In life, a person is at times forced to lie. This greatly depends with the circumstances or even situations that coerce an individual into doing so. A lie can be defined as knowingly expressing truth as untruth to a person or persons, institution like schools, courts and even at the work place. A lie is a kind of deception and it usually involves misleading people. A lie can take any of the following forms: holding unto some information that can be of importance to another party. The other is making misleading a person into believing in a different thing that is untrue or even emphasizing such kind of belief.
However, one needs to know that there are many trivial kinds of deception. These are: euphemism, elusion and amplification or overstating. There are the unconscious kinds of deception like disguise, lack of action or complete inaction and leading one to the wrong path with signs. On the political stage, the government at times withholds very important information from its citizenry. In the United States of America, this purposeful withholding of information has taken the center stage when it comes to issues of national security and terrorism. Most U.S citizens are kept in the secret when it comes to these two critical issues. The government knowingly makes “white lies” to defend its position (Grossman 3).
In the US government, “white lies” have been made in the past and some have led to billions of losses and lives. At times these lies have been made knowingly. Several American Presidents have used them as a reason to do something like attack a nation as for the case of Pearl Harbor Attack and the War in Iraq, Vietnam War among others.
President Franklin Roosevelt lied to the people and put their security at stake just like President Bill Clinton, George William Bush. All these presidents know the truth and have a completely different intention before carrying out attacks. They have their own reasons but choose to mislead the public by informing them that they are protecting their security.
On December 6, 1941, hours before Japan attacked Pearl Harbor; President Franklin Roosevelt had all the information that America was going to be attacked but did nothing which was somehow intentional. This was when the diplomatic relations between Japan and America were severed. He knew that his fellow citizens were at risk. After Roosevelt had called for peace from the Emperor of Japan and he got no response from the latter. Truly, Roosevelt should have had prepared for war or at least took measures to ensure that all the people in his nation were safe. Also his previous actions against Japan had put the economy of Japan on the brink of collapse. It is therefore reasonable to argue that Japan was ready for revenge with or without winning. The Federal Government of America had refused Japan to get supplies or raw materials from Indochina, and South East Asia making the Japan economy to collapse.
The truth about this attack is that, Roosevelt was well informed of the attack. It is this attack that Roosevelt used to get into World War II and at the same time attack Japan, Germany and Italy. The lives of millions of Americans had been risked with the simple intent of America going into war. But the citizens were told that America is going into war so that it can protect them against any invasions which were not true. In any case, America’s entry into war had put the lives of Americans at a greater risk than before because war creates more enemies.
In 2001, September, the Twin Times Towers in New York were bombed and about three thousand lost their lives. The American Government held AL-Qaeda responsible for the attack (AL-Qaeda is an Islamic militia group which has got terrorist links all over the Middle East but it is led by the Saudi born dissident Osama Bin Laden) (Zunes 3). After the 9/11 bombings, the U.S government had put in place committees to investigate the bombings and the findings have not been published to date or made public. Zunes argues that this is withholding of information that is of importance to the American citizens. The main place of operation is in the mountainous terrain of Afghanistan. But America chose to revenge the 9/11 attacks and invaded Iraq.
The reasons President George Bush gave on attacking Iraq were just simple: to free the Iraq people and the then Iraq President, Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The other reason is that the Iraq people are had links with Al-Qaeda network. The latter is what America termed as the “war on terrorism”. All these reasons lack clear evidence and it is very true that Iraq and its people have never been a threat to the national security of the United States.
On this issue, the truth is that America wanted the Mesopotamian oil which has flown freely from the earth’s chambers for close to a century. After the United Nations imposed “Oil for Food Program” for the Middle East, American oil cronies had to look for ways of getting the oil without giving food or being bound by the UN rules (Chin 4). America seeks to control the energy of the world and by so doing; they will get to rule the world forever. This is the driving force behind the attack. The American economy is based on military industries and somehow it wanted to expand their proceeds form sale and use of complex weapons (Zunes 3).
The truth is that America was lusting for revenge on 9/11 and they lied to the citizens that they were “taking care” of their national security. According to the neoconservative point of view, America feels that they are the only exceptional and last superpower to bring hegemony into the Middle East. They want to beat those nations into accepting the presence of Israel on Palestine soil through control of oil, their only main resource. If America were attacking the Al-Qaeda network, then should have had concentrated their effort in Afghanistan but rather chose to attack a nation rich in fossil fuels.
As a matter of fact, those who perpetrate the war are never involved directly. They just recruit innocent civilians into the armies to go die after brainwashing them that they are fighting to maintain national security. The people of America and the Middle East are innocent but at a greater risk than ever. The truth here is that America is executing people and not war. The government the US has set in Iraq is puppet and can not venture outside the green zone that is heavily guarded by US soldiers.
In the Iraq war, many nations like France, the United Kingdom, and United Nations among others have been given the wrong information concerning Iraq. According to Grossman, The “lie” that Iraq is a threat to national security has been reinforced to a level that they supported the war without having any real reasons (15). The rest of the world has also been deceived that Iraq is a threat to the world security. America should give its clear intent and reason as to why it is waging war against some nations in the world. Grossman says that from the South Dakota massacre of 1890, where 300 Indians of Lakota origin were killed to Iraq, America’s reasons are war for resources not for the interests of its citizens (1).
Integrity is being honest both in action and word. It is better for a thousand people to die because of the truth rather than loose one head and have greater implications later. It is good to be truthful at all times no matter what. It earns someone or a country respect.
The world should understand that there is nothing like “war on terrorism”. America’s actions are the ones that have called for people to rise up against the West (Grossman 13). In conclusion, the American government has deceived its citizens and used lies to support its Iraq attacks. They have eluded the facts, over amplified their reasons of attack and taken no action in informing the world with the truth.
Works Cited
Chin, Larry. “Peak Oil and Inflation Lie”. Global Reasearch.Ca. 2010. Web.
Grossman, Zoltan. From Wounded Knee to Iraq: A century of U.S Military Interventions. The Evergreen State College. Web.
Zunes, Stephen. Ed. Gershman John. “The U.S Invasion of Iraq: The Military Side of Globalization?” Foreign Policy in Focus. 2004.