Dr. Kevin Barrett: Seven Myths About the Iraq War!

Nafeez Ahmed was the original Muslim 9/11 truth scholar. His book, The War on Freedom, the earliest work of its kind, made a 9/11 truther of Gore Vidal. He is also a star contributor to the book I edited, 9/11 and the American Empire. Nafeez's controlled demolition of the war criminal BBC, reproduced below, nicely complements Tony Rooke's moral victory over the BBC, in Monday's court case. Seven Myths About the Iraq War: How BBC News-night failed journalism on the 10 years anniversary of the invasion. As a participant in BBC News-night special, "Iraq, 10 Years On", I found myself feeling slightly miffed at the lack of real debate on the crucial issues. On the one hand, Newsnight presented a number of narratives of the war and its aftermath as "fact", which are deeply questionable. On the other, there were no serious, factually grounded criticisms of the war, despite a diverse panel, which included people who did not support it. As author of a major book on the war and its historical context, Behind the War on Terror: Western Secret Strategy and the Struggle for Iraq, as well as co-author of a new report, Executive Decisions: How British Intelligence was Hijacked for the Iraq War, I consider myself to be reasonably informed. Yet BBC News-night failed almost entirely to bring any of these issues to light. What follows is my Newsnight inspired Iraq War Myth Busting exercise, based on what was, and wasn't discussed on the show: Myth 1. Sectarian violence has increased in postwar Iraq, because sectarianism has always existed in Iraq, and the removal of Saddam allowed it to erupt. One of the first News-night bloopers started with a short introductory clip from John Simpson, the BBC's World Affairs Editor. Among other things, Simpson talked about the rise of sectarian Sunni Shi'a violence in postwar Iraq, and argued that, while Saddam's regime had clamped down on sectarian divisions, regime change effectively unleashed those previously suppressed divisions and allowed them to worsen. This was the first of many over simplifications about the escalation of sectarian violence in Iraq. The reality, as pointed out on the show by my colleague in the audience, anthropologist Professor Nadje al Ali, is that prior to the war, generic sectarian antagonism was unheard of in Iraqi society.