{"id":4029,"date":"2011-02-07T09:16:54","date_gmt":"2011-02-07T17:16:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=4029"},"modified":"2011-02-07T09:16:54","modified_gmt":"2011-02-07T17:16:54","slug":"the-failure-of-the-bush-doctrine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2011\/02\/07\/the-failure-of-the-bush-doctrine\/","title":{"rendered":"The Failure of the Bush Doctrine"},"content":{"rendered":"

Once upon a time, National Defense<\/em> meant exactly that.  Over the years it became more and more twisted from that until it reached the apex of misrepresentation under America\u2019s ChickenHawk in Chief, GW Bush.  Under the Bush Doctrine, National Defense<\/em> embodied the notion of preemptive war to secure our nation through spreading democracy<\/em>.  I summarize the Bush Doctrine as \u201cShoot Now; Aim Later!\u201d  Recent events in the middle east demonstrate that the Bush Doctrine has failed.<\/font><\/p>\n

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\"7BushDoctrine\""The defense of freedom requires the advance of freedom."<\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

– George W. Bush, January 2004<\/font><\/em><\/span> <\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

Imagine yourself a juror in a trial. It is the time for closing statements from both sides. On the one side is a lawyer arguing for democracy imposed by military invention, and on the other a lawyer advocating for uprising and revolution among the common people. As an American, which would you most likely identify and side with?<\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

Imagine what would be happening today in Iraq had George W. Bush not invaded it<\/strong>? The spontaneous uprisings in various countries of the Middle East are demanding, without American assistance, an end to the autocratic regimes that have ruled these lands for decades. Is there any doubt that much the same would be happening in Iraq as well? America has no control over these events and does not know how they will ultimately unfold. One can speculate over the causes. There is the gap between the wealthy and poor, ever greater with globalization. A yearning for personal freedom among the youth. The plea of the middle classes against a calcified, ensconced rapacious oligarchy. Time will tell. But there is one thing that is obvious: these uprisings were not caused by American military intervention<\/strong>.<\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

The recent events in the Middle East are an international rebuke of the central thesis of the Bush Doctrine. That doctrine holds that only democracy makes nation states safe and stable. Therefore, for America to be safe, the Middle East needs democracy, by force if necessary. And so from that, proceeded the necessity to invade Iraq, destroy its government, and reorganize its society so that it will be more amenable to American security needs. But this project didn’t go quite as planned.<\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

With Hussein, as now with Mubarak, there was a dictator in power who ruled by intimidation, violence, and villainy. There were always rumblings of revolt, but as in all dictatorships they were quickly suppressed with secret police, paramilitaries, and American-supplied weapons. In both cases, regimes with a long history of oppression rewarded their friends and punished their enemies. Back before the first Gulf War, both Hussein and Mubarak were a part of the American fold of friendly dictators, their regimes openly supported by American munitions and money. When the Project for a New American Century found a powerful ally in President Bush, they made it their business to end this state of affairs, by force<\/em><\/span>, beginning with Iraq<\/strong>.<\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

Instead of being greeted as liberators, we were greeted as invaders. Long-simmering sectarian tensions caused a bloody civil war. Civil institutions collapsed completely. Law and order disappeared. Millions became refugees. A trillion dollars borrowed, spent, and never repaid. And many, many, of our finest citizens cut down in their prime. All to build up a democracy that chose our worst enemy as its closest ally. This is the final verdict the Bush Doctrine of democracy by gunpoint: a fragile, weak state propped up by a coalition of gangsters and theocrats. This is not what America should stand for<\/strong>\u2026 [emphasis added<\/em>]<\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Inserted from <Daily Kos<\/a>><\/p>\n

In 2002, the Taliban proposed that they take part in the so-called democracy being formed by the Republicans\u2019 puppet, Hamid Karzai.  They agreed to return to Afghanistan, disarm, sever all ties to Al Qaeda, and field candidates just like any other Afghanis.  Bush and Karzai refused.  Why?  The other thing about the Bush Doctrine and Republican foreign policy is that when they say \u201cdemocracy\u201d in a 2nd or 3rd world country, they mean a puppet government who will do what they are told.  The last thing Bush and the Republicans wanted in Afghanistan is a real democracy.<\/font><\/p>\n

As I write, I am listening to Barack Obama speaking about the need to reduce the deficit.  The place to start is to end the war of conquest in Afghanistan, begun under the Bush Doctrine.<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Once upon a time, National Defense meant exactly that.  Over the years it became more and more twisted from that until it reached the apex of misrepresentation under America\u2019s ChickenHawk in Chief, GW Bush.  Under the Bush Doctrine, National Defense embodied the notion of preemptive war to secure our nation through spreading democracy.  I summarize […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4029\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}