*One Year On*

Mass anti-war rallies marked the one year aniversary of the USA's liberation/invasion/imperialist conquest of Iraq.

Pity.

I think my attitude on this topic is pretty clear. The war was justified...and a long time in coming. And on balance, it is still a good thing. The beauty of hindsight is that it is 20/20. After a while, people start to forget that when on the ground at that time, things look a lot different. Based on the intelligence of that time (remember, the FSB and French secret service agreed with the assessment by the CIA and MI6), Saddam Hussein's behavior (very very very suspicious, and even till the end, tried to hide documents from the Inspectors) and the general climte of the war on terror (yes it may have been a little disingenous to link Saddam and Al-Qaeda, but the link has been born out and the danger has always been that services and weaponary could be sold to them and Iraq could be a safe haven, not to mention a sponsor)...1441 practically begged the Security Council to launch an invasion. What was the alternative? Another decade of crippling sanctions that hurt the people, another 12 years of living under a brutal regime?

And yes, I do think (unlike Mr Devas) that what happen in Spain was appeasement. Even if, Iraq had never had a link with the general war on terror. One, the actions by Al-Qaeda say otherwise. And two, their actions now draw the link nice and clear. We love death like you love life. Chilling words that we gave in to. Does he honestly think that Al-Qaeda is about the avenging of Iraq? Hardly the case. Top of their list involved the US out of the holy cites. Done. Iraq and the Palestinian conflict was tacked on at the very last. What they want is nothing more than the complete, utter and total anniliation of our (liberal, secular and democratic) way of life. How does pulling out help? Will increasing the instability of the current situation somehow make things better? Will the acknowledgement that we will back down in a total war make us stronger? How will rolling over and surrender somehow appease these lunatics?

Make no mistake, it is the next great war of ideologies. The cold war is over. Welcome to the Hot Peace, or so we hope. This will not end till we take a clear united stance and reject what the Al-Qaeda stands for and who their sympathisers are.