Quote of the Day

No one knows for certain how many Iraqis have died as a result of the [U.S.-led] invasion 15 years ago. Some credible estimates put the number at more than one million. You can read that sentence again. The invasion of Iraq is often spoken of in the United States as a “blunder,” or even a “colossal mistake.” It was a crime. Those who perpetrated it are still at large. Some of them have even been rehabilitated thanks to the horrors of Trumpism and a mostly amnesiac citizenry. (A year ago, I watched Mr. Bush on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, dancing and talking about his paintings.) The pundits and “experts” who sold us the war still go on doing what they do. I never thought that Iraq could ever be worse than it was during Saddam’s reign, but that is what America’s war achieved and bequeathed to Iraqis.

– Sinan Antoon
Excerpted from “Fifteen Years Ago,
America Destroyed My Country”
The New York Times
March 19, 2018

Above: An Iraqi boy, who lost both legs in a U.S. bombing raid, lies in a hospital bed in Baghdad, April 2003. (Photo: Tyler Hicks/The New York Times)

Related Off-site Links:
Unmitigated Failure: Operation Iraqi Freedom, 15 Years Later – Danny Sjursen (Antiwar.com via Common Dreams, March 20, 2018).
The 15th Anniversary of "Original Sin" – Stacy Bannerman (Common Dreams, March 11, 2018).
Fifteen Years After the Start of the Iraq War, the U.S. Is at War in at Least Seven Countries – Joshua Keating (Slate, March 19, 2018).
15 Years After Invasion, Many Americans Still Fail To Recognize Unending Scale of the Crime – Julia Conley (Common Dreams, March 20, 2018).
Trump’s Talk Worries Me, Like the Talk Before the Iraq War – Nicholas Kristof (The New York Times, March 21, 2018).
15 Years After Invasion, Demands for Iraq War Reparations and a New Global Peace Movement – Andrea Germanos (Common Dreams, March 19, 2018).
Secret Memos Expose Link Between Oil Firms and Invasion of Iraq – Paul Bignell (The Independent, April 18, 2011).
The Iraq War: Images by Carolyn Cole – Framework, August 18, 2010).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• The Tenth Anniversary of the U.S. Invasion of Iraq
• The War Racket
• Making the Connections
• Quote of the Day – May 28, 2017
• Sami Rasouli's Holiday Invitation from Iraq to Donald Trump
• Saying "No" to Endless U.S. Wars
• Quote of the Day – September 7, 2015
• You, O Comforter, Are Ever Near . . .

Opening image: The initial "shock and awe" bombing of Baghdad when the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003. (Photo: via IPA)