On the Iraq Election

Noam Chomsky interviewed by Andy Clark

Radio Netherlands, December 18, 2005

Andy Clark: Let's start off by talking about the elections in Iraq. Let's hear how President Bush was billing them just a few days ahead of the vote.

President Bush: "By helping Iraqis build a strong democracy, we're adding to our own security and, like a generation before us, we are laying the foundation of peace for generations to come. Not far from here, where we gather today is a symbol of freedom familiar to all Americans - the Liberty Bell. When the Declaration of Independence was first read in public, the Liberty Bell was sounded in celebration and a witness said: 'It rang as if it meant something.' Today the call of liberty is being heard in Baghdad and Basra, and other Iraqi cities, and its sound is echoing across the broader Middle East, from Damascus to Tehran, people hear it and they know it means something. It means that days of tyranny and terror are ending and a new day of hope and freedom is dawning."

Andy Clark: President Bush there, speaking at the Philadelphia World Affairs Council, just a few days ago. I mean the sentiment is very clear there from the President, that the US is bringing hope and democracy to Iraq and that the elections are crucial in this. After the vote, the President has called the elections an important milestone. Professor Chomsky, how do you see the elections? Do you see them as an important milestone for Iraq?

Noam Chomsky: Actually I do, but before talking about that, I should just bring up a kind of a truism. No rational person pays the slightest attention to declarations of benign intent on the part of leaders, no matter who they are. And the reason is they're completely predictable, including the worst monsters, Stalin, Hitler the rest. Always full of benign intent. Yes that's their task. Therefore, since they're predictable, we disregard them, they carry no information. What we do is, look at the facts. That's true if they're Bush or Blair or Stalin or anyone else. That's the beginning of rationality. All right, the basic facts we know: when Bush and Blair invaded Iraq, the reason was what they insistently called a 'single question.' That was repeated by Jack Straw, by Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, everyone. 'Will Iraq eliminate its weapons of mass destruction?' That was the single question, that was the basis on which both Bush and Blair got authorization to use force. Within a few months this single question was answered and the answer came out the wrong way and then all of sudden...

Andy Clark: This was weapons of mass destruction you're talking about?

Noam Chomsky: Yes. Then very quickly it turned out that that wasn't the reason of the invasion. The reason was what the President's liberal press calls his 'Messianic Mission' to bring democracy to Iraq and immediately everyone had to leap on the democratisation bandwagon and it began to be described as the most noble war in history and so on and so forth. Well, anyone with a particle of sense would know that you can't take that seriously and, in fact, if you look at the events that followed, it just demonstrated that. The US tried, in every possible way, to prevent elections in Iraq. They offered effort after effort to evade the danger of elections. Finally, they were compelled to accept elections by mass non-violent resistance, for which the Ayatollah Sistani [moderate Shi'ite leader] was a kind of a symbol. Mass outpourings of people demanding elections. Finally, Bush and Blair had to agree to elections. The next step is to subvert them and they started immediately. They're doing it right now. Elections mean you pay some - in a democracy at least - you pay some attention to the will of the population. Well, the crucial question for an invading army is: 'do they want us to be here?' Well, we know the answer to that. The British Ministry of Defence carried out a poll a couple of months ago, it was secret, but it leaked to the British Press - I don't think it's been reported in the US. They found that 82 percent of the population wanted the coalition forces, British and US forces to leave. One percent of the population said that they were increasing security.

(rest of interview at link)