[Texgreen] We Must Prevent Permanent Bases in Iraq

[margaret]

Alternet - Dec 8, 206
http://www.alternet.org/story/45223/

We Must Prevent Permanent Bases in Iraq
By David Swanson, davidswanson.org

Did you notice something about the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group
Report? It recommends all sorts of changes, all of them far short of
actually ending the war, but it recommends them all to the same person
responsible for the disastrous situation we're in now. It doesn't
suggest what Congress should do to rein in an out-of-control president.
Rather, it recommends that the President do dozens of things. Here's
one of them:

Recommendation 22: The President should state that the United
States does not seek permanent military bases in Iraq. If the Iraqi
government were to request a temporary base or bases, then the U.S.
government could consider that request as it would in the case of any
other government.

Bush came close to stating this on April 13, 2004, when he said "As a
proud and independent people, Iraqis do not support an indefinite
occupation and neither does America." But the Iraq Study Group does,
and so -- judging by other remarks and actions, does Bush. When you
refuse to set a definite time for getting out, you are supporting an
indefinite occupation. Robert Gates, the new Rumsfeld, told the Senate
Armed Services Committee on Tuesday that he thought the "war on
terror," which he dishonestly connected to the War on Iraq, would last
"a generation." That's pretty indefinite.

But what if Bush were to state that the United States does not seek
permanent bases? How would that differ from Bush stating that he had no
warning of Katrina, or that he knew Iraq had weapons of mass
destruction, or that the United States does not torture, or that he
planned to keep Rumsfeld on another two years?

Speaking of Rumsfeld, on February 17, 2005, Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld, testifying before the same Senate Armed Services Committee,
said: ''We have no intention, at the present time, of putting permanent
bases in Iraq.'' Now, in Rumsfeldspeak this probably meant that he
would build temporary bases and then decide later to make them
permanent, or that they would just be "enduring," which would mean
permanent but not, you know, permanent -- in the same way that an
"enemy combatant" is a prisoner of war without the rights of, you know,
a prisoner of war. In any case, what is gained by having Bush or
Rumsfeld say the words? Wouldn't it make more sense to recommend to
Congress that it do something that used to be the role of Congress:
namely, pass a law?

But there's the catch. Congress already has. Since the moment we
entered Fiscal Year 2007 in October, every dime spent on permanent
military bases in Iraq has been illegal. But no one even knows how to
find out how many dimes that is. And that illustrates a broader
problem. Bush not only began this war in secret with money that
Congress had approved for something else, but he also immediately
turned it into a permanent occupation and began constructing permanent
bases. It took Congress three years to get around to cutting off the
funding for more such construction, but Congress had never approved the
whole idea. Neither, of course, had the Iraqis.

This past weekend there was a huge protest in Italy where a permanent
U.S. military base plans to expand with the construction of a new base
nearby. In South Korea it's a similar story, with the added kicker that
our military is evicting townspeople, eliminating their village, and
building a new base with a golf course attached. There's a global
meeting planned in March in Ecuador on eliminating foreign military
bases. It was U.S. bases in Saudi Arabia that enraged Osama Bin Laden.
Americans pay a fortune to maintain bases all over the world, and the
primary product of them is anger.

Last March, when Congress passed the "emergency" supplemental funding
for the war for 2006, both houses of Congress included language banning
the use of funds to build permanent bases. A Republican-run conference
committee "reconciled" this agreement by deleting it.

But leaders on this issue like Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-Calif.)
didn't give up. Similar language was included in the "Defense"
Appropriations bill for 2007. Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) introduced an
amendment on the floor of the House to again delete the language on
no-permanent-bases. But most of the Republicans and almost all of the
Democrats went against him. Appropriations Committee Chairman C.W. Bill
Young (R-Fla.) urged King to withdraw his amendment: "If we strike this
prohibition from this bill that was well thought out, what we are
saying to the Iraqi people and what I am satisfied the propaganda
machine of al Qaeda in Iraq are going to do is use this and say: see
there, we told you so. The Americans plan to occupy us for the rest of
our lives." The House voted 376-50 for no-permanent-bases. It's been
the law since October. The 2007 "Defense" Authorization bill passed
including the same language.

Why did King want to allow the construction of permanent bases? He
argued on the floor: "I believe that we should not foreclose our
options in Iraq ... Historically, basing rights agreements have been a
necessary part of diplomatic relations with foreign governments." Well,
yes, but that's exactly what the Iraq Study Group recommends: working
the basing arrangements out with the puppet government. Indications are
that the Iraqis are not fooled.

When a number of us wrote to Congressional leaders to thank them for
cutting off funds for permanent bases, we noted that: "This important
step comes as evidence increasingly points to its need. A University of
Maryland poll recently showed that 77 percent of Iraqis believe that
the United States intends to maintain permanent bases in that country,
while a State Department study found that a majority of Iraqis are
calling for U.S-led military forces to withdraw immediately. The
recently issued National Intelligence Estimate confirmed what many of
us had feared for so long: the U.S. presence in Iraq is increasing
terrorist threats and not making America's homeland more secure."

So, over three-quarters of Iraqis are hip to what we're doing.
Americans don't lag so far behind. In a new study released by the same
university this week, we learn that 66 percent of Americans (including
a near majority of Republicans) believe that a majority of Iraqis
oppose the establishment of permanent U.S. bases in their country, and
68 percent of Americans (including a majority of Republicans) believe
that, in any case, we should not have such bases. Tom Engelhardt points
out that: "This is an especially remarkable set of figures, given that
the permanent bases have received next to no attention in the American
mainstream media."

Enough has been reported, however, for us to know that we are spending
billions of dollars to construct bases in Iraq for the U.S. military.
The new Democratic majority in Congress knows this, knows the damage
these bases are doing, and knows the good that could be done by making
better use of all that money, not to mention the lives lost in the
process. If we speak up, perhaps the new majority will also know how
quickly it can become a minority again if it does not seize this issue,
expose it, and set it right. As Congressman Dennis Kucinich said on the
floor of the House on Wednesday: "The American public did not vote for
the Iraq Study Group. They voted for a new congress and a new direction
in Iraq -- out."

(c) 2006 Independent Media Institute.