It was March 2003, just days into the Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld invasion of Iraq. In my former college’s student forum, people stood around and watched in awe on TVs as “smart bombs” targeted “military” buildings in Baghdad and largely obliterated them. Many of my neoconservative colleagues were positively giddy with delight over the cheesy video graphics that seemed so impressive back in those days. It was suggested that inside a week, this program of “shock and awe” would bring about the end of that war. In truth, the one-sided military battles were over relatively shortly. But the ignited subsequent disruption, instability, and insurgent war(s) went on for many years.

Mostly, in those days, a president followed the Constitution and got congressional approval for major military actions. Back then, the job of diplomatically selling the Iraq war went to the Secretary of State, Colin Powell. Before the United Nations, he lost much of his personal credibility by twisting the truth about supposed CIA evidence of Iraq’s “Weapons of Mass Destruction.” He was trying to build a broad consensus of nations; Bush’s “coalition of the willing” (willingly duped nations), presumably to “help” take down the terrorist bad guy, Saddam Hussein. Indeed, the bad guy was captured and executed, but famously, the WMD were never found, nor was the “democracy” Bush ultimately claimed to be spreading ever realized. However, the war set the Middle East ablaze. 

Not content to learn from their bungling in Iraq, Bush and his cronies created yet greater havoc in Afghanistan, where famously, “empires go to die.” After 20 years of U.S. occupation, bombing and death, our troops and treasure were exhausted. As in Viet Nam, in humiliation we eventually fled and left the country. Ultimately, we turned Afghanistan over into the hands of a new generation of the same religious zealots who had ruled prior to our invasion.

The latest adventure in stupid is the invasion and bombing of Venezuela. Like the neocons of old, this administration is trying to sell us “shock and awe.” Videos of alleged drug motorboats blasted by sophisticated rockets prove nothing, but make a spectacle to those so inclined to see the videos as a “show.” An unauthorized invasion of a relatively weak sovereign foreign country and the arrest and detention of its leader is not only unlawful and unconstitutional, it conjures a kind of Iraq 2.0. The difference is that prior to the Roberts SCOTUS decisions on presidential immunity, et. al., however deceitfully engaged, presidents of old actually tried to follow the Constitution. The current almost-octogenarian in the White House does not even bother to try. He knows he is immune from prosecution. What could go wrong? Likely, the American people shall soon find out. Stay alert.

John Pace lives in Honesdale, PA. He writes on Substack at John in the Woods.