Ibrahim is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations (about as mainstream and establishment an institution as there is) and a former reporter for the New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.

IHT Article Print Page
President George W. Bush's war is fueled by two things: bolstering the president's popularity as he attempts to ride on the natural wave of American patriotism unleashed by the criminal attacks of Sept. 11; and a misguided temptation to get more oil out of the Middle East by turning a ''friendly" Iraq into a private American oil pumping station.

Both will backfire and may indeed cost this president and his warmongering cabinet their sought-after second term. ...


The fact that Saddam Hussein tortures, jails and oppresses his people, which Bush keeps repeating in every speech, has been going on for 30 years without disturbing Americans. Many countries, including the Russians in Chechnya , the Chinese in Tibet and elsewhere, and scores of American friends and allies including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, to mention just a few, repress their people's freedom.

When Saddam took on Iran in 1980 the United States joined in attacking the Iranian navy and destroyed Iranian off-shore oil platforms, crippling Iran's economy and making sure he survived the war he started. In 1991, the first President Bush saved Saddam again when the uprising against him turned into an uncontrolled civil war.

So all the talk about spreading democracy and changing the whole Middle East, starting with Iraq, does not hold water. The United States, obsessed with oil and something called "regime change," wants to create a totally pro-American Middle East. The problem is that it will not work. You don't impose democracy by installing an occupying power in a region that has no tradition for it.