Hey, folks. Sorry about the [ever-ongoing] technology problems. I hope you were able to finish watching "No End in Sight" off www.freedocumentaries.org or youtube. Anyway, I know it's a complicated issue with a lot of names and facts to remember, so I'm pasting in my notes. Hope they help! If you use these for your paper, just add a parenthetical citation, i.e. (Class Notes).
1) The film begins by stating a number a number of problems that the U.S. faced in Iraq-including a lack of adequate supplies, troops, and a workable plan. The film also points out how, in the build-up to the war, the public was told that it would be quick, relatively painless, and cheap, something I (and probably your parents) remember from the news at the time.
2) The film shows an ironic scene in which Rumsfeld says Bush's contributions will be recorded by history. What do you think Bush’s place is history will be?
3) Do the filmmakers have a bias? Do they make this bias obvious through their lighting and editing? It's not necessarily bad to make your bias clear—in fact, it's an honest thing to do—but we as the audience should be willing to fact check. I think there's a bias in this film, but I also think that they make a serious effort to show all sides of the debate and verify their claims.
4) May 1st, 2003-Bush says: "In the battle of Iraq, the United States and her allies have prevailed." Four years later, 3,000 more American deaths, 20,000 American wounded. Baghdad has at least 10-15 bombings a day. Civilian death toll could be as high as 600,000.
5) Robert Hutchings, Chairman of the National Intelligence Council, produced a detailed, disheartening report on Iraq that the president and his staff immediately condemned, but the president hadn't actually read it!
6) Colonel Paul Hughes says he immediately suspected bin Laden on 9/11, when the Pentagon was attacked.
7) Marc Garlasco, senior Iraq analyst, was immediately told to see if there was any link between al Qaeda and Iraq. He concluded that there was NO relationship. So why did Bush and most of his staff insist that there was?
8) History—Bush's inner circle had a long history with Iraq. Hussein used chemical weapons against Iran, as well as his own people, but Reagan feared Iran more and supported Saddam Hussein. Said one State Department document, "Human rights and chemical weapons use aside, in many respects our interests run roughly parallel to those of Iraq." Iran and Iraq fight to a stalemate. Iraq invades Kuwait (first Gulf War). U.S. sweeps in and defeats Iraq, but Saddam Hussein left alive. Bush Sr. urges a revolt. Iraqis revolt; U.S. doesn't support the revolt and the rebels are massacred. Under the economic sanctions (especially during the Clinton Administration), countless more Iraqi citizens die while the rich remain wealthy. The desperate turn to fundamentalist Islam (historically, desperate people often turn to radical movements and/or religions). Hussein attempts to assassinate Bush Sr.
9) Jan. 20th, 2003, President George W. Bush signed NSPD #24 which gave control of post-war Iraq to the Pentagon, meaning that technically, Iraq could be governed without the direct oversight of the White House or Congress.
10) Ahmed Chalabi is named president of the Iraqi National Congress. He is widely viewed with suspicion; the U.S. Intelligence community didn't trust him. He said that post-war Iraq would be pro-American if he was in charge. The plan—the U.S. would stay for 3-4 months, install Chalabi, then in 2003, we'd start leaving. (Obviously, that didn’t happen.)
11) Initially, the U.S. was welcomed. Most Iraqis were overjoyed to be freed from Saddam’s brutal reign. Why did things change? In WWII, the planning to occupy Germany was started two years in advance. In Iraq, it was started 60 days in advance. Retired general Jay Garner was put in charge. Instead of leading 22,000 men, as he had in the past, he would be in charge of the entire country of Iraq. Ambassador Barbara Bodine was placed in charge of Iraq's capital, Baghdad. They had minimal staff, no computers, no plan, almost no one who spoke Arabic, etc.
12) Donald Rumsfeld, then Secretary of Defense, said we weren't there to run Iraq or establish marshal law, just to get rid of Saddam Hussein. American soldiers offered little or no intervention in the looting. The looting escalated, due in large part to about 100,000 criminals that Saddam Hussein released from jail prior to the war. One estimate of the damage from the looting—12 billions dollars! Rumsfeld: "Stuff happens!" Imagine your own city/country is being looted on an unprecedented scale. How would this affect your morale?
13) Bodine made a list of 20 sites that need to be protected. The list was ignored. For example, the National Museum of Baghdad, which contained some of the world's oldest artifacts, priceless treasures as much as 7,000 years old, and Iraq's National Library and National Archives were all burnt down. Obviously, this had a tremendous psychological and economic effect on peaceful Iraqis.
14) Rumsfeld originally wanted only about 100,000 troops. General Shinseki testified before Congress, despite pressure to keep his mouth shut, and said it would take several hundred thousand to do the job right. Colin Powell and Dick Armitage privately agreed. Rumsfeld eventually conceded to sending a little more—a total of 160,000.
15) Not enough U.S. and coalition troops to stop the violence or ensure the safety of Iraqi civilians. Iraqi v. Iraqi violence escalates.
16) April 23, 2003, Rumsfeld replaces (fires?) General Jay Garner and puts Paul Bremer in charge instead. Bremer immediately purged at least 20,000 members of the Ba'ath party, including those who had joined only to save their lives. Many of these were the "technocrats," the most educated and experienced Iraqi public officials. This further crippled Iraq's economy. 27% to 50% unemployment in Iraq. (By comparison, the U.S. had 25% unemployment during the Great Depression.) Imagine you're a civilian who's already endured a brutal dictator, the destruction of all your cultural history, and rampant lawlessness and murder, and on top of that, you haven't been able to find a job for eight or so years.
17) Bremer disbanded Iraq's army and secret police, thereby infuriating half a million armed men! Many of these men, out of work and angry, joined the insurgency instead. The U.S. then had to train a new military in Iraq from the ground up—something which, according to General Garner, can take years.
18) Iraq had around 70 large weapons storage depots and many ammunition dumps, but there weren't enough U.S. soldiers to guard them. Since many of the insurgents were former military men, they knew where the weapons/munitions were. The film doesn't mention Al Qa'qaa, but that's yet another example. Details are sketchy, but it’s believed that as much as 370 TONS of explosives was probably stolen. If you happened to be watching the news around that time, you probably noticed that's when attacks and suicide bombings started happening on a massive scale.
19) Paul Hughes says that he repeatedly told Walt Slocombe (Bremer’s second-in-command) that he had plenty of Iraqi soldiers who wanted to join with the U.S., but Slocombe (according to Hughes) ignored him, even though Slocombe wasn't actually in Iraq and hadn't met with the Iraqi military leaders. Slocombe also admits that they didn't consult with the U.S. military officials before supporting Bremer’s decision to put half a million armed men out of work.
20) U.S. troops did not have adequate armor. Despite constant attacks, Rumsfeld and Bremer said it wasn't a gorilla war, just isolated violence, etc. A key scene: a U.S. soldier asks why they don't have adequate armor; Rumsfeld basically says it's because they haven't had the time and resources to make it yet.
21) Hughes says he repeatedly left "the green zone" to meet with actual Iraqis, whereas most of the rest of those in charge of reconstruction did not. Bodine was fired for rocking the boat. Hughes said a lot of "pretty boys" were hired to work with the reconstruction because their families had made substantial financial contributions; however, these new hires had little or no experience and did virtually nothing. Every three months, they'd be cycled out.
22) Iraqi contractors were ignored so that U.S. contractors (like Parsons and Halliburton) could be brought in at much greater cost.
23) $18 billion dollars earmarked for reconstruction, but one year later, only $1 billion had been spent (i.e. the Iraqis had no water, heat, power, etc., despite what Bush and Bremer had promised).
24) Bremer allegedly refused to meet with many Iraqis. He also wouldn't return calls or meet with Sergio Vieira de Mello, the U.N. chief envoy, who had come to Iraq (with a team of U.N. diplomats who spoke Arabic) to try and mediate with the Iraqis. Sergio was later killed in a bombing.
25) 45,000 civilian contractors serving in a military capacity, often with very bad judgment (like in the case of Blackwater, which the film doesn't mention, who opened fire on and massacred unarmed Iraqi civilians).
26) Said one Iraqi: "Saddam hurt us badly. This is true. This is something we won't forget. But what came is worse than Saddam."
27) The insurgency was made up of many different groups with different religious views and goals.
28) As the situation in Iraq got worse, the CIA made a special report with several scenarios, but the president didn't bother to read it—even the one page summary.
29) Muqtada al-Sadr used the frustration and desperation of the Iraqis to fuel anti-American sentiments and gain political power in 2005 elections.
30) Cheney, in 2005: "we're in the last throes of the insurgency", but the violence continued!
31) In 2005, the U.S. escalated training of Iraqi soldiers. Rumsfeld "resigns".
32) As of 2010, the estimated costs of the Iraq war: around 740 BILLION dollars! (That's roughly double the costs of the war in Afghanistan, according to www.costofwar.com.) This is epically higher than we were promised it would cost before the Iraq War, like when Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said that due to Iraq's oil revenue, the war would pay for itself. What could we have done in terms of education and healthcare in the United States with that money? When President Eisenhower was leaving office, we warned America about the "military-industrial complex." In other words, watch out for those who encourage us to go to war so they can get rich!
33) To quote Marine lieutenant named Seth Moulton: "Are you telling me that's the best America can do?"
34) Since this documentary was made, the situation in Iraq has become more stable. Why? We sent more soldiers to restore order (aka "the troop surge" talked about my politicians), drove out most of the terrorists, and put control of the Iraqi government more in the hands of the Iraqis.
35) The big questions: why were all these mistakes made (so that we can avoid making them in the future), and what do we do now? Whether you're conservative, liberal, or moderate, what's the moral of the story here?
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