Iraq War 20 years on: How Ukraine conflict, growing power of Iran and rise of Trump can be traced back to 2003 invasion
At the turn of the century, America had emerged victorious from the Cold War and stood unchallenged.
It had greater power and influence than any other nation in history. It could have wielded that power judiciously to protect the American-led post-war world order and inspire other countries to follow its values of freedom and democracy.
Instead, it squandered that supremacy embarking on a calamitous misadventure in Iraq that was ill-advised and disastrously executed. It would be the beginning of the end of the pax Americana.
A direct line can be drawn between that debacle, which began on 20 March 2003 and others that followed, right up to the perilous state of the world today.
The war in Ukraine, the unchecked ascendancy of China, the growing power of Iran, and even the rise of Trump and the politics of populism all have roots that can be traced back to America’s folly in Iraq.
Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein standing by an Iraqi flag in 2002
George W Bush had the support of Britain’s Tony Blair in his decision to invade Iraq
The falsehoods and delusions that led to war
America went to war led by ideologues who believed they could refashion the Middle East in their own likeness and bring democracy and a more pro-Western outlook to the region.
The failure of that neoconservative project has done lasting damage to Americans’ claims of exceptionalism, and their belief that their form of governance is an example to the rest of the world. And that has by extension done enduring harm to the American-led world order.
The failings of that project in Iraq are well documented. The false premise of non-existent weapons of mass destruction, the delusion that invaders would be welcomed as liberators, the absence of any plan for the day after. The damage to America’s standing in the world has been incalculable.
Equally, human rights violations, violations of democratic norms, targeted killings, and the atrocities of Abu Ghraib prison, from where photographs showing abuse of inmates by US soldiers emerged, tarnished America’s image as the standard-bearer of democracy and human rights.
Iraq fell apart under occupation. The US disbanded the Ba’ath party and sents its army home. In the vacuum sectarian extremists thrived. The war had been fought to neutralise the threat posed by Al Qaeda in the wake of 9/11.
The opposite happened and even more extreme groups were spawned launching unprecedented campaigns of terror against occupiers and civilians alike. From the failed states of Iraq and Syria, Islamic State was born – an organisation that for years wrenched swathes of territory from both countries and plumbed new depths of terror and depravity.
For America, the enduring impact of the war and occupation has been a weakening of Washington’s influence in the world. When India and other countries in the global south sit on the fence in UN resolutions on Ukraine, their ambivalence can in part be traced back to America’s record in Iraq.
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US military escort a group of Iraqi soldiers dressed in civilian clothes north of Basra, Iraq, in 2003
An Iraqi man cries in front of a house damaged by a missile in Baghdad in 2003
A lasting impact on US foreign policy
The failure undermined America’s own self-confidence. The spectre of Iraq made Barack Obama reluctant to be drawn into the Syria conflict and punish its leader’s diabolical use of chemical weapons.
That reluctance was seen in Moscow as an American weakness, and arguably emboldened it to defy the West and seize Crimea with relative impunity a few years later. And that in turn encouraged Vladimir Putin to invade Ukraine in earnest last year.
The distraction of Iraq led to failure in Afghanistan, a protracted two decades of occupation and a disastrous withdrawal.
Iraq sucked up what policymakers in Washington call bandwidth year after year, while in the east a far greater challenge was rising. The West would take years to wake up to the threat posed by China.
Closer to Iraq, Iran was strengthened. Before the invasion, its regional influence was limited to a militia in southern Lebanon, Hezbollah. Today it has clout in capitals from Beirut to Damascus to Baghdad to Yemen.
The war in Iraq has done damage to America’s belief in itself. The conflict cost a trillion dollars and thousands of American lives. It has fuelled opposition to any more military adventures abroad.
And it has undermined Americans’ faith in both government and the political and media elites meant to hold it to account. That only in part helps explain the rise of populism that ultimately brought Trump to the White House.
An explosion rocks Baghdad during air strikes on 21 March 2003
US military escort a group of Iraqi soldiers dressed in civilian clothes north of Basra, Iraq, in 2003
Iraq still recovering from journey to hell and back
In Iraq, people are now no longer living under tyranny. There is reportedly some sense of hope and renewal, but only recently. And the country has literally been to hell and back to get there.
Hundreds of thousands have died in the war and the waves of sectarian violence that followed. The country has been broken, its institutions destroyed and its economy ravaged.
It is only just beginning to recover from all that trauma. But perhaps it can now look forward cautiously to a slightly better future. That is more than might have been said had Saddam Hussein remained in power or any of his impulsive, venal sons.
Another view of Saddam Hussein’s statue being pulled down
Thousands of crosses at a memorial for US troops killed in the Iraq war, in Lafayette, California
Ten years ago, George W Bush said the final verdict on his actions in Iraq would come long after his death.
That may be true, and it may take more time to judge whether the removal of one of the worst tyrants in history in any way justified the enormous cost and pain that then ensued.
Twenty years on, though, we can say the invasion and occupation have had a lasting legacy on the region and the world, and much of that has not been for the better.
World
Donald Trump says Vladimir Putin wants to meet – and that he and Barack Obama ‘probably’ like each other
Donald Trump says a meeting is being set up between himself and Vladimir Putin – and that he and Barack Obama “probably” like each other.
Republican US president-elect Mr Trump spoke to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Thursday, saying Russian president Mr Putin “wants to meet, and we are setting it up”.
“He has said that even publicly and we have to get that war over with. That’s a bloody mess,” Mr Trump said.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday there was a “mutual desire” to set up a meeting – but added no details had been confirmed yet and that there may be progress once Mr Trump is inaugurated on 20 January.
“Moscow has repeatedly declared its openness to contacts with international leaders, including the US president, including Donald Trump,” Mr Peskov added.
“What is required is a mutual desire and political will to conduct dialogue and resolve existing problems through dialogue. We see that Mr Trump also declares his readiness to resolve problems through dialogue. We welcome this. There are still no specifics, we proceed from the mutual readiness for the meeting.”
Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin in July 2017. Pic: AP
Trump on Obama: ‘We just got along’
Mr Trump also made some lighter remarks regarding a viral exchange between himself and former Democrat President Barack Obama at Jimmy Carter’s funeral on Thursday.
The pair sat together for the late president’s service in Washington DC on Thursday, and could be seen speaking for several minutes as the remaining mourners filed in before it began.
Mr Obama was seen nodding as his successor spoke before breaking into a grin.
Asked about the exchange, Mr Trump said: “I didn’t realise how friendly it looked.
“I said, ‘boy, they look like two people that like each other’. And we probably do.
“We have a little different philosophies, right? But we probably do. I don’t know. We just got along. But I got along with just about everybody.”
The amicable exchange comes after years of criticising each other in the public eye; it was Mr Trump who spread the so-called “birther” conspiracy theory about Mr Obama in 2011, falsely asserting that he was not born in the United States.
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Insults continued for years, with Mr Obama famously dedicating much of his final White House Correspondents’ Dinner speech in 2016 to jokes at his political rival’s expense.
Mr Trump has repeatedly attacked the Obamas, saying the former president was “ineffective” and “terrible” and calling former first lady Michelle Obama “nasty” as recently as October last year.
On Kamala Harris’s campaign trail last year, Mr Obama said Mr Trump was a “78-year-old billionaire who has not stopped whining about his problems since he rode down his golden escalator nine years ago”, while the former first lady said that “the consequences of him ever being president again are brutally serious.”
World
‘The future is in our hands’ scientists say, as 2024 becomes first year to pass 1.5C global warming threshold
Last year was the warmest on record, the first to breach a symbolic threshold, and brought with it deadly impacts like flooding and drought, scientists have said.
Two new datasets found 2024 was the first calendar year when average global temperatures exceeded 1.5C above pre-industrial levels – before humans started burning fossil fuels at scale.
The record heat has not only has real-world implications, as it contributed to deadly flooding in Spain and vicious drought in places like Zambia in southern Africa.
It is also highly symbolic.
Countries agreed in the landmark Paris Agreement to limit warming ideally to 1.5C, because after that the impacts would be much more dangerous.
The news arrives as California battles “hell on earth” wildfires, suspected to have been exacerbated by climate change.
And it comes as experts warn support for the Paris goals is “more fragile than ever” – with Donald Trump and the Argentinian president poised to row back on climate action.
What caused 2024 record heat – and is it here to stay?
Friends of the Earth called today’s findings from both the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change service and the Met Office “deeply disturbing”.
The “primary driver” of heat in the last two years was climate change from human activity, but the temporary El Nino weather phenomenon also contributed, they said.
The breach in 2024 does not mean the world has forever passed 1.5C of warming – as that would only be declared after several years of doing so, and warming may slightly ease this year as El Nino has faded.
But the world is “teetering on the edge” of doing so, Copernicus said.
Prof Piers Forster, chair of the UK’s Climate Change Committee, called it a “foretaste of life at 1.5C”.
Dr Gabriel Pollen, Zambia’s national coordinator for disasters, said “no area of life and the economy is untouched” by the country’s worst drought in more than 100 years.
Six million people face starvation, critical hydropower has plummeted, blackouts are frequent, industry is “decimated”, and growth has halved, he said.
Paris goal ‘not obsolete’
Scientists were at pains to point out it is not too late to curb worse climate change, urging leaders to maintain and step up climate action.
Professor Forster said temporarily breaching 1.5C “does not mean the goal is obsolete”, but that we should “double down” on slashing greenhouse gas emissions and on adapting to a hotter world.
The Met Office said “every fraction of a degree” still makes a difference to the severity of extreme weather.
The California fires were whipped up by strong, dry winds and likely worsened by climate change. Pic: Reuters
Copernicus director Carlo Buontempo added: “The future is in our hands: swift and decisive action can still alter the trajectory of our future climate”.
Climate action is ‘economic opportunity’
Copernicus found that global temperatures in 2024 averaged 15.10°C, the hottest in records going back to 1850, making it 1.60°C above the pre-industrial level during 1850-1900.
The Met Office’s data found 2024 was 1.53C above pre-industrial levels.
The figures are global averages, which smooth out extremes from around the world into one number. That is why it still might have felt cold in some parts of the world last year.
Greenpeace campaigner Philip Evans said as “the world’s most powerful climate denier” Donald Trump returns to the White House, others must “take up the mantle of global climate leadership”.
The UK’s climate minister Kerry McCarthy said the UK has been working with other countries to cut global emissions, as well as greening the economy at home.
“Not only is this crucial for our planet, it is the economic opportunity of the 21st century… tackling the climate crisis while creating new jobs, delivering energy security and attracting new investment into the UK.”
World
Picture shows baby girl moments after birth on packed migrant dinghy heading for Canary Islands
Photographs have captured the moments after a baby girl was born on a packed migrant dinghy heading for the Canary Islands.
The small boat was carrying 60 people and had embarked from Tan-Tan – a Moroccan province 135 nautical miles (250km) away.
One image shows the baby lying on her mother’s lap as other passengers help the pair.
The boat’s passengers – a total of 60 people, including 14 women and four children – were rescued by a Spanish coastguard ship.
Coastguard captain Domingo Trujillo said: “The baby was crying, which indicated to us that it was alive and there were no problems, and we asked the woman’s permission to undress her and clean her.
“The umbilical cord had already been cut by one of her fellow passengers. The only thing we did was to check the child, give her to her mother and wrap them up for the trip.”
Coastguards rescued all 60 people aboard the boat. Pic: Salvmento Maritimo/Reuters
The mother and baby were taken for medical checks and treated with antibiotics, medical authorities said.
Dr Maria Sabalich, an emergency coordinator of the Molina Orosa University Hospital in Lanzarote, said: “They are still in the hospital, but they are doing well.”
When they are discharged from hospital, the pair will be moved to a humanitarian centre for migrants, a government official said.
They will then most likely be relocated to a reception centre for mothers and children on another of the Canary Islands, they added.
Thousands of migrants board boats attempting to make the perilous journey from the African coast to the Spanish Canaries each year.
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In 2024, a total of 9,757 people died on the route, according to Spanish migration charity Walking Borders.
Mr Trujillo said: “Almost every night we leave at dawn and arrive back late.
“This case is very positive, because it was with a newborn, but in all the services we do, even if we are tired, we know we are helping people in distress.”
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