The Washington Informer: Opinions/Editorials

Try to get any self-respecting Democrat, even, who’s close to the leadership to say otherwise, for attribution, okay?

Most U.S. leaders, consider the Iraq war (or its successors yet to come) as the last stand fight for the very survival of Western Civilization itself, against the teeming Jihadist hordes.

There are some among the top leadership who consider this more of America’s manifest destiny. This time it’s called “Armageddon.”

Yes, it’s about oil, but more it’s about: “Oil in the hands of whom? Us? Or people who hate us?”

The United States must permanently occupy Iraq (U.S. leaders believe, whether they admit it or not), because quite frankly, there is no Iraqi government which Americans will trust to protect American interests. Those interests include access to the huge oil reserves of the country, and projecting American power and domination throughout the region.

So, Americans are not being told that they are fighting now in Baghdad, so they won’t have to fight the same adversaries at some future time in Baltimore.

I can imagine there may have been a similar strategy responsible for another grave military blunder by another leader named “George.”

There’s one big difference between George Armstrong Custer and George W. Bush. Before going off into the military debacle that not only ended his political career, but ended his life, George Custer had always demonstrated personal valor and bravery, under arms. George Bush was a “slack soldier” at best when it was time for him to serve during the Vietnam War. He has become a swaggering commander, only since he began ordering his country men and women into a war which should never have been fought.

So, it was with George Custer. He did not have to attack Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse at Little Big Horn. He did not have to try to bring about “regime change” in the Sioux Nation. In 1875, Gen. Custer swore by the White Buffalo Calf Pipe, a pipe sacred to the Lakota people, that he would not fight Native Americans again. But in 1876 he recanted. He led the attack on a Native force, even though he knew his forces were outnumbered, maybe three-to-one.

Gen. Custer attacked Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse and their superior forces because he believed that when attacked by the U.S. Cavalry, the Natives would cut and run. Man Law. White Man Law.

He gambled and lost badly, a war he did not have to fight.

So it is with Pres. Bush, who “won” two badly flawed elections, which many contend he did not win at all. He led the country into war with Iraq on completely false pretenses, which he knew all along were flawed because his administration manipulated the intelligence it used to justify it’s charges to everyone else that Iraq was an imminent threat to the U.S. because it had a stockpile of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Lies.

Four years later, that same fight which was started unnecessarily by President “Mission Accomplished” has now become the Clash of Civilizations in which our way of life—our tail-gate parties, our gas-guzzling SUV and truck-favoring lifestyle—is at stake.

What could happen if America did not prevail in Iraq? America would have to learn to “get along” and to “share” with those Muslim and Arab people in the Cradle of Civilization there. And if that happened, the Asians, the Latin Americans, the Blacks and the Browns inside this country will soon want the same deal for themselves. And then who’s next?

Askia Muhammad is Editor of National Scene News Bureau, which provides editorial, audio and photographic content for broadcast and print clients, including The Final Call, National Public Radio, Soundprint, WPFW-FM and this newspaper. askia99@verizon.net

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