Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
EDITORIAL: Bombing cannot mask our shame over Iraq carnage
What a bloody mess. And what a source of shame for the West that so much blame for the carnage now visiting Iraq lies with us. But let us remind ourselves first of the surreal chain of events that has brought us here.
It started with an official lie, deliberately promoted to persuade the British people to support a war of choice. The claim that Saddam Hussein was a danger to this country was then mingled with idealistic plans to bring democracy to a ‘New Middle East’.
We certainly got a ‘New Middle East’, but not the one we had been told to expect.
Without Saddam, Iraq’s dangerous Sunni-Shia split widened into a chasm. With the Christian West blamed by many Iraqis for the invasion and the chaos that followed, local Christians suffered horribly, fleeing in their thousands to Syria, until that country, too, was sunk in murderous sectarian chaos by Western intervention.
Full editorial: Mail On Sunday UK