Ultimately, even the great rhetorical skills of Barack Obama could not hide the fact that the US military had been defeated in Iraq. American troops sneaked out of the country into Kuwait on December 15, a full two weeks ahead of the stipulated deadline.
The fact that the US has suffered a massive defeat in Iraq is no longer disputed by any but the most slavish apologists for the Bush regime. As the reality of the US’s position first became apparent, many Western commentators went through a process of retroactive redefinition of the justifications and objectives of the war, to try ways of making the war look less disastrous that it actually is. Now few even try that.
Perhaps never before in history has a self-declared superpower fallen from glory as precipitously as has the US. In less than 20 years it has gone from a hyperpower to being a spent force unable to deal even with such backward societies as Afghanistan and Iraq.
Visiting Vietnam last month, US president George Bush tried to put a positive spin on the US’s defeat in Iraq by comparing it with the US experience in that country. The truth, however, is that the US defeat in Iraq surpasses the humiliation it suffered in Vietnamin terms of its political implications.
America has undoubtedly suffered a humiliating defeat in Iraq, even if no US soldier has yet actually left the country. It is enough that America has become the most hated country in the world today...
