‘US to blame for Iraqi power struggle’
The US is responsible for the factional struggles among the Iraqi elite, and the continuing battle for the country's oil, according to Joseph Kishore, a writer for the World Socialist.
“The conflict – the violence in Iraq is very much a product of the occupation itself,” Kishore notes, adding that it is the source of the crises currently plaguing Iraqi politics and society. “Look at what this occupation has produced: over one million people killed by some estimates, and thirty-five percent of Iraqi children living now are orphans. The entire society has been scarred by this war.”The analyst also points out that these problems bring new struggles in the political realm.“You have different factions of the Iraqi elite battling over power, over control of the resources – including particular oil contracts, and this threatens to unravel into civil war. But this is very much a product of the American occupation itself.”
Jeremy Corbyn, Labour MP and member of the Stop the War Coalition, told RT live from London that those responsible for the recent atrocities in Baghdad are trying to say that the Iraqi government is unable to maintain control. “We are in for a very nasty and difficult period, and I think the origins of all this relate back to the US-led invasion and the disbandment of the then-existing Iraqi army and police forces.”For years, the US and its allies – including Britain – gave their unconditional support to current PM Nouri al-Maliki, the same man now accused of sparking a new sectarian war, undoing everything that the allies were there to do. Corbyn says that indeed, the irony is huge, because the British and Americans have always claimed that Iraq would emerge as a democratic, Western-style state – and that Maliki was a product of the democratic process.“The reality is that the Deputy Prime Minister has been arrested, and apparently accused of planting bombs or attempting assassinations of other people. And there is now this mayhem on the streets, and it seems to me that the Iraqi government is extremely beleaguered, and the danger, of course, is that they will ask for Western forces to come back in order to protect that government."As a result, Corbyn says, there will be a Western-backed government facing huge opposition from its own people in the midst of the violence plaguing the region. The analyst recommends that the West rethink its strategy very carefully.
A wave of synchronized bombings has ripped through the Iraqi capital, killing at least 72 people and wounding almost 200. Ambulances became a common sight as massive plumes of smoke rose above Baghdad. Since US troops have left, almost 20 blasts have rocked the city, in the form of car bomb and other hidden explosives. The wave of attacks indicate a continuing era of uncertainty and surging religious tensions to follow the American withdrawal.
