THE BUSH Administration's untoward pressure on Mark Latham to prolong Australia's military involvement in the Middle East reflects its fear that the withdrawal of the tiny Australian contingent will damage the veneer of legitimacy which the recent Anglo-American initiated Security Council Resolution has grafted onto the invasion and occupation of Iraq in the run-up to the American presidential elections.
The resolution of June 8 has relabelled the new Interim Government of Iraq as "sovereign" and the current occupation of Iraq as a "security partnership". But the transfer of power is muddied by the Interim Government's close ties with the CIA and MI6 and its lack of power to veto "sensitive offensive operations" by the "multinational force", whose presence, it has dutifully assured the Security Council, is essential to prevent Iraq from sliding into chaos and civil war.
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The Iraqi government was neither guilty, nor even capable, of military aggression in 2003. It was also prevented by UN monitoring from posing a credible long-term threat to its neighbours; and it has just, to the chagrin of Mr Bush, been cleared of any collaboration with al-Qaeda by the United States 9/11 Commission.
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The human rights credentials of the invaders have been tarnished by their support for Saddam's bloody tyranny in the 1980s and the privations inflicted by UN sanctions in the following decade. To make matters worse, the invasion was not a response to an escalating humanitarian crisis; and it has given rise to substantial, and as yet uncompensated, human and material suffering, social dislocation, physical insecurity and the sadistic human rights abuses endemic to a catch-all crusade against "evil" aliens.
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http://canberra.yourguide.com.au/detail.asp?class=news&subclass=international&category=general%20news&story_id=315424&y=2004&m=6Thoughtful discussion.
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