“Masquerade” is definitely the word which fits best the current US policy in Iraq. For Iraqis themselves, the world which describes best their own situation is “tragedy”. And now masquerade goes one step further with the soon to be hold “democratic elections”.

Iraq elections are indeed set to be organized on January 30th 2005. Here is what the US governor of Iraq, Mr. Negroponte, and his Iraqi spokesman, Mr. Allaoui, have decided. Nevermind that the country is at war; and even “more at war” than before President Bush decided that “mission was accomplished” and war was “over”. The US army (and its Kurdish suppletives called the ‘Iraqi National Army’) are indeed rushing from one city to the other in order to try to tame uprisings. In the meantime, they destroy entire cities as to prove that they can defeat the “terrorists”.
Of course, in order to prevent a backlash at home (in the US), the authorities are trying to organize a very ‘sanitized’ media coverage of the war in Iraq. Medias, but the “embedded” journalists (another part of the masquerade), are kept at bay from Fallujah’s destruction. So the US people and the world is “protected” from seeing the atrocities triggered by the “war on terror”. To be honest, let’s say that this policy only works within the US. For the rest of the world, the case is made. Nobody believes anymore what is said by US officials or medias regarding Iraq or connected topics (from Iran to terrorism threats).

In life every action carries a price tag. The price to pay by the US for the Iraq tragedy is the loss of almost every single bit of credibility in terms of international policy. This loss was maybe not that obvious till the rest of the world was expecting Kerry to win the presidential election, because the rest of the world was trying to prevent to generate negative feelings which could have interfere negatively with the vote. Now that this option is over, the world is free to act as it wanted. And it does: from the recent failure of the Apec summit in Chile, where G.W. Bush was given a polite rebuff by the Asian and Latin American countries concerning his “war on terror” or the ‘Apec Free Trade Area’ fantasy; to the growing and faster pull out of European coalition partners in Iraq.
Let’s take a minute on that one because I was amazed by the fact that it was almost not mentioned (and of course not analysed) inside US medias: two staunched allies of the USA, the Netherlands and Hungary have announced that they refuse to keep their troops one minute longer than was initially agreed upon, despite pressure from the USA. And, what is a very significant evolution, in both cases, the Parliaments of these countries refused a short term extension (of a few months) proposed by their governments. The message coming from people’s representatives was in both cases very clear: our people want our troops outside this mess as soon as possible; and they do not want to shoulder the US anymore in such kind of operations. By mid 2005, Italian and Polish troops will most likely be taken back home as well, following the very likely electoral defeat of the two pro-Bush governments.
The coalition will then be more and more looking like what it is really: another masquerade.

For all those who speak about future Transatlantic relations, I would dare giving a little advice: take into account for your own analysis, that since November 3rd 2005, Europeans are not anymore considering that the EU and the USA are following the same historical course, that their core values are still essentially the same. With this evolution mind, you will be able to see how the whole construction of transatlantic relations built since 1945 is already collapsing. To be true, it more and more looks like a kind of Transatlantic ‘masquerade’.

To transform this masquerade into a new pristine efficient relationship, we are faced with the challenge of building new links between the EU and the USA; not with reshaping Transatlantic ties, between the USA and European countries, as developed after 1945.

Paris
Franck Biancheri