UN peacekeepers should be deployed in Iraq once the US withdraw

international | anti-war / imperialism | opinion/analysis Friday March 23, 2007 19:53 by Common Sense

The International community must not shirk its responsibility to Iraqi democrats

Everybody but the most myopic neo-conservative agrees that the invasion of Iraq has been an utter catastrophy.
It seems inevitable that US troops will be withdrawn, if not in the lifetime of the Bush administration, then certainly in the lifetime of the next US administration either Democrat or Republican, when a realist will certainly occupy the White House with the mandate of a US public who have awoken from the hysteria after 9/11 which brought to them to war in the first place.

But only a fool would believe Iraq will be peaceful after the US withdraw. Indeed it seems obvious that Shia and Sunnis will slaughter with impunity once the ineffectual US referee is removed from the boxing ring.That is why the UN must send peacekeeping troops to the region to prevent this catastrophe from occuring.

The anti-war movement must look ahead with mature common sense.
They have been largely vindicated despite their detractors.

Saddam was an evil tyrant and yes he needed to be removed.
However the US invaded illegally Iraq illegally without the vote of the International Security Council who believed that Resolution 1441 had not been breached by Iraq because Hans Blix had requested that he needed more time to search for evidence of WMD (which proved to be nonexistent).

The naked attempt by the US to annex Iraq for its oil sparked the insugency.

But the insurgency who (They also are motivated by oil greed and fanatical goal of establishing a mirror image of the Taliban era Afghanistan only this time in Iraq) bomb and shoot innocent Shias and Sunnis, have no democratic mandate.

The UN forced the US to allow Iraqis to run their own affairs.
Iraqis accepted the new constitution and voted overwhelmingly for democratic political parties in the elections of 2005.
The UN recognises the legitimacy of this election and the legitimacy of the Maliki government.

The US military and the new Iraqi Army and Police have demonstrated their incapacity to pacify Iraq.

It is clear that when the US withdraws that Iraq will be torn apart as the civil war between the Shia and Sunni government will tear Iraq apart in a bloody catastrophe which will drag in the rest of the Middle East.

This vacuum must be filled by the UN with a strong peacekeeping force.

Anti-war demonstrators must demand that such a force be sent to Iraq to keep the warring factions apart.

Otherwise the world will be doomed to experience, what I fear will be another global war.

The greatest threat to our planet is climate change.
But if a global war explodes between the West and Islam then this issue will be sidelined as both sides become immersed in a bloodbath.

I believe that this can be stopped if the UN acts to intervene in Iraq.

This can only happen if antiwar demonstrators demand it.

Anti-war demonstrators exposed the lies of the Bush administration.
They must now complete the job to give Iraq and the rest of the world a future.