Eight years. Over $1.3 trillion. Almost 4,500 American soldiers dead. Between 102,417 and 1 million more Iraqis. All for one deposed dictator and zero weapons of mass destruction.
On Friday, President Barack Obama announced that all troops will be withdrawn from Iraq by the year’s end, and “will definitely be home for the holidays.”
The Iraq War, also known as the Occupation of Iraq, Operation Enduring Freedom, and—since September 2010—Operation New Dawn, is finally over. It couldn’t have come any sooner.
The Iraq War was this generation’s Vietnam War—a deeply unpopular, highly polarizing war fought against a faceless threat that, in the end, turned out to be a great waste of lives.
Like Vietnam, many of the soldiers who return home will be unrecognized by their families. At least 47,541 have been injured, and many have been disfigured. By January 2007, over 500 Iraq war veterans returned to the U.S. as amputees. Official statistics have never been disclosed, and many believe that number is significantly higher. One senior Department of Defense official was reported saying at least 1,600 soldiers have returned without one whole arm.
Leagues more of veterans suffer from mental trauma, which can be more dangerous as it often goes undiagnosed and untreated. As many as 360,000 U.S. soldiers suffered a traumatic brain injury and, as a result, 45,000 to 90,000 of them require special care.
Nearly 30 percent of troops suffer from mental trauma, according to Col. Charles Hoge, a top U.S. Army psychologist. Almost a third of soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan between 2001 and 2005 were found to suffer from a mental illness. More than half of those suffered from two or more—most commonly post traumatic stress disorder and depression. In 2007, the U.S. Army reported that it had the highest suicide rate since it began keeping the statistic in 1980.
Also like Vietnam, we are hastily leaving Iraq, even though the country remains in disarray. After Saddam Hussein was toppled from power and the country was free to pursue a democracy, unforeseen problems emerged. Violence between warring tribes and factions erupted like water through a quilted dam, and corruption crept into all corners of the fledgling government. Most of those problems remain.
The cities of Kirkuk and Mosul are battlegrounds for spats between Arabs and Kurds. In other parts of Iraq, insurgents emerge at unsuspecting moments and perpetuate devastating attacks, such as mid-August’s coordinated outbreaks of violence during the holy month of Ramadan that killed about 90 people and injured several hundred more.
The government that is supposed to keep the peace is smeared in corruption. In September, its anti-corruption chief stepped down, saying the government was intentionally hampering him from doing his job. Two weeks later, The International Crisis Group, a non-profit, non-governmental agency, published a damning report that said the Baghdad-based government “has allowed corruption to become entrenched and spread throughout its institutions.”
Those who seek to stem the corruption must navigate a divided government, where the Sunni minority group believes the unity government is a cover for Shiite domination.
The soldiers may be coming home, but the war is far from over. Eight years of bloodshed have earned the world countless more years of suffering—especially for the citizens of Iraq and the American soldiers who will never be the same.
