There's been this question floating about recently. Reporters want to pester Jeb Bush to see if he will admit his brother (W.) made a big mistake invading Iraq after 9/11. And whether or not that mistake led directly to ISIS.
Apparently the majority of Americans now see the invasion as unprofitable, possibly even wrong on some grounds or other. (Even before the advent of ISIS.)
And clearly, the power vacuum caused by our eventual withdrawal blew open the door for various radical factions, including ISIS. In addition, the civil war in Syria sucked various fighters together in a witches' brew of unhappy but aggressive folks.
But reporters want to concentrate on a single, simple question. (Oh how we love simple questions. We think these simple answers will solve many things that are wrong with our lives.)
The question: Did George W. Bush pave the way for ISIS?
Aside from slapping a guilty verdict on some fellow in order to make ourselves feel better about things, there is an implication that assigning blame might teach us something that will prevent future gaffs and other, inevitable crises.
We think (hope) we can mend the process of politics in order to avoid new disasters. We aim to fix our errant ways so we can lead better, more comfortable lives.
Is that a reasonable goal?
I'll tell you the answer in a moment. First, let's get back to the question of ISIS.
Blaming W. for ISIS is facile and juicy in an election year (they're all election years now). If Iraq had never been invaded, would ISIS exist today? Maybe.
Here's a more far-reaching and provocative question: Would ISIS exist today without the religion called Islam?
Surely (if I may call you that), some armed entity could be expected to be roaming the deserts and towns of Iraq following the exit of American troops. Power vacuums just naturally suck folks in and give them the hope of setting up their own regimes.
(There's only two strategies for avoiding this situation: Don't invade other peoples' countries; or—if you do—never leave. Can you guess the one I like best?)
ISIS, however, has the added kick of being a determined mass of deeply religious folks. (Politicians throughout the West are proficient at denying ISIS draws any potency from religious fervor. Come on!)
ISIS performs various brutalities for specifically religious reasons. Sharia law, and all that. Should a woman suffer a wardrobe failure that leads to her rape, she would absolutely be dumped into a pit and have a bulldozer push a pile of stones on top of her.
You can set your watch by their predictable behavior.
No question, Islam (or a misinterpretation of it) is the power behind the throne. Sure, humans are brutal a-holes, but they perform their best work when driven (excused) by deeply-held religious beliefs.
Given half a chance, humans will aways misinterpret divine instructions in order to free up work for the sharp knife, the well-stocked bench of torture implements, the stack of tinder-dry firewood, the cauldron of boiling oil.
("No one expects the Spanish Inquisition!" Really? Hate to tell you, but it's in our blood to behave this way.)
If you feel I'm being too harsh on Islam, please recall that Christianity is also a vast, gurgling heap of baseless and dangerous crap.
Which brings us to the lowest level of human behavior: the fundamental flaw in our brains that urges us to create systems of supernatural nonsense.
We just naturally gravitate to pulsating clouds of baloney gas. We refuse to believe the universe is an uncaring machine operating on simple laws of physics.
We need the universe to possess a personality—preferably a benign one—so that we can be protected from evil and rewarded when we display the ability to step back from murdering our fellow man.
(We also want to be rewarded when we step up to murder particular groups of our fellow man, those pointed out in our sacred texts as needed killing.)
A disturbing number of people want nothing more out of life but an opportunity to prove exactly how effed-up they are. And I mean effed-up in God's name.
To return to the question ("Can we learn from our mistakes and do better in the future?"), the answer is: Not bloody likely.
We seem to lack the ability to learn such things. We do, however, pack a talent for figuring out better and faster ways of getting the horror done.
Not the answer we were looking for, of course, but an answer nevertheless. Sometimes you just have to make do.
By the way, here's the answer to the title question: W. didn't create ISIS. He just made it extremely easy for the group to work its magic on the region.
President Obama didn't help, either, in his reluctance to get involved in Syria. But interfering in a civil war is a mug's game. (Remember Viet Nam?) And half the folks fighting Bashar al-Assad were (and are) members of al-Qaeda backed groups. And who wants to help them?
The enemy of my enemy is still some kind of enemy.
[For more on faulty human thought processes, see the book What's Wrong With Us, available in Kindle ebook format.]
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