by right wingers to organise boycotts of French goods.

The fact that France refused to line up next to the US in the Iraqi misadventure was seen as an act of both cowardice and insolence.

It's interesting now to reread a Time magazine article on why the Europeans, led by France and Germany, opposed Bush's Iraq war. This article was published on February 3rd 2003. Before the invasion took place, but as the pressure from the US was reaching it's peak.

So most Europeans want to be shown a fresh, momentous piece of evidence before they'll back a war. When they hear Bush make accusation after accusation, when they hear repeated avowals that the U.S. has "very convincing evidence," they wonder why the Administration has not offered that proof in public. They aren't satisfied with the explanation that if the classified info were revealed, it would harm America's intelligence-gathering capability.

It goes without saying that the Europeans have been shown to be right and Bush has been shown to be wrong.

Therefore, almost four years after the invasion took place, no-one can say that Chirac has rushed to say "I told you so".

Now, as Bush is said to be preparing to send even more troops to Iraq - like some insane gambler unable to resist one more roll of the dice - Chirac has finally chosen this as his moment to put the knife between Bush's shoulder blades.

"As France foresaw and feared, the war in Iraq caused upheavals whose effects have not yet finished unravelling," he said.

"The venture exacerbated the divisions between (Iraqi) communities and undermined the very integrity of Iraq," he said. "It weakened the stability of the region, where every country is now worried about its security and independence. It gave terrorism new terrain for expansion."

Now, "more than ever, the priority is to return sovereignty to the Iraqis," Chirac said.

He has proposed an international conference between the Quartet - the United States, the EU, Russia and the United Nations - on the whole subject of the Middle East. Although he has one major precondition... there should be no preconditions.

Chirac said it should be "a new form of conference that, without claiming to dictate the terms of the settlement to the parties involved, would bring the new guarantees that they aspire to," he said. "Then, I am persuaded, a true dynamic of negotiation could be launched."

Of course, this is anathema to the Bush doctrine where both Iran and North Korea have been asked to agree to all of the US's terms before any negotiation can begin.

However, as Bush prepares for his latest failure in Iraq, one has to wonder how long before someone steps in and finally breaks it to him that the Iraq war is lost and that he needs, desperately, to change course and try another route.

And on that day, even if that day doesn't occur until after Bush has left office, the right wingers who championed his illegal war and cheered him on as thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died for a lie, will have to admit the one fact that will gall them more than any other.

Chirac was right and they were wrong.

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tag: Bush, Iraq, Iraq war, Chirac, France