Free Essays on Iraq

Introduction Modern Iraq occupies the area of the Middle East that has a long history of civilization- from Sumer to Chaldea to Babylonia and Assyria to Medes-Persians to the Greeks and Romans- four thousand years, in the land governed by the ebb and flow of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers (Harris 9-14, Metz 3). Iraq is a land of diverse people, both in terms of ethnic origins and in religious beliefs. It is an ancient land that has existed under a variety of governments. A Brief History Modern Iraq had its beginnings coming out of the breakup of the Ottoman Turk Empire after World War I. The area was placed under a British Mandate by the League of Nations (Harris 1). In 1921, Iraq became a separate nation under British control (Baram 1, Farouk-Slugett 11-12). An Arab, Prince Faysal ibn Husayn of the Hashimite house of Hijas, was elected king and coronated August 1921 as King Faysal I (Baram 1). Upon entry into the League of Nations, Iraq became an independent country, but still under considerable British influence, in 1932 (Farouk-Slugett 13), Using the British political system as a model, a constitutional monarchy was established (Harris 114), The Iraqi Parliament consisted of two chambers: an upper chamber- Senate- and a lower chamber- Chamber of Deputies. The senators were appointed by the king, and the deputies were elected by â€Å"secondary† electors who were in turn elected by â€Å"primary† electors, â€Å"all male Iraqi subjects who have reached the age of 20, are mentally competent, are not undischarged bankrupts, and have not lost their civil rights or been convicted of a crime (Harris 87).† The â€Å"primary† electors elect the â€Å"secondary† electors, who elect the deputies. 2 The king was the commander in chief of the armed forces. After consultation with the former prime minister and other ministers (cabinet heads), the king appointed the prime minister. He could also dismiss the prime minist... Free Essays on Iraq Free Essays on Iraq Iraq started out as a part of the Ottoman Empire. Iraq was controlled by Britain during World War 1. Iraq gained it independence in 1932. It is located between Iran and Kuwait. Iraq is mostly dessert with mountains on the Turkish boarder. The highest peak in Iraq is unnamed but the second highest point is Gundah Zhur 3,607 meters. Four of its most common natural resources are petroleum, natural gas, phosphate, and sulfur. Problems they have with natural disasters include sand storms and floods. The sand storms are sort of obvious because it is mostly desert but the flooding comes down of the mountains or from the government water control projects. The current population of Iraq is about 25,000,000 people. About 58 percent of the population is of working age while about the other 40 percent are under the age of fourteen. The Current birth rate to One thousand people is about thirty-three while the death rate is around 6. The infant mortality rate is about 53 to 1000. The life expectancy is right around 68. About 80% of the population is Arab while the other 20% is Kurdish. Most of the population in Iraq is Muslim around 97% worth. Right now Iraq doesn’t really have a government the United States is keeping order until a government can be established. What they call it is the interim government and that was appointed on June 1st 2004. The capital of Iraq is Baghdad. The voting age is 18 and both men and women can vote. They also have a supreme court that was appointed on September 28th 2004. So there government is still trying to get back on its feet after saddam’s reign. Most of Iraq’s economy comes from the oil industry it is about 95% of it. They feel into horrible financial problems in the 1980s during the 8-year war. They suffered about 100 billion dollar in financial downfall. After the war ended in 1988 they started to build new pipelines and the economy was slowly starting to come back. I... Free Essays on Iraq Introduction Modern Iraq occupies the area of the Middle East that has a long history of civilization- from Sumer to Chaldea to Babylonia and Assyria to Medes-Persians to the Greeks and Romans- four thousand years, in the land governed by the ebb and flow of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers (Harris 9-14, Metz 3). Iraq is a land of diverse people, both in terms of ethnic origins and in religious beliefs. It is an ancient land that has existed under a variety of governments. A Brief History Modern Iraq had its beginnings coming out of the breakup of the Ottoman Turk Empire after World War I. The area was placed under a British Mandate by the League of Nations (Harris 1). In 1921, Iraq became a separate nation under British control (Baram 1, Farouk-Slugett 11-12). An Arab, Prince Faysal ibn Husayn of the Hashimite house of Hijas, was elected king and coronated August 1921 as King Faysal I (Baram 1). Upon entry into the League of Nations, Iraq became an independent country, but still under considerable British influence, in 1932 (Farouk-Slugett 13), Using the British political system as a model, a constitutional monarchy was established (Harris 114), The Iraqi Parliament consisted of two chambers: an upper chamber- Senate- and a lower chamber- Chamber of Deputies. The senators were appointed by the king, and the deputies were elected by â€Å"secondary† electors who were in turn elected by â€Å"primary† electors, â€Å"all male Iraqi subjects who have reached the age of 20, are mentally competent, are not undischarged bankrupts, and have not lost their civil rights or been convicted of a crime (Harris 87).† The â€Å"primary† electors elect the â€Å"secondary† electors, who elect the deputies. 2 The king was the commander in chief of the armed forces. After consultation with the former prime minister and other ministers (cabinet heads), the king appointed the prime minister. He could also dismiss the prime minist... Free Essays on Iraq The words â€Å"War with Iraq† headline at least one article in every major newspaper everyday. Americans are being bombarded with breaking news on Saddam Hussein. This is not the first time Americans have witnessed their nation preparing for war with Iraq. However, today the situation is different. Support on our home soil is sparse; a good percentage of the United States does not support Bush's administration effort to launch a preemptive attack on Iraq. The first time the United States went to war against Iraq they had the support from our allies. However, through many conferences with allied nations; top advisors of the current Bush administration have been unable to get the support required to take on this war. The question is: Why the difference? What makes Americans under this Bush administration differ from Americans of the past Bush administration? Iraq is still under the leadership of Saddam Hussein. Twelve years ago, Iraq invaded its' neighboring country Kuwait. Iraq used chemical weapons fifteen years ago against Kurdish rebels. It might be true that Iraq is developing, and still may have weapons of biological and chemical agents. Taking these facts into consideration, let us consider why the United States should not launch a preemptive attack against Iraq by examining the United States economy: can we afford such a war? Is Saddam Hussein a real threat to the United States and its interests? Finally, we will consider what moral issues are involved in such a war. Many are not aware of how much it will cost to go to war with Iraq. This cost will be anywhere between one hundred and two hundred billion dollars (Woolsey, Nov. 2). Rather than spending it on military hardware, there are many ways this money could be used. For instance, we could repair all the public schools, provide health care coverage for those less fortunate, and even develop programs that will help the poor. Even before the first bomb i... Free Essays on Iraq It would be a mistake, I think, to reduce what is happening between Iraq and the United States simply to an assertion of Arab will and sovereignty versus American imperialism, which undoubtedly plays a central role in all this. However misguided, Saddam Hussein's cleverness is not that he is splitting America from its allies, which he has not really succeeded in doing for any practical purpose, but that he is exploiting the astonishing clumsiness and failures of U.S. foreign policy. Very few people, least of all Saddam himself, can be fooled into believing him to be the innocent victim of American bullying; most of what is happening to his unfortunate people who are undergoing the most dreadful and unacknowledged suffering is due in considerable degree to his callous cynicism-first of all, his indefensible and ruinous invasion of Kuwait, his persecution of the Kurds, his cruel egoism and pompous self-regard which persists in aggrandizing himself and his regime at exorbitant and, in m y opinion, totally unwarranted cost. It is impossible for him to plead the case for national security and sovereignty given his abysmal disregard of it in the case of Kuwait and Iran. Be that as it may, U.S. vindictiveness, whose sources I shall look at in a moment, has exacerbated the situation by imposing a regime of sanctions which, as Sandy Berger, the American national security adviser has proudly said, is unprecedented for its severity in the whole of world history. It is believed that 567,000 Iraqi civilians have died since the Gulf War, mostly as a result of disease, malnutrition and deplorably poor medical care. Agriculture and industry are at a total standstill. This is unconscionable of course, and for this the brazen inhumanity of American policy-makers is also very largely to blame. But we must not forget that Saddam is feeding that inhumanity quite deliberately in order to dramatize the opposition between the United States and the rest of the A...