As the pretexts to justify the illegal war of aggression against Iraq started to collapse one after the other, the Bush Administration, its vassals and the mass media adopted the cliché of “democracy” to justify the invasion and the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi men, women and children. However, from the outset of the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the U.S. objective was conspicuous; to destroy Iraq, install a puppet government and pillage the nation’s resources.

In less than three years, the nation has gone from a safe and functioning nation to brutally occupied and chaotic nation. The health care services have collapsed. Acute malnutrition among Iraqi children between the ages of six months and 5 years has increased from 4% before the invasion to 7.7%. In other words, despite the 13-years long genocidal sanctions, Iraqi children were living much better (by 3.7%) under the regime of Saddam Hussein than under the tyranny of George W. Bush. Lack of clean water and adequate supply of electricity have exacerbated the problem and encouraged various infectious diseases, particularly among children, infants and the pregnant women.

In less than three years, one of the best education systems in the region has deteriorated. Schools have been taken over and transformed into military bases to accommodate the occupying forces. School’s attendance, particularly among girls is at its lowest level. Women’s rights have all disappeared. Unemployment has jumped from an acceptable level to around 60-70 per cent and most Iraqi remain economically inactive. The living conditions of once prosperous people have worsened significantly and the nation is descending into extreme poverty.

Iraq is one of the most diverse and well-integrated societies in the Middle East. There is over a million Kurd in Baghdad. There are millions of Turkmen and Assyrian and other minorities all over the country. Not long before the invasion the New York Times op-ed that Iraq’s ethnic and religious diversity must be used “to our advantages”.

In less than three years, peace between Iraq’s diverse communities has disappeared and replaced by violence and mistrust. Small minorities, such as the Christian minority have fled the country. To speed up the breakage of the Iraqi society, the U.S. Administration put in power a collection of Iraqi expatriate criminals and fanatics and identified them according to their religion and ethnicity. Together with their U.S. minders, they introduced a culture of corruption, fear and violence unheard of in the history of Iraq. Assassination for vengeance and the liquidation of any thing looks like an opposition are committed in Gestapo-like methods.

In less than three years, a vibrant community of scientists, academics and prominent Iraqi politicians and intellectuals has been liquidated in cold blood by criminal elements of the Occupation, including the Israeli Mossad. The objective is to cement sectarian divisions and remove Iraq’s nationalism to service U.S.-Israel imperialist agenda.

Knowing the full consequences of it action, the U.S. Administration deliberately dissolved the Iraqi army and security forces and replaced them with sectarian-based militia groups. The Iranian-trained Badr brigade, the Israeli-trained Kurdish Peshmerga, and other U.S.-trained and armed militias constitute the new Iraqi army and police. Their lack of loyalty to the Iraqi nation, rivalries and hostilities are exploited by U.S. forces and used against each others. They are deployed to fight their Iraqi brothers in different ethnic areas, and in the process foment civil strife. It is a U.S. policy of creating sectarian violence which eventually will lead to “civil war”.

Of course, the ongoing Occupation is justified not only “to spread democracy”, but also as necessary to prevent “civil war”. Nothing could be further from the truth. Evidence shows that the U.S. and its collaborators are behind every step leading to violence and “civil war”. “[W]e have widespread evidence that the outside forces are attempting to instigate a civil war here and Iraqis are conscious of that and have made determined effort not to respond to it”, said Dr. Saad Jawad, a political scientist at Baghdad University.

In less than three years, the nation has more prisons and prisoners than at any time in its history. Daily mass arrest, sadistic torture, abuse and humiliation of tens of thousands of innocent Iraqi men, women and children by U.S. soldiers and their vassals have become parts of Western moral values. One only has to look into the Nazi archive to find something similar to these criminal violations of human rights.

What George W. Bush brought to Iraq is daily terror against the Iraqi civilian populations. Entire towns and villages are taken hostages by U.S. forces and bombed indiscriminately. Hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi men, women and children, have been needlessly murdered. And many more have been wounded and permanently handicapped. In October 2004, the reputed and peer-reviewed British medical journal, the Lancet published a conservative estimate of 100,000 Iraqis, mostly women and children, killed by U.S. forces between March 2003 and October 2004.

This normalised Western terrorism, including a widespread Nazis-like anti-Muslim and anti-Arabs hatred in West Europe, is creating legitimate Resistance around the world, not “terrorism”. The victims of Western terrorism have been transformed from victims into perpetrators of terrorism. This flawed propaganda is promoted by Western media and Western “progressives” to justify the ongoing Occupation of Iraq. It is true that Iraq is “a heaven for terrorists”, but Iraqis and most Muslims, see the terrorists as Western terrorists.

There are more than 200,000 armed foreigners in Iraq killing Iraqi women and children with impunity, and deliberately instilling fear among the Iraqi population. Iraqis did not ask George Bush and his vassals for protection from “terrorism”. The majority of Iraqis are vehemently against the Occupation and support Resistance attacks against these so-called “Multinational Forces”, and their collaborators.

In November 2005, indiscriminate U.S. bombings of civilian centres killed 18 innocent Iraqi children in Ramadi, 97 civilians in Husaybah, and 40 civilians in Qaim. Westerners need to take a hard look in the mirror to see who the real terrorists are. Not surprisingly, these crimes of Western terrorism against the Iraqi people have become daily routine in a country ruled by foreign occupying forces and without the slightest barking from (supposed to be sovereign) a puppet government.

In less than three years, the Iraqi people have lost their sovereignty and national constitution. They were replaced with fake sovereignty and a U.S.-crafted constitution that strips Iraqi women of all of their human rights and divides Iraq along sectarian and ethnic lines. In addition, Iraqis have lost their freedom, including freedom of movement, and their rights to organise and protest. They are replaced by insecurity, curfews, and martial laws.

In less than three years, the U.S. orchestrated three illegitimate and fraudulent elections in order to manipulate public opinions, Americans in particular, and legitimise the Occupation. The elections were unfair, undemocratic, and based on sectarianism rather than politics. Indeed, all the so-called “parties” are divided on sectarian lines and do not subscribe to any political ideology. As mentioned earlier, the U.S. aim was to produce a puppet government devoid of nationalism and totally dependent on U.S. forces, and bent on carrying out U.S. colonial agenda. It is traditional pattern of Western colonialism. Colonisers have always used the clichés of “democracy” and “human rights” to manipulate their citizens into believing that their governments are morally responsible and have no evil intention.

Of course, every one knows that the U.S. is not interested in participatory democracy or human rights, particularly in the Middle East. The U.S. is more interested in submissive and violent colonial dictatorships in service of U.S. and Israel interests. This strategy allows for the suppression of any support for the Palestinian people provided by popular democracy. We all know that the U.S. form of democracy (even at home) is flawed and corrupt. For example, Kuwait – occupied by U.S. troops since 1991 – is still a brutal dictatorship, not democracy. We all know that the fraudulent and undemocratic elections in Egypt and Saudi Arabia were praised in all Western capitals. Meanwhile the landslide victory of the Resistance movement, Hamas in the January 25 free and faire Palestinian legislative elections were condemned by the U.S. and its European vassals because Hamas is not beholden to Israeli and Western interests. Indeed, Palestinians under Israeli’ brutal Occupation may have to endure further punishment as a result of electing the “wrong” candidates.

In less than three years, without the participation of the Iraqi people, the Bush and Blair governments, and the puppet government are in the process of transferring Iraq's entire economy into a “free market” economy to serve U.S. corporate interests. The long-awaited covert plan to transfer Iraq's oil resources to U.S. and British Oil Corporations is on the table. According to the so-called production sharing agreements (PSAs) – proposed by the U.S. State Department before the 2003 invasion and put aside to be implemented after the December 15 2005 illegitimate elections – Iraqis are set to lose control of their own economic and political fate. (See my Endless Looting of Iraq).

In less than three years, Iraq has gone from a major oil exporter to an importer of oil and petroleum products. Iraqi oil prices have increased dramatically, and for the first time Iraqis are queuing to buy petrol. Many Iraqis believe that it is cheaper to buy a barrel of oil in Kuwait and bring by limousine to Iraq than buy it in Iraq.

The increase in oil prices was forced by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). History shows that wherever the IMF went, poverty went up and standards of livings went down. Argentina, Bolivia, Chile and Russia are just few examples of IMF initiated destruction. Consistent with its policy of destroying the livelihoods of ordinary peoples around the world, the IMF argued the Iraqi puppet government on 23 December 2005 to start “controlling the wage and pensions bill reducing subsidies on petroleum products, and expanding the participation of the private sector in the domestic market for petroleum products” in favour of U.S. corporations.

In less than three years, an entire nation has been destroyed beyond recognition. The birthplace of human civilisation has been deliberately looted and raped of its cultural heritage. Vibrant towns and cities like Fallujah, Ramadi, Samarra, Hilla, Najef and Qaim that had taken many years and generations to build have been completely destroyed. More than 500,000 Iraqis have been displaced and ethnically cleansed from their towns and cities. “Clean words can mask dirty deeds”, is how the destruction of Iraq is propagated as “reconstruction”.

In less than three years, every stone has been turned over and every lie has been exposed. Westerners, Americans in particular need to pull themselves out of ignorance and stop pretending that “things will get better” while their fellow human beings in Iraq continue to be slaughtered en mass. It is time to demand an end to violence and racism, and hold the war criminals accountable.

Global Research Contributing Editor Ghali Hassan lives in Perth, Western Australia.