A Single Day of Commemoration Cannot Replace a Lifetime of Lessons Learned

 America will mark the 20th anniversary of the disastrous decision to invade Iraq for the following eight years. More than 80 Missourian service members were killed on March 20, 2003, but this was only the beginning of the killing and maiming of tens of thousands of Iraqis and American soldiers alike. 

The fallout from that conflict, which the Bush administration falsely claimed was caused by Saddam Hussein's stockpile of WMD and his hosting of al-Qaida terrorists, is still being felt in both nations to this day.

Iraq sways from crisis to crisis. For instance, there is a persistent shortage of medical professionals. That's because, at the time, doctors in Iraq were all trained by Hussein, tended to practice Sunni Islam, and were therefore viewed negatively when the Shiite majority took power. Despite hospitals being overrun with war casualties, doctors and other medical staff were threatened and told to leave.

The initial weeks of the war were planned with an eye toward troop and financial efficiency by then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney. However, they did not prepare for the ensuing chaos. They erroneously believed that free elections would follow the removal of Iraq's dictator and that the oil wealth of Iraq would provide a blueprint for prosperity and democracy for the rest of the Arab world.

That wasn't exactly how things turned out. An armed uprising resulted from the Bush administration's decision to fire the entire Sunni-dominated Iraqi military. After fighting one another, Sunni and Shiite militias both turned their weapons on American soldiers. Iraq descended into a $2 trillion bloodbath of chaos.

Weapons of mass destruction were not discovered. And it was nonsense that Hussein was hosting terrorists from al-Qaida, as claimed by the Bush administration. Osama bin Laden, the founder of Al-Qaida, had long viewed Hussein as an enemy and an apostate. To get rid of him, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, an adherent who was too radical even by al-Qaida standards, had been sent by Bin Laden to northern Iraq. As a result of the U.S.-caused chaos, Zarqawi created his own militia, the Islamic State, which made the carnage worse and then exported it to the neighboring country of Syria.

The lies of the administration were paid for with the lives of thousands of service members and American contractors. Others will always be plagued by crippling emotional and physical scars.

Politically, some Republicans use the mess in Iraq to call for the United States to leave the world and let oppressed nations and peoples fight for themselves. Others contend that one should never again have faith in the American government. Both arguments have some merit, but the real lesson of Iraq is to stay involved while being much more cautious, especially when the evidence is merely a collection of hazy reconnaissance photos. Additionally, Congress must fulfill its constitutional duty to check the White House rather than support it.