Reuters Misquoting Iraqi Vice President?
Here’s a headline you’ll no doubt be seeing a lot of as the journalists lovingly bandy it about:
It’s not a good thing that an Iraqi VP is calling something America has done in Iraq idiotic, but I think it’s important to note that he’s probably not talking about the actual invasion of Iraq as Reuters suggests.
From the article:
DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan 25 (Reuters) – The U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 was an “idiot decision” and Iraqi troops now need to secure Baghdad to ensure the country’s future, Vice-President Adel Abdul Mahdi said on Thursday.
“Iraq was put under occupation, which was an idiot decision,” Mahdi said at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
Mahdi is talking about putting Iraq under occupation being an “idiot decision,” not necessarily invading. Which makes sense, given that Mahdi had been living outside of Iraq in exile from 1969 until the time of our invasion. Indeed, his political party (for whom he is a major player) supported the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the toppling of Saddam Hussein. Neither Mahdi nor his political cohorts are particularly pro-U.S., but saying that they opposed the toppling of Saddam is laughable.
Mahdi is probably thinking that it was idiotic for U.S. forces to disband the Iraqi army choosing instead to use U.S. troops to govern the nation in the aftermath of the invasion, which is why he’s talking about the American occupation as opposed to the American invasion. And he’s got a point in that, which is a much different thing from calling the invasion itself idiotic.
But that distinction won’t matter now that the press has already painted it’s picture of his comments. For millions of Americans, an Iraqi VP calling our invasion of Iraq idiotic will be the story of the day even though that’s not actually what happened.
Just another victory for objective journalism.
