Thomas Friedman and the Invasion of Iraq

Nothing Man: Thomas Friedman and the Invasion of Iraq 2003

6 May 2023

“States do bad things.”

Thomas Friedman, 16 September 2019.

“I heard a similar message just a few days ago from Sergio Vieira de Mello, the chief U.N. officer in Baghdad, who was killed in yesterday's bombing.

…

His senseless death is heartbreaking.”

Thomas Friedman, “No Time to Lose in Iraq”, New York Times, 20 August 2003.

“Asked how a bomb could be placed in the always tightly guarded driveway of the embassy, where only the Ambassador's armor-plated limousine is allowed to enter, Mr. Dillon said he could only speculate that a car packed with explosives crashed through the checkpoint at the end of the driveway and into the entrance.

…

A Navy medical officer from the United States Navy ship Guadalcanal, which was resting off the Beirut coast about five miles out to sea, said his entire ship ''shuddered'' from the blast tremor.”

Thomas Friedman, “U.S. Beirut Embassy Bombed”, New York Times, 19 April 1983.[1]

“In recent times US grand strategy has been guided by a new kind of doctrine, named after not its author but its exemplar: the Costanza doctrine.”[2]

Michael Fullilove, “America’s ‘Seinfeld’ strategy in Iraq”, Financial Times, 29 March 2007.

“I despise [EH] people who believe something without evidence and then go out and take action which damages other people.”

Richard Dawkins, Interview with Pierce Morgan, 20 March 2023.

“Any kind of international news is a cross-cultural product involving the labor of people with diverse professional and ethnic or national backgrounds.”

Amahl Bishara, “Local hands, international news: Palestinian journalists and the international media”, 7(1) Ethnography, pp.19-46 (2006).

“We can fight our way back, into the light. We can climb out of hell. One inch at a time.”

Any Given Sunday Film, 1999.

American Invasion of Iraq

On 17 March 2003 the American President George W. Bush delivered a speech laying out the justifications for an upcoming military invasion against Iraq. He provided two reasons for the upcoming war: 1. Iraq’s possession of weapons of mass destruction, including he pursuit of nuclear weapons, and its refusal to disarm peacefully; 2. Iraq’s harboring of persons tied to the attacks perpetrated in New York and at the Pentagon on 11 September 2001.[3] Both were false.

Bush indicated two legal frameworks to legitimate the war. Congress’s authorization to use force against Iraq a year earlier and U.N. Security Council resolutions from the early 1990s (678 and 687) combined with another resolution from November 2002 (1441).

France, Germany, and Russia opposed using military force against Iraq. They considered it necessary to adopt a specific U.N. Security Council resolution for this objective and to allow for the international weapons inspection team to properly conclude their work.[4]

American and British troops attacked Iraq on 20 March 2003.[5] Devastated by a staggering number of human fatalities as a result of sanctions imposed against the country since 1990,[6] it did not take long for the American and British invading armies to conquer Iraq. The war also generated a substantial number of deaths among Iraqis. In 2004 it was estimated that 100,000 Iraqis had died because of the invasion, in 2006 655,000, and by 2008 the number reached one million.[7]

In early May 2003 President Bush declared that the military phase in Iraq had ended. While no weapons of mass destruction had been found, Bush underscored the victory of removing Iraq’s President Saddam Hussein from power and his close ties to the perpetrators of the 11 September 2001 attacks.[8]

The notion of changing the regime in Iraq formed a central theme in the ideological justification to engage in war against Iraq. It was widely invoked in the political discourse particularly in the United States and Britain,[9] despite its glaring illegality and violation of basic principles of the United Nations Charter.

Legally, the U.N. Security Council resolution advanced by President Bush in his speech explaining the reason for the upcoming military action against Iraq do not support his claim. Resolutions 678 of 29 November 1990 and 687 of 8 April 1991 were adopted considering Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait on 2 August 1990 and the introduction of resolution 660 by the Security Council on the same day. The issue of weapons of mass destruction was noted in resolution 687 in the specific circumstances of the post August 1990 Iraq – Kuwait events declared over by this resolution.

U.N. Security Council resolution 1441 of 8 November 2002 determined that Iraq has been in material breach of its obligations regarding weapons of mass destruction and stipulated a further mechanism of international weapons inspection as Iraq’s last opportunity to uphold its international obligations. Iraq accepted this resolution.[10]

The three U.N. Security Council resolutions do not authorize the use of force against Iraq. No determination has been made by the Security Council in accordance with article 39 of the United Nations Charter about the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression to facilitate an international use of force. Such a statement was included in resolution 660 of 2 August 1990 declared on the day of Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait. Further, as indicated above France, Germany, and Russia required a specific resolution authorizing the use of force. So did the legal advisory of the British Foreign Office.[11] General principles of humanitarian intervention do not salvage the invasion of and the use of force against Iraq.

Failure to obtain the required authorization to use force internationally renders the American – British invasion of Iraq illegal. Ab act of aggression. British Lord Chief Justice Lord Tom Bingham opined in 2008 that the invasion of Iraq was illegal and reiterated this position again in 2010 as a critique of the British Chilcot inquiry.[12] In the Netherlands, a commission of inquiry found that the invasion of Iraq had no sound basis in international law concluding that the Dutch government’s support for the war following intelligence from US and Britain was inconsistent with its declared policy. According to the Guardian:

The war in Iraq had "no basis in international law", a Dutch inquiry found today, in the first ever independent legal assessment of the decision to invade.

In a series of damning findings, a seven-member panel in the Netherlands concluded that the war, which was supported by the Dutch government following intelligence from Britain and the US, had not been justified in law.

‘The Dutch government lent its political support to a war whose purpose was not consistent with Dutch government policy,’ the inquiry in the Hague concluded. ‘The military action had no sound mandate in international law.’

In a further twist, it emerged that the UK government refused to disclose a key document requested by the Dutch panel.

The document – allegedly a letter from Tony Blair asking for the support of the Dutch prime minister, Jan Peter Balkenende – was handed over in a breach of diplomatic protocol and on the basis that it was for Balkenende's eyes only, an inquiry official told the Guardian.

‘It was a surprise for our committee when we discovered information about this letter,’ said Rob Sebes, a spokesman for the Dutch inquiry. ‘It was not sent with a normal procedure between countries – instead it was a personal message from Tony Blair to our prime minister Jan Peter Balkanende, and had to be returned and not stored in our archives. We asked the British government to hand over the letter but they refused,’ Sebes said.[13]

Congress’s October 2002 resolution Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq fails to provide the necessary legal legitimacy for the invasion of Iraq by the United States. Section 3(a) of the resolution empowers the President and the US government to use armed forces in two correlative circumstances: defend the country’s national security and pursue the implementation of United Nations Security Council resolutions. No UN Security Council resolution authorizing force against Iraq was available; Iraq did not pose a threat to America’s national security in the meaning of article 51 of the Unite Nations Charter; and the entire narrative in the resolution about Iraq’s possession of WMDs is false.[14]

Having received the backing for its war effort from prominent democrats such as Hillary Clinton[15] and Joe Biden,[16] the Bush administration proceeded towards the invasion of Iraq. The aftermath of Iraq’s occupation by the American and British forces was shaped by the predictable shadowy reality of the only superpower in the world: chaos, problems, and damage.

In addition, ordinary grave human rights violations by American forces persisted such as torture[17] and excessive use of force.[18]American preaching for democracy epitomized in the young Noah Feldman as a source for introducing democratic constitutionalism in Iraq.[19] His academic legal narrative about his endeavor acknowledged that it took place “in the wake of the American led campaign to depose Saddam Hussein from power”, without informing the reader about its legal status under international law.[20] American and British oil companies reaped substantial gain from Iraq’s oil resources, a subject considered to be a main pretext for the illegal war.[21]

President Bush[22] down the chain of command repeatedly echoed the allegation regarding Iraq’s possession of WMDs. All failed to indicate the strategic military alliance with Iraq when these weapons were used by the Iraqi government during its war with Iran (1980 – 1988).[23]

The insistence was overwhelming, also shortly after the invasion when no WMDs were discovered. In his memoire, Bush refers to similar performance of use of force against Iraq by the Clinton Administration to justify his decisions.[24] National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said “we don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud”[25] and defended in her memoire the nature of intelligence production towards the invasion.[26]

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced in June 2002 that “they have them and they continue to develop them. And they have weaponized chemical weapons. We know that they've had an active program to develop nuclear weapons.”[27] Ten days after the invasion Rumsfeld asserted knowing where the WMDs are in Iraq “we know where they are. They’re in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south, and north somewhat.”[28] Subsequently, in May 2003 Rumsfeld acknowledged “we never believed that we’d just tumble over weapons of mass destruction in that country”.[29] Rumsfeld also indicated in his memoire that his deputy Wolfowitz raised the need to include Iraq as part of the response to the 9/11 attacks few days thereafter, on 15 September 2001. Wolfowitz’s proposal was not appealing to President Bush.[30]Assassinated United Nations official Sergio De Mello is not mentioned in Rumsfeld’s chronicled memory.

Rumsfeld’s deputy Paul Wolfowitz played a key role in pushing for the invasion of Iraq and was willing to broadly interpret evidence about Iraq’s alleged possession of WMDs and links to the 9/11 attacks.[31] After the invasion, Wolfowitz claimed that it was understood that WMDs would not be found immediately maintaining that Iraq’s links to terrorism were the main issue to be considered.[32]

Secretary of State Colin Powel presented at the United Nations the purported evidence about Iraq’s WMDs programs.[33] The Bush administration claimed that the CIA’s position was that Iraq’s possession of WMDs was a “slam dunk”, whereas head of the CIA at the time George Tenet alleged that he was misrepresented. According to Tenet, the term referred to the threshold of the needed information to justify the war,[34] which is still a problematic position from an international law perspective.

In February 2001 Cheney said that Iraq has not developed any significant capability with respect to WMDs.[35]Few days after 9/11 attacks and following the gathering of top administration officials at Camp David, Cheney confidently claimed that the Iraqi government has no connection to the 9/11 attacks. Cheney’s position differed from the proposal echoed by Deputy Secretary of Defense Wolfowitz.[36]

The Vice President’s public pronouncements shifted towards implicating Iraq. In August 2002 he declared that there is no doubt about the country’s possession of WMDs,[37]including pursuing a nuclear program.[38] In March 2003 he stressed ties between Iraq and the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks.[39]Judith Miller who proclaimed the administration’s false allegation about Iraq’s WMDs, including seeking a nuclear bomb,[40] argued that both she and her sources acted in good faith.[41]However, Cheney’s Chief of Staff Scooter Libby was the source who revealed the identity of a CIA agent married to a diplomat critical of the Bush administration.[42]Cheney did not regret the Iraq war despite its false justifications and devastating consequences.[43]

U.N. inspectors found no evidence of WMDs in Iraq until their withdrawal on 18 March 2003 by the U.N. Secretary General.[44] Both invading countries were aware of this fact,[45] but preferred to ignore it,[46]and contradict the U.N. inspecting teams’ assessment about Iraq’s cooperation with the search for WMDs.[47] The same pattern took place with regards to Iraq’s framed pursuit of nuclear weapons.[48]

Linking Iraq to the 9/11 attacks is an exercise in hallucinating psychology typical to the mythological American political discourse. We will relate to it in brief. The main person within the Bush administration that produced false evidence linking Iraq’s government to perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks and other terrorists is Paul Wolfowitz’s subordinate Douglas Feith who held the position of Under Secretary of Defense for Policy between July 2001 to August 2005.[49]

2007 report prepared by the Pentagon’s Deputy Inspector General for Intelligence criticized Feith’s conduct. Feith’s performance was described as inappropriate, broad in scope, that failed to provide the most accurate of intelligence analysis.[50] In response, Feith underscored that he was asked to initiate the intelligence project by his superior Wolfowitz.[51] From Feith’s home library where Zionism’s founder’s picture is hanged Jeffrey Goldberg mounted a predictable defense for Feith.[52] Goldberg proudly participated in the American media’s push towards invading Iraq.[53]

Changing the Iraqi regime and instilling democracy in that country shaped the approach of many proponents of the invasion. It does not render the war legal or legitimate. The actual intentions, motives, and tactical maneuvers of those who put forward this argument is immaterial to the glaring illegality of the use of force against Iraq.

As already indicated, Paul Wolfowitz raised this issue already on 15 September 2001 during the meeting of senior officials of the Bush administration held at Camp David.[54] At that time President Bush was not responsive to this proposition. Wolfowitz preserved his messianic belief in the war also after it became clear that Iraq did not possess WMDs nor were there any ties between its government and the 9/11 terrorists.[55]

During the Clinton years in the 1990s the idea of changing Iraq’s regime was on the table, as underscored by Joe Liberman in March 2023.[56] Richard Perle fiercely advocated for the destruction of the regime in Iraq in December 2001.[57] Clinton administration officials joined their conservative colleagues in chanting for a war against Iraq.[58]And there is Fouad Ajami, the equivalent of a local informer, who made Americans feel good about using their military against Iraq.[59] AIPAC could not miss the opportunity to lobby.[60]

Thomas Friedman

Thomas Friedman stood out in his advocacy for the war against Iraq because of what he wrote and given his location in the landscape of American media. Friedman is also a trusted adviser on foreign affairs, particularly the Middle East, by the current and irritating President Joe Biden. The celebrated New York Times reporter said in a climacteric prophecy on CNBC about a year ago that Biden may be the last true pro-Israel U.S. President.

Friedman was not the only proponent of the war. In addition to his New York Times colleagues Judith Miller who reverberated the Bush Administration’s positions[61] and William Safire’s zealous preaching for the illegal invasion,[62] other media outlets facilitated the unjustified use of force against Iraq.[63]The British equivalent of Friedman would be Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair’s communication adviser. We will be discussing both and other British officials in a separate report.[64]

Friedman is a veteran and decorated employee of the New York Times. He started his career as a reporter with this newspaper in 1981 writing mostly about the Middle East. In 1995 he became a foreign affairs columnist. Friedman received the Pulitzer Prize three times for his work: in 1983, 1988, and 2002. His articles are often replicated by other mainstream media outlets either independently or in conjunction with hosting him for an interview.

Friedman had ample opportunities not to push for the war against Iraq, but he selected to miss all of them. These options contained: the serious reservations to the war by prominent republicans, including Henry Kissinger;[65] opposition to the war by Anthony Zinni, former head of the U.S. army’s central command that covers the Middle East;[66]former republican national security adviser Brent Scowcroft’s clear warning not to wage the war;[67]former senior military commanders’ risk assessment against the war;[68]Colin Powell’s initial assertion that Iraq is not a topic for aggressive military activity;[69]possible reluctance among the CIA to wage war as opposed to other officials in the Bush administration;[70]and finally, his newspaper’s editorial of 9 March 2003.[71]

Instead, Friedman ideologically joined his colleague at the Times William Safire. Both were followed by their adolescent admirer Jeffery Goldberg tracking and reproducing the tone and policy set by Wolfowitz and Feith at the Pentagon. Coincidentally, all are passionate supporters of Israel, but that is not the main topic of this research.

Despite Dick Cheney’s 16 September 2001 interview on NBC’s Meet the Press, Friedman was overwhelmingly excited by the tragic 9/11 explosions throughout the period before the Iraq invasion and after. Similar devastating damage took place in the United States and abroad. Given the nature of the American system’s performance, such enthusiasm could be construed as a cynical internal affirmation about the identity of the actual perpetrators of this tragedy. Not in the case of Friedman, however. It seems that he considered the transformative event an opportunity to insist on long held agendas, beliefs, and desires. Friedman immediately discovered the emergence of Third World War against the potentially responsible for the 9/11 attacks in an article published two days after the event:

And this Third World War does not pit us against another superpower. It pits us -- the world's only superpower and quintessential symbol of liberal, free-market, Western values -- against all the super-empowered angry men and women out there. Many of these super-empowered angry people hail from failing states in the Muslim and third world. They do not share our values, they resent America's influence over their lives, politics and children, not to mention our support for Israel, and they often blame America for the failure of their societies to master modernity.[72]

By early November 2001, Friedman was providing public relations advice to the war effort in Afghanistan and potential war against Iraq.[73] Later that month, writing again as someone who joined the developing war, he defined its cultural premise shallowly underscoring the purported difference between a modernized Judeo - Christian tradition on the one hand and an Islamic one on the other.[74]

Friedman’s altruism in the defense of American foreign policy is no surprise. It fits his epistemology and role at the newspaper and coincides with unchallenged assumptions by many of its subscribers in New York who consider Israel central to their Jewish identity as part of their American citizenship. Friedman could be analytical about various topics, irrespective of the light prose, deadlines, and public mood attached to the job of being a journalist. But on Israel, Friedman is fierce and a-historical. After the 9/11 attacks the first analytical, dimension fundamentally decreased, while the Israel component of his writing expounded.[75]

For Friedman, the devastating sanctions that crippled Iraq’s state and society during the 1990s were a mere public relations stunt that necessitated a counter information offensive.[76] Similar effort was required, Friedman preached, to explain the inherent justness of the American conduct on the world stage following the 9/11 attacks. Certain European reservations may have been correct tactically, but they missed the big strategic picture.[77]As to France, Friedman simply decided to clash with the undomesticated ally.[78]

As a prelude to the regime change invasion, Friedman provided in September 2002 a bloody history of Iraq noting that it is an artificial state built by British borders and composed of three rival groups: Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds.[79]Aware of his substantial and comical influence over significant factions in mainstream media, Friedman reiterated the savage nature of Arabs and Muslims who ‘caused’ the 9/11 attacks and advocated for an invasion of Iraq that would trigger a change in their non-modern mindset.[80]

Friedman advised the Bush administration to follow a good cop bad cop strategy when the issue of WMD inspections was being deliberated at the United Nations. No need to be totally insane at this stage and declare the will to invade Iraq unilaterally. A rare and unconvincing moment where Friedman appeared to depart from the Wolfowitz – Feith policy and ideology towards Colin Powell’s increasingly contained position by the same epistemology.[81]

Projecting his seemingly total ignorance of and disregard for international law and the requirements under it to wage a legal war, Friedman boasted that the approaching invasion of Iraq is partly about oil, and there is no point in denying this aspect of the nearing major event.[82] His spirit in this article can only be attributed to an awkward confidence in his stature in the newspaper and among its subscribers, with New York’s conformist elites,[83] and the American mainstream media in general.

In two consecutive articles in January 2003, before the final American decision to invade Iraq was pronounced publicly, Friedman repeated his advocacy for a war the purpose of which is regime change addressing two groups of individuals: liberals and conservatives.[84] For him, the main and probably only reason for a possible war was changing the Iraqi regime and fundamentally introducing a different mode of governance for a troubled community. His audience was similarly simplistically binary, a typical Anglo-American mode of analysis. What these two articles revealed, for anyone who was in doubt, is Friedman’s passion for the use of violence against Arabs and Muslims. His shameless journalism is sourced in his upbringing[85] and the development of his professional environment.[86]

Friedman’s eagerness for the war and regime-change in Iraq led him to be infuriated by the French demand to permit more time for WMD inspections.[87] By now Friedman had departed from his own advice to the Bush administration about not waging war immediately, to appear, in Friedman’s terms, wild but not insane.[88] His alignment with Tony Blair as a the reasonable lesser evil than the American conservatives is peculiar. Blair himself was following the American conservative’s cue,[89] and in Britain he was being led by Murdoch’s conglomerate media.[90] Preaching for the war as a regime change mechanism continued by Friedman in February 2003, playing the good cop strategist in the American polity in the face of mounting international opposition to waging war without genuinely completing the inspections for WMDs.[91]He is either absolutely inattentive or thinks that the reader shares his mindset. Advocating for a regime change war and discussing U.N Security Council dynamics are mutually exclusive.[92]

Underscoring what he had been vigorously indoctrinating for the past few months, Friedman revealed that his approach is aligned to the small group that convinced President Bush to wage a regime changing war, contrary to public opinion and to Friedman’s wife’s approach. Not exposed by name, most probably this group consists of Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith and Richard Perle. Using Friedman’s terminology again from a previous article on the war against Iraq, between the wild and insane, he opted for the latter because of the inherent captivating charm of the geopolitically transformative project. Friedman enlightens:

A U.S. invasion to disarm Iraq, oust Saddam Hussein and rebuild a decent Iraqi state would be the mother of all presidential gambles. Anyone who thinks President Bush is doing this for political reasons is nuts. You could do this only if you really believed in it, because Mr. Bush is betting his whole presidency on this war of choice.

…

He has been convinced by a tiny group of advisers that throwing ''The Long Bomb'' -- attempting to transform the most dangerous Arab state -- is a geopolitical game-changer. [93] (emphasis added – MD).

In his last article shortly before the invasion of Iraq commenced titled melodramatically ‘D-Day’, Friedman reaffirmed his position throughout leading up to the war for a regime changing one because of the backward nature of not only Arabs and Muslims in Iraq, but in the entire Arab world.[94]

Consistency was the quality that defined Friedman after the war. It was a regime changing invasion.[95] Not finding WMDs is a minor detail in the burden to form democracy in a savage region,[96] as is the issue of the small group that unjustifiably led the country to war and was keen to blame the intelligence failure on the CIA.[97]

Conclusion

The Anglo – American invasion of Iraq was an act of aggression contrary to international law. No leader of either country had been brought to justice domestically or internationally. In this research we focused on the American aspect of the invasion. In another one we will analyze the British dimension of the illegal war.

America’s rush to war was a result of passionate advocacy by a small ideologically coherent group of people, led by Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, and Douglas Feith. They saw the Middle East, not only Iraq. Changing a regime by force is possible, desired, and manageable. The interests of the United States in the region and other allied actors would be served consequently. Fragile intelligence was sufficient to bypass a necessary authorization by the U.N. Security Council to use force. They were wrong in their allegations against Iraq, but they were zealous in their pursuit to change the nature of the country’s regime.

Reading Thomas Friedman’s commentary towards the war is useful in many ways. We can understand the inner psyche of an influential commentator in the American media. We learn about the actual reasons for launching the war as opposed to its declared objectives and help establish a solid case under international law. We experience the media frenzy that accompanied the heated conversation prior to the war. All in the wake of the bizarre, apocalyptic, and deranged threatening event of the 9/11 attacks.

While contemporaneously Friedman may had been emetic to read, analyzing him retrospectively is a fulfilling and required mission historically as well as legally.

We look forward for a similar analysis regarding the British culpability for the illegal war against Iraq.

[1] Ronald Regan’s 23 April 1983 address about this bombing may reveal the actors’ identity, if the American political vocabulary is followed “We don’t know yet who bears responsibility for this terrible deed. What we do know is that the terrorists who planned and carried out this cynical and cowardly attack have failed in their purpose.” There is an interesting element of similarity between this bombing and a later one that took place in 2005 in Beirut, Lebanon, which claimed the life of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri. It is the obscure subsequent claim of responsibility. Friedman wrote also about the Hariri assassination noting “Well, Rafiq, this one’s for you. I am sorry you won’t be able to read it. It will be difficult to prove who killed Mr. Hariri.” See Thomas Friedman, “‘Hama Rules’”, New York Times, 17 February 2005. Hariri’s assassination is similar to Sergio De Mello’s in Iraq reflected upon by Samantha Power in her 2008 book who wrote a captivating description despite not being on the scene of the crime “Just after the group had taken their seats, a deafening explosion sounded, and the sky flashed white.” If we were serious participants in the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, one of Hikmah’s major projects, we would have invited both Friedman and Power to testify about the explosivity policy of the American military’s double layered structure. Another revealing article by Friedman is about the 4 August 2020 explosion in Lebanon’s port which occurred on 9 August 2020. Friedman is the ultimate American schizophrenic. He knows the identity of the atrocity’s perpetrators, but is comforted by the fact that he will enjoy full impunity for concealing the truth or misrepresenting it. While there is no expectation that Friedman would exercise any civic ideals in this arena, the fact that Power refrains from offering her knowledge and analysis to the Lebanon Tribunal in the Hague, the Netherlands, underscores a horrible character disfunction. The same could be said of the senior American participants in this Tribunal, from the Registrar to the Defense. The kind of ‘knowledge’ produced by Friedman and Power can be termed, using George Soros’s repetitive phrasing in his self-invited public speaking engagements, as ‘imperfect knowledge’. What is peculiar about Soros is the smiling and almost satisfactory spirit when indicating these types of reality affecting facts. Soros’s moral projection is no less abominable than Friedman’s which is intensified by his repulsive oligarch heir. For consistency purposes we should emphasize that concealing America’s troubled nature in its foreign affairs is part of this country’s own self-definition and spans all political, cultural, and religious affiliations.

[2] Many in American culture symbolize strategic nothingness such as Seinfeld’s and in various forms, including Jewish comedians Sarah Silverman, Ben Stiller, Adam Sandler, and Seth Meyers. Yet, Bill Maher excels in this field of creativity and ingenuity. They are part of the collective American ‘cover – up’ and ‘amnesia’ for their country’s criminal behavior. Superb obstructors of justice.

[3] See Presidential Address on Iraq, C-Span, 17 March 2003.

[4] See John Tagliabue, “French and German Leaders Jointly Oppose Iraqi War Moves”, New York Times, 22 January 2003; Sarah Left, “France, Germany and Russia condemn war threat”, The Guardian, 19 March 2003; John Tagliabue, “France and Russia Ready to Use Veto Against Iraq War”, New York Times, 6 March 2003.

[5] Patrick Tyler, “U.S. and British Troops Push into Iraq as Missiles Strike Baghdad Compound”, New York Times, 21 March 2003.

[6] See Barbara Crossette, “Iraq Sanctions Kill Children, U.N. Reports, New York Times, 1 December 1995; Patrick Cockburn, “UN aid chief resigns over Iraq sanctions”, The Independent, 30 September 1998; Ewan MacAskill, “Second official quits UN Iraq team”, The Guardian, 16 February 2000; UNICEF, Iraq Child and Maternal Mortality Survey. Baghdad, 1999; Denis Halliday, “The Impact of the UN Sanctions on the People of Iraq”, 28(2) Journal of Palestine Studies, pp.29-37 (1999); Denis Halliday, “The Deadly and Illegal Consequences of Economic Sanctions on the People of Iraq”, 7(1) The Brown Journal of World Affairs, pp.229 – 233 (2000); H. C. von Sponeck, A Different Kind of War, (Berghan, 2006). For a preposterous understanding of the sanction’s effects see “Smarter Sanctions on Iraq”, New York Times, 18 May 2002.

[7] Sarah Boseley, “’655,000 Iraqis killed since invasion’”, New York Times, 11 October 2006; “Iraq conflict has killed million Iraqis”, Reuters, 30 January 2008.

[8] David Sanger, “President Says Military Phase in Iraq has Ended”, New York Times, 2 May 2003.

[9] A constant message conveyed by the British Prime Minister at the time Tony Blair. His personal responsibility for the invasion of Iraq will be explored separately.

[10] Julia Preston, “Iraq Tells the U.N. Arms Inspections Will be Permitted”, New York Times, 14 November 2002.

[11] Michael Holden, “UK government lawyer said Iraq war was illegal”, Reuters, 26 January 2010; Helen Pidd et al, “Lord Goldsmith changed legal view of Iraq war in two months, says adviser”, The Guardian, 26 January 2010.

[12] Richard Norton – Taylor, “Top judge: US and UK acted as ‘vigilantes’ in Iraq invasion”, The Guardian, 18 November 2008; Stephen Moss, “Iraq war was illegal says former lord chief justice”, The Guardian, 8 February 2010.

[13] Afua Hirsch, “Iraq war was Illegal, Dutch panel rules”, The Guardian, 12 January 2010. See also Richard Falk, The Costs of War: International Law, the UN, and World Order after Iraq (Routledge, 2008).

[14] U.S. Congress’s Select Committee on Intelligence published three reports that did not address the war’s legality, rather the intelligence on WMD (9 July 2004), Iraqi government’s alleged links to terrorism / September 11 attacks (8 September 2006) and reliance on information provided by Iraqi sources (8 September 2006). Obviously, engaging with the American discourse on the 9/11 attacks requires genuine imagination and, if you are Arab or Muslim, unexplainable restraint.

[15] See, for example, Micah Zenko, “Hillary the Halk: A History”, Foreign Policy, 27 July 2016; “Hillary Clinton: No Regret on Iraq Vote”, CNN, 21 April 2004.

[16] Ryan Grim, “Joe Biden, Five Years before Invasion, Said the only Way of Disarming Iraq id ‘Taking Saddam Down’”, The Intercept, 7 January 2020; Mark Weisbrot, “Joe Biden championed the Iraq war. Will that come back to haunt him now?”, The Guardian, 18 February 2020.

[17] See Seymour Hersh, “Torture at Abu Gharib”, New Yorker, 10 May 2004; Elise Swain, “Iraqis Tortured by the U.S. in Abu Gharib Never Got Justice”, The Intercept, 17 March 2023.

[18] HRW, Off Target: The Conduct of the War and Civilian Casualties in Iraq, December 2003; AI, 20 Years since the US-led coalition invaded Iraq, impunity reigns supreme, 20 March 2023.

[19] Jennifer Lee, “American Will Advise Iraqis on Writing New Constitution”, New York Times, 11 May 2003.

[20] Noah Feldman et al, “Constitutional Politics and Text in the New Iraq: An Experiment in Islamic Democracy”, 75(2) Fordham Law Review, 883-920, 883 (2006). Feldman also fails to mention the significant event of murdering the U.N. official de Mello in Iraq in August 2003 and other grave human rights violations introduced by Iraq’s invaders. True to the spirit of its era, Feldman’s 2004 What We Owe Iraq: War and the Ethics of Nation Building is a parody of knowledge production constituting another significant low point for the American academy. Further, the constitutional, Middle East, and Israel scholar has yet to reflect on the performance of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon from any perspective of his choosing.

[21] Jeff Gerth et al, “Halliburton Contracts in Iraq: The Struggle to Manage Costs”, New York Times, 29 December 2003; Rebecca Leung, “Bush Sought ‘Way’ To Invade Iraq?”, 60 Minutes – CBS, 9 January 2004; Peter Beamont et al, “Greenspan admits Iraq war about oil, as deaths put at 1.2m”, The Guardian, 16 September 2007; JoAnne Allen, “Greenspan clarifies Iraq war and oil link”, Reuters, 17 September 2007; Peter Goodman, “For Iraq’s Oil Contracts, A Question of Motive”, New York Times, 29 June 2008; Mathew Weaver, “British and US companies win Iraq Oil contracts”, The Guardian, 30 June 2008. See also Neta Crawford, “Pentagon Fuel Use, Climate Change, and the Costs of War”, Watson Institute International and Public Affairs – Brown University, 13 November 2019. See also Rashid Khalidi, “Resurrecting Empire – Western Footprints and America’s Perilous Path in the Middle East (Beacon Press, 2004).

[22] See Bush’s State of the Union Address, C-Span, 29 January 2002.

[23] Patrick Tyler, “Officers Say U.S. Aided Iraq in War Despite Use of Gas”, New York Times, 18 August 2002.

[24] George W. Bush, Decision Points (Random House, 2010), pp.227 -228.

[25] Condoleezza Rice, Interview on Late Edition, CNN, 8 September 2002.

[26] Condoleezza Rice, No Higher Honor: A Memoire of my Years in Washington, (Simon & Schuster), pp. 166 – 172.

[27] Lou Dobbs, Money Line, CNN, 10 June 2002.

[28] This Week with George Stephanopoulos, ABC, 30 March 2003.

[29] Interview with Fox News, 4 May 2003.

[30] Donald Rumsfeld, Known and Unknown: A Memoir, (Penguin, 2011), p.359.

[31] James Risen et al, “Split at C.I.A. and F.B.I. on Iraqi Ties to Al – Qaeda”, New York Times, 2 February 2003.

[32] Interview with Paul Wolfowitz, Washington Post, 4 May 2003; Sam Tanenhaus, “Bush’s Brain Trust”, Vanity Fair, July 2003; Interview with Paul Wolfowitz, Charlie Rose, 4 August 2003.

[33] Steven Weizman, “Powell, In U.N. Speech, Presents Case to Show Iraq Has Not Disarmed”, New York Times, 6 February 2003. See also Douglas Jehl, “Wary Powell Said to Have Warned Bush n War”, New York Times, 17 April 2004; Andrew Stephen, “George, Tony, and me”, The Guardian, 13 November 2005 (“What is clear, though, is that Blair simply failed to comprehend that neocons such as Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle, whom Meyer says Colin Powell privately dismissed as 'fucking crazies', saw Iraq as 'the anvil on which they could forge a realignment of the Middle East', and that Britain was being inexorably dragged down their path. Those same neocons also see a strong Europe as a threat to American hegemony, and Meyer describes how Rupert Murdoch and senior Republicans complained to him over dinner about Britain's 'appeasement' towards France; such mutterings from the American right alone, it seems, were soon enough for Blair to abandon Churchill's long-held strategy that British support for a powerful US must be balanced by strong ties to both Europe and the Commonwealth. 'Blair's famous bridge between Europe and America,' Meyer notes, 'was sinking beneath the waves.'”; Robert Draper, “Colin Powell Still Wants Answers”, New York Times, 16 July 2020.

[34] See Michelle Nichols, “Ex – CIA chief says ‘slam dunk’ Iraq quote misused”, Reuters, 27 April ,2007; Interview with George Tener, 60 Minutes – CBS, 29 April 2007.

[35] Dick Cheney, Cairo Press Conference, 4 February 2001.

[36] Dick Cheney, Meet the Press – CNBC, 16 September 2001. Conducted few days after the 9/11 attacks, it is an important advanced course in coding American troubled conduct at home and abroad.

[37] Dick Cheney’s full speech before the Veterans of Foreign Wars National Convention, The Guardian, 27 August 2002; Elizabeth Bumiller et al, “Cheney Says Peril of a Nuclear Iraq Justifies Attack”, New York Times, 26 August 2002.

[38] Interview with Dick Cheney, Late Night Edition – CNN, 24 March 2002.

[39] Interview with Dick Cheney, Meet the Press – CNBC, 14 March 2003.

[40] See Michael Gordon & Judith Miller, “U.S. Says Hussein Intensifies Quest for A-Bomb Parts”, New York Times, 8 September 2002 .See also Judith Miller, “Iraqi Tells of Renovations at Sites for Chemical and Nuclear Arms”, New York Times, 20 December 2001; Chris Hedges, “Defectors Cite Iraqi Training for Terrorism”, New York Times, 8 November 2001.

[41] Judith Miller, “The Iraq War and Stubborn Myths”, Wall Street Journal, 3 April 2015.

[42] Katharine Seelye, “Times Reporter Agrees to Leave the Paper”, New York Times, 10 November 2005; Julian Borger, “Cheney’s aide revealed as source of CIA leak”, New York Times, 1 October 2005; Neil Lewis et al, “Reporter Who Was Jailed Testifies in Libby Case”, New York Times, 31 January 2007. See also “The Times and Iraq”, New York Times, 26 May 2004.

[43] Suzanne Goldenberg, “Cheney has no regrets over Iraq invasion”, The Guardian, 4 May 2006.

[44] Report of the Executive Chairman of the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, 30 May 2003 (S/2003/580). See also, Julian Borger, “There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq”, The Guardian, 7 October 2004.

[45] Hans Blix’s briefing to the security council, The Guardian, 14 February 2003; Reports to the Security Council by the Chief U.N. Weapons Inspectors, New York Times, 15 February 2003.

[46] Hans Blix, “A war of utter folly”, The Guardian, 20 March 2008.

[47] Helene Mulhlland, “Hans Blix at the Iraq war inquiry – live”, The Guardian, 27 July 2010.

[48] Mohamed El Baradei’s report to the UN security council, The Guardian, 14 February 2003; Ian Traynor, “UK nuclear evidence a fake”, The Guardian, 8 March 2003.

[49] See Seymour Hersh, “Selective Intelligence”, New Yorker, 5 May 2003; James Risen, “How Pair’s Finding on Terror Led to Clash on Shaping Intelligence”, New York Times, 28 April 2004; Douglas Jehl, “Pentagon Reportedly Skewed C.I.A.’s View of Qaeda Tie”, New York Times, 22 October 2004.

[50] Pentagon’s Deputy Inspector General for Intelligence, Review of the Pre-Iraqi War Activities of the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, 9 February 2007; “The Build-a-War Workshop”, New York Times, 10 February 2007.

[51] Interview with Douglas Feith, Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace, 11 February 2007.

[52] Jeffery Goldberg, “A Little Leaning: What Douglas Feith Knew and When he Knew it”, New Yorker, 2 May 2005.

[53] Jeffery Goldberg, “The Unknown: The C.I.A. and the Pentagon Take another Look at Al Qaeda and Iraq”, New Yorker, 2 February 2003; Jeffrey Goldberg, “The Great Terror: In Northern Iraq, there is New Evidence of Saddam Hussein’s Genocidal War on the Kurds – and Possible Ties to Al Qaeda”, New Yorker, 17 March 2002.

[54] See Donald Rumsfeld, Known and Unknown: A Memoir, (Penguin, 2011), p.359; Interview with Dick Cheney, Meet the Press – CNBC, 16 March 2001.

[55] Interview with Paul Wolfowitz, Charlie Rose, 4 August 2003; Peter Boyer, “The Believer”, New Yorker, 25 October 2004; Peter Mlne, “Intellectualism in U.S. Diplomacy: Paul Wolfowitz and his Predecessors”, 63(3) International Journal, pp.667-680 (2007); A Conversation with Paul Wolfowitz, Miller Center – University of Virginia, 26 October 2009.

[56] Joe Liberman, “20 years on, it’s clear our collective memory of the Iraq War is simply wrong”, New York Post, 16 March 2023.

[57] Richard Perle, “The U.S. Must Strike at Saddam Hussein”, New York Times, 28 December 2001.

[58] Todd Purdum, “The Brains Behind Bush’s War Policy”, New York Times, 1 February 2003.

[59] Fouad Ajami, “Iraq and the Thief of Baghdad”, New York Times, 19 May 2002.

[60] Jonathan Steele, “Israel puts pressure on US to strike Iraq”, The Guardian, 17 August 2002; Dan Collins, “Israel to U.S: Don’t Delay Iraq Attack”, CBS-News, 8 August 2002; Dana Milbank, “For Israel Lobby Group, War is Topic A, Quietly”, New York Times, 1 April 2003; Stephen Walt, “I don’t mean to say I told you so, but…”, Foreign Policy, 8 February 2010; Robert Mackey, “Kerry Reminds Congress Netanyahu Advised U.S. to Invade Iraq”, New York Times, 25 February 2015; Benjamin Netanyahu’s testimony before Congress on Conflict with Iraq, C-Span, 12 September 2002.

[61] Supra, notes 39-41.

[62] William Safire, “‘To Fight Freedom’s Fight’”, New York Times, 31 January 2001; “Myth America 2002”, 8 July 2002; “Saddam and Terror”, 22 August 2022; “The German Problem”, 19 September 2002; “‘In Material Breach’”, 28 October 2002; “The Northern Front”, 16 January 2003; “Give Freedom a Chance”, 6 March 2003; “Missing Links Found”, 24 November 2003. Safire’s January 2001 article accurately predicted the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. It may have been sourced by Wolfowitz/Feith school at the Pentagon.

[63] Steven Kull et al, “Misperception, the Media, and the Iraq War”, 118(4) Political Science Quarterly, pp.569-598 (2003/2004); Tell Me Lies: Propaganda and Media Distortion in the Attack on Iraq (Pluto Press, 2004); David Altheide et al, “War programming: The Propaganda Project and the Iraq War”, 46(4) The Sociological Quarterly, pp.617-623 (2005); Bill Moyers, Buying the War, PBS (2007); Howard Kurtz, “Media’s Failure on Iraq still stings”, CNN, 11 March 2013.

[64] See, for example, Nicholas Watt, “Rupert Murdoch pressured Tony Blair over Iraq, says Alistair Campbell”, The Guardian, 15 June 2012.

[65] Todd Purdum et al, “Top Republicans Break with Bush on Iraq Strategy”, New York Times, 16 August 2002.

[66] Thomas Ricks, “Ex-Commander Opposes Iraq Invasion”, Washington Post, 11 October 2002. See also Philip Shenon, “U.S. General Warns of Dangers in Trying to Topple Iraqi”, New York Times, 29 January 1999.

[67] Brent Scowcroft, “Don’t Attack Saddam”, Wall Street Journal, 15 August 2002; “Warning Shots on Iraq”, New York Times, 16 August 2002.

[68] James Dao, “Experts Warn of High Risk for American Invasion of Iraq”, New York Times, 1 August 2002; David Stout, “Former Military Leaders Urge Caution on War with Iraq”, New York Times, 23 September 2002.

[69] Bill Keller, “The World According to Colin Powell”, New York Times, 24 November 2001.

[70] James Risen, “C.I.A. Rejects Request for Report on Preparations for War in Iraq”, New York Times, 3 October 2002.

[71] “Saying No to War”, New York Times, 9 March 2003.

[72] Thomas Friedman, “World War III”, New York Times, 13 September 2001.

[73] Thomas Friedman, “One War, Two Fronts”, New York Times, 2 November 2001.

[74] Thomas Friedman, “The Real War”, New York Times, 27 November 2001.

[75] Thomas Friedman, “Arafat’s War”, New York Times, 13 October 2000; Thomas Friedman, “Bush’s First Memo”, New York Times, 27 March 2001; Thomas Friedman, “Campus Hypocrisy”, New York Times, 16 October 2002; Thomas Friedman, “The Arafat Voids”, New York Times, 14 November 2004. Critiquing Arafat is desird but not from Friedman’s misrepresenting motive.

[76] Thomas Friedman, “The War Saddam Won”, New York Times, 6 February 2001.

[77] Thomas Friedman, “Crazier Than Thou”, New York Times, 13 February 2002.

[78] Thomas Friedman, “Tone It Down a Notch”, New York Times, 2 October 2002; Thomas Friedman, “Vote France Off the Island”, New York Times, 9 February 2003; Thomas Friedman, “Our War with France”, New York Times, 18 September 2003.

[79] Thomas Friedman, “Iraq Without Saddam”, New York Times, 1 September 2002.

[80] Thomas Friedman, “Iraq, Upside Down”, New York Times, 18 September 2002.

[81] Thomas Friedman, “Chicken a` l’Iraq”, New York Times, 9 October 2002.

[82] Thomas Friedman, “A War for Oil?”, New York Times, 5 January 2003.

[83] Michael Bloomberg was the mayor of New York City from January 2002 to December 2013, preceded by Rudy Giuliani. Both supported the war against Iraq. See Michael Finnegan, “2020 candidate Michael Bloomberg says he doesn’t regret backing Iraq”, Los Angeles Times, 6 January 2020; “Giuliani: ‘Thank God that George Bush is our president’”, CNN, 31 August 2004; Eric Bradner, “Giuliani on taking Iraqi oil: ‘Of course it’s legal. It’s a war”, CNN, 12 September 2016. Billionaire New Yorker investor George Soros enriched Friedman’s and other newspapers with a total of 185,000$ in adds after the war seeking answers about the false justifications for waging it. He did not attach any blame for the troubled reporting constituting an implied admission that it is a significant source of information for the billionaire. See “Soros challenges reasons for war in press”, Al-Jazeera, 27 July 2003. Soros often aligns himself with Friedman’s foreign policy understanding and analysis. Given Soros’s unpersuasive claim for philanthropy and ‘reform’, like Friedman, he should be ousted from the Middle East.

[84] Thomas Friedman, “Thinking about Iraq (I)”, New York Times, 22 January 2003; Thomas Friedman, “Thinking about Iraq (II)”, New York Times, 26 January 2003.

[85] See Zionism and American Jews: Bringing Us Together and Pulling Us Apart, Center for Jewish History, 30 April 2023.

[86] Joseph Patrick McKerns, “The History of American Journalism: A Bibliographical Essay”, 15(1) American Studies International, pp.17-34 (1976); Jean Folkerts, “American Journalism History: A Bibliographical Essay”, 29(2) American Studies International, pp.4-27 (1991). See also Vol. 6(4)(1992) of OAH Magazine of History – Communication in History: The Key to Understanding.

[87] Thomas Friedman, “Tell the Truth”, New York Times, 19 February 2003.

[88] Supra, note 81.

[89] Michael Savage, “Goldsmith: why I changed my mind on Iraq”, The Independent, 28 January 2010.

[90] Supra, note 63.

[91] Thomas Friedman, “Present at…What?”, New York Times, 12 February 2003. See also Henry Kissinger’s interview with Charlie Rose, 13 February 2003. Kissinger does not express clear support for the war, and seems reluctant to advocate for a unilateral armed action. By March the reluctance evaporated: Henry Kissinger’s interview with Aaron Brown, CNN, 12 March 2003.

[92] See, for example, Anthony Lewis, “Bush and Iraq”, New York Review of Books, 7 November 2002.

[93] Thomas Friedman, “The Long Bomb”, New York Times, 2 March 2003.

[94] Thomas Friedman, “D-Day”, New York Times, 19 March 2003.

[95] Thomas Friedman interview with Charlie Rose, 25 March 2003.

[96] Thomas Friedman, “Hold Your Applause”, New York Times, 9 April 2003; Thomas Friedman, “The Meaning of a Skull”, New York Times, 27 April 2003; Thomas Friedman, “Winning the Real War”, New York Times, 16 July 2003.

[97] Thomas Friedman, “Because We Could”, New York Times, 4 June 2003.