Background and Context

The War on Terror poses a very real danger to international stability and peace, and as exemplified by the invasion of Iraq in 2003, sets a dangerous precedent for the U.S. to pursue a unilateralist agenda that is highly ineffective in eliminating the threat of terrorism (see for example, Aoudé, 2016). Most analysts agree that since the invasion of Iraq, Iraq has become more unstable and a breeding ground for radical or fundamentalist

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Islamic terrorism (see for example, Milton-Edwards, 2006; and Baker, 2015). There is much evidence to suggest that the forced removal of Saddam Hussein from power, and the subsequent destabilization of the country that ensued, has resulted in a further destabilizing effect on neighbouring nations as well as the wider region. As General Michael Flynn (Ret.), the former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency noted, “[i]n 2004, there were 21 total Islamic terrorist groups spread out in 18 countries. Today, there are 41 Islamic terrorist groups spread out in 24 countries.” (Flynn, 2014).

In terms of financial cost, different studies of the long term costs of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have estimated costs between $4 trillion and $6 trillion (Bilmes, 2013, p. 20; and Crawford, 2014, p. 12). Nothing is more costly than the loss of human life, but there remain huge disparities in estimates of Iraqi civilian deaths in the conflict, in part due to estimates being taken for different periods in time by different agencies. For example, according to the Iraq War Logs based on classified documents released by WikiLeaks, 66,081 civilian deaths were recorded between January 2004 and December 2009 (WikiLeaks, 2010); estimates by the Iraqi Health Ministry for the period between January 2005 and December 2009 were 87,215; and Iraq Body Count – the source most often cited by coalition forces politicians (Tapp et al., 2008) – put the figure at 119,902 for the period between 2003 and 2011 (2017). However, a study published in The Lancet

estimated that between the invasion and June 2006, the number of civilian deaths due to violent causes was a staggering 601,000 (Burnham et al., 2006, p. 1426). Although the figures of the Lancet study were rejected by the U.S. and U.K. governments, other studies such as Hagopian et al. (2013) have estimated the figure to be close to 500,000 when accounting for deaths attributable to the collapse of infrastructure and other war-related

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causes. Breau and Joyce (2011) bemoan the lack of enforcement of the existing legal frameworks in human rights law obliging belligerents to accurately report on civilian deaths, an accounting essential to assessing the human cost of war (p. 380).

Regardless of the differing opinions on how many civilian deaths have occurred, the cost of the U.S. led invasion for the Iraqi population has been enormous. In addition to civilian deaths, the numbers of those injured or maimed also run into the hundreds of thousands. Then there are other direct casualties of war such as five million orphaned children (Alternet.org, 2007), 2.7 million internally displaced Iraqis, and 2.2. million refugees (according to UNHCR figures, quoted in Baker and Adriaensens, 2012; similar figures are also quoted in Ismael and Ismael, 2013, p. 137), and of course, other victims of violent crimes like rape or torture. Studies have also been conducted to estimate the long term effects and indirect deaths through the fleeing of medical doctors, the destruction of medical facilities, and the destruction of sources for food and water (see for example Crawford, 2011). The war in Iraq has also come at a significant cost in terms of U.S. military and Department of Defense (DoD) personnel killed, with deaths for the period 2003-2011 being 4,497 and a further 32,249 wounded (DoD, N.D.). The invasion has also resulted in the violent deaths of thousands of Iraqi police and military personnel as well as other coalition forces.

In addition to the loss of life and economic destruction, the longer term effects of the war, including the destruction of essential infrastructure such as sewage treatment plants, factories, energy facilities, communication, transport, schools, and hospitals, will continue to be felt in Iraq for decades. In Chapter Two I will elaborate further on the LIS research that has focused on the damage to Iraq’s rich cultural heritage institutions such

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as the National Archives, libraries, museums, and sites of enormous archaeological significance. The war has also had a devastating effect on Iraq’s educational institutions, a country with once high levels of literacy and education amongst its citizens (Baker & Adriaensens, 2012, p. 261). Al-Azawi (2016) has written about the extensive

environmental damage, including destruction of soil texture and internal structure, and exposure to desertification as a consequence of the coalition’s intensive bombing

campaigns that involved the use of 18,467 smart bombs and missiles in addition to 9,251 dumb bombs. (p.57). This dissertation will shed light on the extent to which the

mainstream press and news discourse in general have addressed such issues in their assessments of U.S. “success” in Iraq.

One of the striking features of the War on Terror, and specifically the war in Iraq, has been the lack of opposition to the war in the United States from leaders of the

opposite parties whether the Democrats during the G.W. Bush years or the Republicans during the Obama years. This is problematic because public protests and opposition to the war in Iraq prior to the invasion were unprecedented; however, both parties remain very closely aligned in terms of foreign policy. This dissertation will demonstrate how ideology operates within the Iraq War news discourse and discuss the implications of news media representations. The Democrats voted in favor of going to war and President Obama also had Republican support to continue the War on Terror. However, many Republicans remained opposed to a withdrawal from Iraq and critical of Obama’s re- focusing of the War on Terror to Afghanistan rather than Iraq. At present, Iraq remains key to the Trump administration as the rise of ISIS in Iraq and Syria have resulted in further American military engagement in the region.

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Not only is the weakness of opposition voices to the wars a reflection of the weak state of representative democracy in the United States, but it is also indicative of a failure of the press to scrutinize government policy choices and the implications of these. This symbiotic relationship is encapsulated in the propaganda model proposed by Herman and Chomsky (1988), who assert that elite influence on the mass media is worrying for the health of democracy and the realization of justice. Furthermore, the lack of media

scrutiny of the agenda of the political establishment to take the country into a war that has been so costly has damaged the image of the U.S. globally, and, as some have argued, may have increased the threat of terrorism (see for example, Stern, 2014; or Stern and McBride, 2013). News media coverage of war is clearly an informational issue when it comes to the public’s understanding of foreign policy.

Given the contextualization of the Iraq War within the War on Terror, it is

necessary to draw attention to the broader conflict of the War on Terror and ask why it is necessary to pursue and when it might possibly end. Following the establishment of a weak government in Iraq that was not inclusive of all groups, parties, and ethnicities, the U.S. withdrew troops from Iraq in December 2011. Yet the aftermath of the withdrawal saw a spiraling of terrorist activity and violence directed at civilians as well as political opponents by various competing factions and groups. Iraq became destabilized, with a strong presence of al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia that did not exist prior to the invasion, with many groups competing for power, including the group known as ISIS. Furthermore, the destabilization of Iraq has resulted in the expansion of armed militias that are carrying out atrocities against political and religious opponents at an alarming rate. In addition, the establishment of a strong extremist presence in Iraq has seen the birth of ISIS, a

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fundamentalist Islamist organization determined to overthrow the government of Syria as well. The effects of the War on Terror are unfolding in the Civil War that is currently taking place in Syria – a conflict that has been raging from 2011 until the present moment – resulting in 470,000 direct and indirect war-related civilian deaths by 2015, according to a policy report from the Syrian Center of Policy Research (2016, p. 61), and a further displacement of over five million Syrians (2016, p. 9), causing an immense refugee crisis. Although at the time of the official ending of the Iraq War, the full ramifications of the war could not have been known, it is important to examine the discourses about the ending of the conflict to ascertain what kinds of meaning and reality were discursively constructed by the media. The next chapter will examine in detail the relevant literature to bring attention to some of the competing analyses and discourses of the situation that arose out of the invasion of Iraq.

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