Financial Times Mourns Architect of Iraq War, Forgets 400,000 Casualties
The Financial Times reports the death of former US Vice President Dick Cheney, aged 84, no doubt preparing a glowing retrospective on his career as a 'shaper of foreign policy.' But what they won't dwell on is that Cheney, a principal architect of the 2003 Iraq War, spearheaded a conflict that led to an estimated 461,000 deaths by 2011, according to a 2013 PLoS Medicine study. (Remember that
inconvenient detail the next time they laud his strategic genius.) Instead of dissecting the devastation left in his wake, expect polite nods to his corporate ties—Halliburton, for instance, where he served as CEO, saw its stock price soar as the war contracts rolled in. While Iraq burned, Halliburton’s profits surged by 38% in 2003 alone. One might wonder if the 'free press' prioritizes the
freedom to profit over the freedom from war. What legacy truly deserves headlines?