Losing on the last mile By Abid Ullah Jan

Losing on the last mile

By Abid Ullah Jan

Al-Jazeerah, November 28, 2004

It does not need much wisdom and in-depth research to prove that the US (government) would lose on the last mile not only in Iraq but every inch that the US (government) wants to dominate outside Iraq. The wisdom, research and analysis for this purpose has already been done by the leading American newspaper, the New York Times, at a great cost.

The person who is paid huge sums and provided full support to travel around the world and move freely from US military bases to the House of Saud and policy deliberations in Washington concludes: “The bad guys in Iraq can lose every mile on every road, but if they beat America on the last mile - because they are able to intimidate better than America is able to coordinate, protect, inform, invest and motivate - they will win and America will lose.” (New York Times, November 28, 2004)[1]

It is a wonderful job on the part of New York Times’ chief foreign affairs analyst because we have been provided with the five elements — coordinate, protect, inform, invest and motivate — for the US success, lacking which is a sure recipe for disaster.

The fun part of the story is that being an embedded journalist or a reporter makes one partially blind. He can dig out such fine elements, for fails to see their total absence to conclude that the US would soon be belly up in all the places where it is out to impose its way of life on others.

Let us analyse these elements to see if the US has any chance to win a war that it has been waging for the last 14 years with weapons of mass deception and destruction of unprecedented scale in human history.

1. Coordinate: The question is: with whom? Killers, dictators, human rights abusers and opportunists monsters like (US-backed rulers)? Or with a partner lair in chief, Tony Blair? These are all that the US can coordinate with. The rest of the world is as against the US motive as it never was in the US history of foreign interventions. If this is the coordination that the New York Times would like to succeed, it better prepare for the much awaited demise of the imperial Washington.

2. Protect: Again, protect whom? The same thugs and sell outs mentioned above or the people of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan? Protect Green Zone and a few mile territory in Kabul or the cities after cities and villages after villages that the US is raising to the ground in occupied and semi-occupied countries, such as Pakistan? Of course killers, dictator and human rights abusers and their collaborators are the people that the US wants to protect and the New York Times wishes to succeed. As far as ordinary Iraqis, for example, are concerned, the US starved them to death for 12 years. It then bombed them to death for weeks with “shock and awe” like noble missions. And now it is flattening their homes for the last three years.

The US is going to lose on the point as well for it is not ready to protect the masses that are totally against US aggression and designs to impose an alien way of life on them and its collaborators are too few and too weak to survive for too long without the US protection. The question is: for long can the US afford to protect its stooges? May be for too long, but not indefinitely.

During the moments of excessive arrogance General Abizaid claims: "every once in a while, the Romans would get a legion overrun. We haven’t even had a platoon overrun” (Nov 25, 2004) and “we can generate more military power per square inch than anybody else on earth, and everybody knows it” (Nov 27). However, he forgets that the US could hardly have a fraction of moral power per square inch of mind or soul of the people it is keeping under occupation. Even the thugs in its legions are not there because they are impressed with the US moral leadership. They are only there for worldly gains and would switch sides much before the US run out of gas on the last mile. Too high a price the US is paying for their protection.

3. Inform: The most laughable element identified by the NY Times at a time when a growing number of Americans are losing trust in its duty to inform. They are switching to alternative sources for information.

Since when has the NY Times assumed that the US can play a role in genuine information when even majority of the Americans are leaving the pro-establishment sources such as CNN, CBC, NBC, LA Times, Washington Post, and others who have the monopoly over reaching to the people under occupation? Banning Al-Jazeera and assuming the US would be able to effectively misinform the world with the help of its embedded journalists and reporters like Friedman, amounts to living in fool’s paradise.

The more the time goes by, the more the people realise the ulterior motives of the United States. It is difficult for the US to hide its intentions that it is neither a war on terrorism, nor weapons of mass destruction, not even a war for democracy. It is pure and simple a war on Islamic ideology, as the 9/11 commission’s report has concluded and as General Abizaid declare long ago: “the two broadest strategic problems we have to deal with...happen to be Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.... It is a battle of ideas as much as it is a military battle” (January 29, 2004.

If informing about this dream is what the New York Times wants the US to inform others, this information has already started to backfire. All that is to see is whether, the US would be able to even complete the last mile with such malicious intentions of changing the way of life and their faith of 1.3 billion people.

4. Invest: Seems as if the New York Times is joking again with expectations from the US to invest more in Iraq. It has already invested billions and has sacrificed more than 1000 Americans (official figures, which are definitely wrong) and more than 100,000 Iraqis (not to count 1.8 million whose life was invested for the US success through economic sanctions).

5. Motivate: Motivate with what? Unfortunately the US is left with nothing to inspire and motivate others. All it has is the military power and that is why General Abizaid constantly talks in the following terms:

"To deter a nation state you should never underestimate the air and naval power of the United States...We have an incredible amount of power.. And so we can generate more military power per square inch than anybody else on earth, and everybody knows it...If you ever even contemplate our nuclear capability, it should give everybody the clear understanding that there is no power than can match us militarily...As it pursues a long war against Muslim extremism, the United States should rely on local forces... After all, who better can go against the cellular structures in Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Egypt, wherever you may find them, but the people that live there.”[2]

The US cannot motivate others with the torture centres like Abu Gharib, or detention camps like Guantanamo, or with (the assault on) Fallujah. It only can hope to intimidate and terrorise others. However, even that is not possible against a people whose families are already perished through the earlier economic sanctions or shock and awe mission and liberation adventures. The US with its war machine can only, repeat only, de-motivate and make people welcome death than living tied to the visible leash of Lindy England in Abu Gharib or invisible leashes of Paul Bremer and others in Baghdad, Kabul, Islamabad, and Cairo.

So, any expectation of the US to improve on the counts mentioned above is as useless as it could be. These are the only last remaining elements that a well-paid, well-travelled, well-informed and resourceful chief foreign correspondent from the New York Times could come up with for the American success in occupied lands.

Interestingly, the more we analyse the same elements, the more we reach the conclusion that the US has already lost on these fronts and there is no chance for it to stand up again. The US has already lost the last mile.

[1] Thomas L. Friedman, “The last mile,” the New York Times, November 28, 2004.

[2] Gen. John Abizaid, commander of U.S. Central Command. Nov 27, 2004

Earth, a planet hungry for peace

Apartheid Wall


The Israeli Land-Grab Apartheid Wall built inside the Palestinian territories, here separating Abu Dis from occupied East Jerusalem. (IPC, 7/4/04).

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank, like a Python. (Alquds,10/25/03).

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