From Shawcross, Who Opposed U.S. Policy in Indochina, a Warning

In 1979, British author William Shawcross wrote an important book called Sideshow that documented Kissinger’s complicity in the destruction of Cambodia. Now Shawcross, who supports Bush and Blair in Iraq, is deeply concerned that the media are preparing the Middle East for destruction. Excerpts:

The bias in much of the coverage of Iraq - in Britain, the US and Australia - helps only those violent extremists who are trying to destroy the country.

It dreadfully discourages all those millions of Iraqis who need our support to build a decent society.

President George W. Bush was not wrong when he said recently that the spike in terrorist attacks in Iraq is similar to the 1968 Tet communist offensive in Vietnam. Both aimed at domestic opinion.

Al-Qa'ida and the Shi'ite terrorists hope to inflict defeat on Republicans in US elections in November that will weaken American commitment to the future of Iraq and thus strengthen Islamism throughout the world. As [Iraq’s Deputy Prime Minister said], we need to be "realistic, not defeatist".

The key to success is to strengthen and encourage the elected Iraqi Government led by Nouri al-Maliki. He has desperately serious problems. . .

Armchair pundits in the West like to blame the crisis in Iraq on mistakes made by Washington, particularly by Donald Rumsfeld. There certainly have been mistakes, but whether the present situation would have been markedly different without them can never be known.

Moreover, the mistakes were tactical, not moral: soldiers have not died plundering or colonising Iraq, they have died trying to help Iraqis make it better.

The blame for the present horrors lies above all with the monstrous al-Qa'ida, Baathist Sunni terrorists and the equally vile Shia militia, which are abetted by Iran. The vast majority of deaths in Iraq are being inflicted by Muslims on other Muslims, for reasons that have little to do with Western forces.

. . . a premature pullout would condemn Iraq and the region to unbelievable horror. And it would be a famous victory for our Islamist enemies, who declared war on the West long before we went into Iraq and liberated 23 million Muslims.

If we allow ourselves and the overwhelming majority of Iraqis to be defeated, that defeat will be the first of many in the region and the world. The Islamists will give no quarter.