We were driving back from a demonstration of hundreds of thousands that had gathered on the Washington DC mall. Hundreds of thousands more had protested in cities all around the world. Over a million people in the streets.
“No war.”
Ten years ago.
As we drove home to Chicago I read aloud the report of the protest in the NY Times to the others in the car.
The Times began their report with, “There are two superpowers in the world this morning: The United States and world public opinion.”
We were elated.
Like so much of what The Times wrote about Iraq and the lead up to the war that started ten years ago today, they were wrong about that too.
George Bush would not be deterred by millions of people saying, “No war.”
Last night, the great Indian writer and activist Arundhati Roy asked a lecture hall full of people in Chicago, who had won and who had lost the war?
The people of Iraq have not won. Not the American people either.
George Bush spends his days painting bad paintings of himself in the shower.
Tony Blair has become a Christian evangelist who charges $500,000 a speech.
I remember getting into a discussion with a young man in a Bucktown restaurant ten years ago.
“We’ll wrap this thing up in a few days,” he assured me.
I shook my head. I was old enough to have seen all this before. “Years,” I said. “Urban warfare. House by house. Thousands will die.”
“No way,” he assured me.
Fred Klonsky 
Shlock & Aw Shucks
Fred….I “knew” the Iraq war was wrong. I protested it’s start. My church has protested (much to quietly but…) the war every Friday night for ten years ( We started with The Afghanistan War). But what totally amazzzed me, blew me away was Not Bush’s lying, Not Condoleeza Rice’s incompetence, Not Cheney’s power grab — it was that the 1000 Generals in the Pentagon that planned the war, commanded the war, ordered American kids to be maimed and killed — and never updated their military game plan after Viet Nam. We didn’t go into Iraq ready for a police action, anti-insurgency — we went into Iraq as if we were going to fight the Russians on the plains of Poland in 1965. The American military took no lessons away from Viet Nam and it took four years for these Generals — chest dripping medals — to change tactics squandering not only American lives but Iraqi lives as well. My biggest disappointment was that there were no war crime trials after it was over. Not just Bush and Cheney but down from the top of the chain of command not some 20 year old Sargent from Grand Junction, Iowa but the top of the American chain of command.
Well stated , Bob.
I too protested the war. Knowing that wars in the past have often been the scams for increasing the economy used by the Republican Party. Both King George Bush the first and his son King George the second were greedy self serving people. Though George the second was truly the idiot. Cheney? Well just follow the money. The economic melt down and outsourcing of American jobs? Just follow the Bush policies and find the laws they advocated.
From Kathy Kelly of Voices in the Wilderness:
A civilized country would heed their call. A civilized country would demand heartfelt reparations to the people of Iraq and cease to interfere in their internal affairs, would secure freedom and official praise for whistleblowers like Bradley Manning, and would rapidly begin to liberate itself from subservience to warlords and war profiteers. Gandhi was once asked, “What do you think of western civilization?” And famously, he answered, “I think it would be a good idea.”
No matter how much we all ignore it, here is the reality: The US invasion of Iraq was unlawful. The leaders who planned and executed the war are criminals. US citizens bear some responsibility for not holding those leaders accountable. . .