It's an occupation not a war

Of course, the US occupation is an occupation. I try to remember to call it that when discussing the situation with my elected representatives, fellow progressives and others. The word "occupation" conjures up very ugly scenarios of abuses of the inhabitants that we learn about in school when we studied other countries that occupied conquered societies. At the Los Angeles Area Impeachment Center we encourage everyone to use the term "occupation".

If you listened to any of the Winter Soldier hearings held recently in Silver Spring then you know that the current occupation also conjures very ugly scenarios of abuse of the inhabitants, so in that regard it's no different than other occupations. I'm sure we're not winning many hearts and minds in Iraq.

There's a practical reason why the Pentagon resists the word occupation, in addition to the fact that the U.S. doesn't DO occupations and all of our 750 bases on foreign soil are there by invitation. While one might suggest that this is attitude is a myth, our departure from Uzbekistan and Saudi Arabia will be referenced as evidence that it's true. Also, the song and dance about the status of forces agreements that have to be signed to formalize the long term status of the mega Air Force bases, as the U.N. mandate to provide security services to Iraq runs out, is designed to sustain that position. Not to mention that the mayhem, alleged to have been generated by alQaeda, was made necessary by the fact that the leaders promoted by the U.S. have not been as willing to sign away their land with long term leases as was hoped.
When the U.N. determined that the interim authority was not legally able to enter into contracts on behalf of Iraq and that the international financial and commercial community would not recognize what Bremer had tried to fob off, it became necessary to restart the process of normalization by setting up a new governmental framework under a democratically approved Constitution. That's when the resistance became aware of what was going forward, since the Constitution is quite explicit in calling for the central government to supervise the disposition of ALL the natural resources of the nation (land, water, minerals, forest products, etc.) The Sunni leadership agreed not to oppose the referendum on condition that these provisions would be amended almost immediately. That hasn't happened. Bush talks about oil leases, but the really critical issue is the land for the bases--the original reason for the invasion. (14 were planned; five have been built)
Although almost everything about the bases is classified, it was Rumsfeld himself, as part of the review of the BRAC process, who indicated that the plan was to move missile batteries out of western Europe and into the deserts, where the troops would be on short rotations and wouldn't want to bring families--thus generating a cost savings over keeping them in euro land. Subsequent funding of base construction is a clear indication about what's afoot. Indeed, our inimitable Air Force has lately been crowing about setting up a golf course on the base near Tikrit, just like on every other base that the Air Force occupies.
What we need to do is get the Air Force out of Iraq. Once the bases are dismantled, they won't need combat forces to protect them from being mortared and shelled. And we won't need drones flying over the land night and day to take out insurgents with missiles. And the insurgents will have less need to take out the traitors.