Photo/Illutration In this April 30, 2004, file photo, U.S. Marines burn their fortifications on front-line positions in Fallujah, Iraq, before pulling out of the city. The U.S. launched its invasion of Iraq on March 20, 2003, unleashing a war that led to an insurgency, sectarian violence and tens of thousands of deaths. (AP Photo)

A little over a year after the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq started, I went to hear a talk given by a high-ranking U.S. government official.

The United States had gone to war on the understanding that Saddam Hussein's regime possessed weapons of mass destruction, but such weapons were never found in the end.

A question was fired from the floor, blaming the government for its bad decision.

In response, the official explained to the effect that just as the goal of the U.S. Civil War had changed while it was still being fought, WMD were no longer the main issue, but the democratization of Iraq was.

In short, the official reminded the audience that the U.S. Civil War, which began as a fight between northern states supporting the federal union and southern states that voted to secede, eventually became a war over ending slavery.

The official may have thought that even this irrational war in Iraq could perhaps be justified, if put in historical context. In fact, the Americans at the time were in the habit of citing Japan under postwar Allied occupation as a successful case of an attempt to remake a nation into a democracy with the support of military force.

However, Japan's democratization was made possible by its own basic systems of parliamentary politics and bureaucracy that had been established before the war.

In Iraq, on the other hand, the war destroyed Iraq's national functions and removed all the people who had kept the old regime running. Society was torn apart and tensions of sectarian struggle were heightened.

In "Iraq: From War to A New Authoritarianism," a study on post-invasion Iraqi politics, British political scientist Toby Dodge notes to the effect that Iraqi society was ripped apart and fragmented into religious and ethnic groups while violence surged.

Falling into a state of civil war, Iraq even came under the rule of the Islamic State terrorist group at one time in some parts of the nation's territories.

The unconscionable acts of terrorism on Sept. 11, 2001, caused the United States to declare war on Afghanistan and then on Iraq.

But no matter how I try to see it, the losses generated by this chain reaction of retaliation are just too great.

This is what the past 20 years have taught me.

--The Asahi Shimbun, Sept. 15

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Vox Populi, Vox Dei is a popular daily column that takes up a wide range of topics, including culture, arts and social trends and developments. Written by veteran Asahi Shimbun writers, the column provides useful perspectives on and insights into contemporary Japan and its culture.

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