Right To Resist

Do the Iraqi's themselves possess a right to resist violently the occupying Coalition Forces in their country?

Do the people of Iraq have the right to defend themselves against violent foreign invasion and occupation by any means at their disposal against an aggressive and rapacious enemy enjoying overwhelming military superiority?

This is a right Americans unquestionably would invoke were their country invaded and occupied by a foreign power. They would take whatever measures were necessary to defeat the enemy and force it to withdraw.

The United States government supports this position and recognizes its validity in relation to all other nations invaded by foreign aggressors--except when it is Washington that initiates or supports the invasion of another sovereign state. By White House whim, the subject state loses its right to self-defense.

In Iraq, for example, President George W. Bush, who launched the unjust and unlawful invasion over two years ago, is appalled by the suggestion that the Iraqis have a right to fight back. The entire opinion-forming mass media echoes this arrogant perspective. Bush defines resistance to U.S. aggression in Iraq as an act of "terrorism," and not a legitimate struggle to reclaim national sovereignty from the brutal occupation.

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It is crucial to understand that were it not for the Iraqi resistance, the U.S. would have won a swift victory in Iraq and quickly implemented the Bush administration¹s neoconservative plan to extend American hegemony throughout the entire Middle East under the guise of "promoting democracy." Had Iraq simply surrendered, this example of the Pentagon¹s invincibility would have demoralized the entire region. It certainly would have tempted the White House to barge into "rogue" Syria and Iran to replace their governments with regimes subordinate not only to Washington but to the requirements of corporate globalization and transnational capital, which, after all, is what ³democratization² is all about.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld even had a simple formula for obtaining this objective. Conservative Harvard historian Niall Ferguson, who supports the notion that an explicit American empire would be good for the world, wrote in the New York Times May 24 that Rumsfeld was guided by a theoretical blueprint for conquest called the "10-30-30 timetable: 10 days should suffice to topple a rogue regime, 30 days to establish order in its wake, and 30 more days to prepare for the next military undertaking."

The resistance, thus, has erected two great obstacles in the path of President Bush¹s drive to control the vast petroleum reserves that have transformed barren deserts into the most strategically important region of the world today. First, the myth of invincibility has been shattered by a small irregular urban guerrilla force, Rumsfeld¹s plans for conquest have gone up in smoke, and the Bush administration has evidently curbed some of its more unsavory ambitions.

Second, the unexpected difficulties the resistance has created for Washington¹s occupation force, spplemented by the existence of a large U.S. antiwar movement ,have been the main reason why a majority of the American people feel that the Iraq war has not been worth the cost of U.S. lives and dollars. This sentiment may undermine Bush for the rest of his term in office unless the resistance is broken quickly, which is now the Bush administration¹s highest priority.

So the question becomes, as we face the Insurgents in a more-present, more-organized way, do they even have the right to fight back? While it's clear that the US would easily uphold this priciple given the exact reverse [that the US were invaded, the government toppled, Occupied for an indeterminate duration] it is also muddied by the fact that we aren't entirely sure exaclty who the Insurgents are.

If, as is possible, they are foreign-funded terrorists (say Iranian or Syrian) or if they are religious theocrats (say Iraqi's own Taleban or Al-Queda), do they possess the same rights to self-determination and self-defense?

Sticky situation, because in some cases, the native Iraqi's are the extremist theocrats, or the external funders and fighters are the democratic reformists...