treats. and as we say farewell to two thousand and eleven or fucked up on the most significant events of the year tonight a discussion of the impact of movements like occupy wall street and the arab spring and what they've done to change the world. well good evening it is friday december thirtieth eight pm in washington d.c. i'm christine and you are watching our t. well it is the end of december the end of the year and also we're told the end of the war in iraq throughout the day today will be taking a look at what was left behind despite more than one hundred thousand troops that have come and gone but first a recap of some of the most significant aspects of operation iraqi freedom and a look at where it all started. well citizens at this hour american and

coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm iraq to free its people and to defend the world from grave danger. it started with a campaign shock. and awe designed to be rapid and power. at first many americans were on board with the plan in part because of this earlier announcement by secretary of state colin powell one of the most worrisome things that emerges from the thick intelligence file we have on iraq's biological weapons is the existence of mobile production facilities used to make biological agents weapons of mass destruction a key factor in selling the war. combined with the idea of bringing freedom to the iraqi people this gesture. largely symbolic and discovered later to be

staged and directed by u.s. troops so it was presented as a win for the americans and a sign of a free iraq just twenty days after the invasion began. a few weeks later president bush landed on an aircraft carrier and declared mission accomplished in the battle of iraq the united states and our allies have prevailed . it was a short lived victory speech that withered in the shadows of reality that the short war that was promised became one of america's longest with more than four thousand american deaths and nearly a million iraqi civilians estimated killed as well along the way america's reputation increasingly soiled by images of americans humiliating iraqi prisoners. or helicopter pilots shooting unarmed iraqis video game style still many stick to

the story line they hope will show up in the history books. progress in iraq has allowed us to continue our policy of return on success i don't. think that it damaged our reputation around the world i just don't believe that i think it was sound policy that a very serious problem and that the limited saddam hussein this image another graphic and memorable one iraq's former leader being hanged on december thirtieth two thousand and six even president obama who is anti iraq war stance helps propel him into office he's asking others now to leave iraq alone other nations must not interfere in iraq. iraq's sovereignty must be respected iraq now home to the largest u.s. embassy in the world and while the combat troops are gone sixteen thousand will stay to guard the embassy today we mark the end of operation new dawn now the flags are being lowered by the story colors of flight number or they will never fade the

memory of all who have sacrificed so much the bases cleared out to bring the promise of freedom to the people of iraq it was the freedom never asked for and came with a high price for both iraqi and american citizens the war was neither painless nor prompt it love the people of iraq with a country destroyed by a decade of war teetering on the verge of sectarian chaos as to change the nations try now to look ahead christine for r.t. . there are of course not just the events of the war but the results of those events and the implications they've had on the past present and future of this country and its place in the world i want to put up a survey of opinions in iraq now that the combat troops are gone so when asked who benefited the most from the war with iraq iraq is were allowed to have two responses in the survey and most often they answered iran fifty four percent of them forty eight percent say the united states forty percent say the iraqi elites

and just four percent say the iraqi people benefited most from the war so i showed this a little earlier to our two guests iraq war veteran. and michael o'brien who worked as a contractor in iraq and here's what they had to say and a little bit of our discussion you know are you surprised that iran is not at the top of the list because i want is fifty four percent of iraqis say iran abetted them benefited the most. ok well yeah i mean and then i missed that point you know this is shouldn't be surprised at all i mean the the shia in the south have totally you know hand over fist had partnered with the iranians and prime minister maliki he and macdowell solder as well as the iranian special operations forces should pat themselves on the back because they hoodwinked would winked the united states and this is this situation and it wasn't obama that did it this was an agreement

that the bush administration screwed up again so now i'm not i'm not surprised by this and it's it's it is just a sad sad tragedy and i think it's a thank god that the things over with though we can say that much michael you're sitting here nodding your head that in that jake said that that sort of resonated with you agreeing with everything jake said and all i can do is add more to what he said both his first segment and the one that the just ended look at the the disparity top of the list is is iran's at the very bottom of the list with four percent is the iraqi people the iraqi people are the ones without a doubt that suffered the most up to a million iraqi people are dead and the whole the whole thing is that what are we going to learn we obviously didn't learn anything from viet nam. we went to iraq so we didn't learn anything from viet nam it was an illegal war in your in your

segment in the piece you did which by the with what was excellent you said it was a freedom the iraqi people didn't ask for you nailed it when i was there they would say mr mike that's what they called you they called you mr or ms by your first name we understand mr bush wants to fight the war on terror why does he have to fight it here they would be nothing i could say in response to that they're the ones that are the big losers and dick cheney and those guys can say whatever they want it's all smoke and mirrors i think that's a really good point i think it's also a good point that you brought up. what did we learn what did we really learn and i think back i remember where i was when that announcement that i showed at the beginning my report was made by george bush on march nineteenth two thousand and three i was living in d.c. i was celebrating st patrick's day you know at an irish bar and there were hundreds of people in this bar watching the guy playing tunes on this little guitar and just a couple of us were looking at the small t.v. on the other side of the bar and it was the president announcing something that

would change our world forever jake you were there will you ever be the same can americans understand what exactly you went through without having you know the ones who didn't go like you did. now this i mean this this iraq war and this afghanistan war has been the bloodiest war the united states has ever fake not in terms of casualties but in terms of the amount of deployments i mean we've gone on you know i mean i went to two combat tours in to check in two years and a lot of these guys are in there serving now in their tenth and twelfth and some of them fifteenth tour in both iraq and afghanistan and that amount of trauma is incredible i mean divorce rate in the military right now is that eighty percent we've got an astonishing number seventy percent of the force deployed have gauged in combat some form so it is. it has beaten the military to pieces that said it has

value personally how has this war impacted you personally. well you know i wrote a post for or r.t. it that there are two blog and i talk about the talk about basically what what for me what it was and it's total distrust in our government i i feel betrayed i feel that the bush administration lied us into this war and that obama is doubling down on the lies and that it's just it's just ruined a lot of what i think about the great part about america is it's a great country and i lost a lot of friends there i was at a lot of friends that were killed and nobody can take them back and if you look if you're in iraq or if you're a muslim and you're thinking about the afghans pakistanis and iraqis up and killed it's unimaginable the amount of trauma that's been caused by this war and that was jake very how iraq war veteran in our time blogger as well as michael o'brien

michael wrote america is still here in iraq. so i do want to stay on this topic for a little longer and talk about the legacy looking at this from more of a historic perspective and put it into a little bit of context so our t. correspondent sean thomas traveled to iraq to find out more. packing up to head home it may be easy to overlook the total costs of war at least one hundred fourteen thousand iraqi civilians killed as well as one have townsend american soldiers millions displaced from their homes not to mention a one trillion dollars financial burden still the former occupiers leave behind some words of encouragement. i can say that with confidence that in the next twenty or fifty years iraq will be a leader here in the in the gulf region that rivals any country inside of the gulf region i think that iraq now is a safe and secure environment it's not a safe and secure is as it should be or it will be but it's it's progressing very

well the american occupation of the rocks on the fall of the mantis regime the capture and execution of deposed leader saddam hussein and the implementation of a democratic government but now nearly nine years later he's the country better off the lead is up they've below him on the u.s. troops invasion of iraq and through thousand three hundred grave mistakes he committed made the situation here worse there are so many mistakes committed by the u.s. military leadership especially in managing civilian aspects here in this hunt and negative effect because i said that in fact many here say it was the american mismanagement of iraq that led to the rise of sectarian violence in the country all people if you us who brings the threat of us to iraq he said usa. who are being given damage to the and suspect set off it out he said usa so i think. we need

a con must cooperate in order to. this. culture the hate. between two people the timeline for u.s. troop withdrawal was set in two thousand and eight and while the obama administration initially tried to extend the deadline the official transfer of power came sixteen days ahead of schedule on december sixteenth two thousand and eleven we hope that the future. want to bring. many good things if. and there you can look today at a quilt about long not by the view with see. follow america must have been everything's on air america. this sub says that's sources and also the mind of the many people who.

love. our country right now the u.s. and iraqi governments are working on a new type of diplomatic relations building a new type of trust if you will but now the next step is in the hands of the iraqi government to move the country forward and america's influence waned political infighting and sectarian divisions in the iraqi parliament have diminished as well giving iraqis hope for a strong future a mob just as regards other aspects civil life the political and parliamentarian aspects as well as the economic aspects that lets me see that iraq has good capabilities that the need to it to become one of the developed states but as iraq prepares to move past this dark chapter they have a message for their former occupiers to our friends the americans that the police gone another mistake and because your mistake is a great mistake and it affects your. butt is teach and also your

future relations and friends are few right now in a region in which america's reputation lies in shreds in the eyes of many in iraq john thomas artes. and to dig deeper and figure out some of the broader implications of the war in iraq i spoke a little earlier with stephen doona a professor of politics and international studies at the university of san francisco i asked him in his view how iraq will be judged in future history books here's his answer. certainly one of the greatest tragedies not just of american policy but american foreign relations certainly in the history of the middle east as well as many of us predicted prior to the invasion it comes on at least across the dinner. hatred between us sudanese and shias in iraq which certain to spend well over elsewhere it was radicalized a whole new generation. of extremist. terrorists

and we're going away similar to the soviet invasion didn't have a storm back in one thousand meetings and i think many ways it was though you know giving them ocracy a bad name and since that it did mater so you want that stalin did the socialism the same so. idealistic concept of distorted and even the name of occupation militarism and expansionism and it's really about current hopes for a stable middle east it's only recently on the past year received starting to recover through the popular pro-democracy struggles kind of like a half percent of those iraqi people and we were talking about this earlier in our show. as you say from their perspective if this is what democracy looks like we don't want any of it let's talk about the white house certainly a celebrate a television or a tone out of the white house in the recent weeks i want to play part of a recent speech from president obama and then we can discuss one of the most

extraordinary chapters in the history of the american military will come to an end iraq's future will be in the hands of its people america's war in iraq will be all. so professor is it is when we talk about this future being in the hands of the iraqi people it wasn't even a few days that the last of the combat troops were out of iraq and we saw you know prime minister nouri al maliki basically kicked the vice president who was a sunni to the curb blaming him for all kinds of things there seems to be i would argue brewing some would argue it's already in the works a civil war happening between the sunni and shiites and kurds there we have left iraq the u.s. has left iraq with kind of a big mess. very much so when the united states is our most responsible to steering us i mean prior to the u.s. invasion. iraq was under very you know

a brutal but stable secular government you had. she was an sunni's both in high positions there is the in from aaron if american susan seamlessness comments especially in her materials in small towns that there was only one mosque sunni islam seals were sick together about the united states and some of the what's going on and not to the policy line rule. exacerbated these a sectarian differences we might see some polish that i've been asked by through some in society that is the iraqi armed forces and and most of the iraqi civil servants so the armed forces is now a collection of militias which are probably more loyal to their particular party or six their community than they are to the state and probably some will serve so depending on the department has some essentially to think tim's going to this competing. sectarian groups and it is going to start it's not even out as much to

terry in conflict as it is around because with the end both the sunni and shia communities you know how both masculist and six very intent is which are also. struggling against each other but in many ways parallels northern ireland where the conflict was not its policy its versus catholics per se but the protestants were genocide with the british occupation other catholics were irish nationalist and some of the sudanese you know who had been you know rock suddenly find their country in the hands of of shiite parties which came to power as a result of an invasion of the us and spend their exile years had very close ties where with a wreck and a ready to our enemies let me pick your brain now you're a poly five how do you arrange for just a second and switch gears a little bit. we're just a few days away of course from the iowa caucuses and all the g.o.p. candidates ron paul seems to be the only one saying enough is enough not only and

the war in iraq but end all wars and they don't start any new ones now in many ways this sort of philosophy has been you know dismissed not only by the other candidates but by the mainstream media and yet he's the only one that served in the military what do you make of this sort of dismissal when you have a candidate running for president who says you know words are bad and they're dismissed. it is ironic isn't it the same song disagreements with congressman paul's position on a lot of the mystic issues but he is one of the few people here who seems to be speaking common sense around the united states is over extending itself and he's not saying this out of any great moral of the last few commitments of pacifism or or of human rights or or international law or anything like that he's just saying it's simply in terms of america's own self interest in the way our own country is being hurt by this kind of imperial overreach and the other republican candidates

have been rather silly in saying that obama should have kept the troops in iran are sort of kept the troops in iraq anyway in other words violating the treaty that was signed by president bush and essentially would have. made a new occupation was a bit of the sas role in a whole number of fronts particularly some so. the army taught his group promise to launch their own armed struggle against the u.s. if we did so again with you know this this idea we're here you know republicans are not only as paul wrong but even obama is somehow being too moderate just indication of how extreme most of the republican party has been certainly extreme and they're also probably hearings and things from defense contractors who are speaking to them in terms of money i can only imagine professor of politics and international studies at the university of california san francisco you perceive that has got us

have even seen us thanks so much for joining us. so i had on our t.v. we remember the events that made headlines this year and those that deserve a little more attention than the mainstream media twenty eleven and review coming up next. and. have. reduced the police corruption and. have. what is one test the a nobody seems to know. that never a proper sprayed the face but not the argument that they're being overly dramatic. one.

of the capital inc well i'm lauren mr. pepper spray not just burning gerard's right right i mean it's like a derivative of actual pepper it's a food product essentially. it's much stronger than anything if you buy off some of these thousands of times we're stronger than any kind of bird you ever put in your .

well as it is the spirit this time of this time of year we want to take a look back and reflect now a little earlier in the show we talked in-depth about the pullout from iraq now let's take a look at some of the other major events that shaped this country and the world in two thousand and eleven are to correspond on a facet churkin to gives us her take on this year in review. a year of frustration january twentieth levon full rage mode for the arab spring and indicator of events to calm washington d.c. across the atlantic the year kickstarts with one in six americans officially living in poverty what's been called one of the worst recessions in u.s. history places like new york over flooded with mountains of trash as much as fifty thousand tons of garbage in just one week february. the revolutions in the arab

world rage on egypt's leader of thirty years resigns. in america's midwest workers protests to kick off nearly one hundred thousand rally at the wisconsin state capitol march back to back disasters hit japan the most powerful earthquake to ever hit there then a monstrous tsunami then a nuclear catastrophe the largest since church noble and in libya a nato led coalition intervenes with deadly consequences april twentieth eleven going on here in the world is glued to the royal wedding while the libyan war is in full swing the real interest of the west are questioned why you have the genocide of nearly a million people and nobody lifted a finger made sexual assault charges the domini extra con case takes over the us mainstream media the alleged rapist is found not guilty party fights off mainstream

media attacks mainstream respectable news stations would never be interested in any of our unrespectable extreme guests. june twenty eighth eleven. greece on the brink of collapse taken over by chaos. as we see this our two crew tear gassed in the protests july. them. stream media is busy with the murder trial of a woman accused of killing her two year old r.t. covers nasa's final shuttle flight they are well protected and investigates the bohemian grove mystery august twenty seventh to a double a plus his story crash america's credit rating dropped. the u.k. in riot spasms symptom for the tenth anniversary of nine eleven first responders on the verge of tears a decade on just to have somebody from the government say thank you.

to thank you for. this protest to reach america the biggest movement in the us in the years kicks off in the big apple parties on the ground from day one one week into the protests violence begins women netted and pepper sprayed last night was october twenty eighth eleven libyan leader moammar gadhafi killed. in new york a march of thousands hundreds arrested u.s. marines join the movement. at occupy oakland protest the war veteran severely injured in the head into unconsciousness. november three years since obama's election riot police tear gassed occupy oakland strike they're still reporting from the. occupy wall street's first camp in new york as

a victim. journalist arrests at occupy wall street go public december twentieth eleven one of the most famous political prisoners in the world held in the u.s. taken off death row after thirty years but gets life behind bars without parole in moscow tens of thousands of people protest election results he gets protests in twenty years. in the u.s. despite initial promises to last only until. the occupy wall street movement still very much alive. protests a symbol of twenty eleven some have brought changes others results on certain or even not at all news events come and go on the media can inflate them downplay them or just question well the lessons of two thousand and eleven be learned the your head will show so stay with us here at r.t. because that's it sure can our party your and be sure to tune in to our team next

week and next year for a brand new lineup all eyes will be on the hawkeye state as iowa caucuses are held on tuesday so could ron paul the man the mainstream media loves to call friend and extreme actually when we'll be here to follow the caucus and the reaction to the results and speaking of iowa what if i told you that one sixth of the world's corn supply goes to making fuel that would fill a lot of rose bowl stadiums or enough to feed the entire american population for a year so while the u.s. spends six billion dollars annually to support the ethanol program here's a hint it's related to politicians pandering for votes in iowa. and america is regarded as a country with a ravenous appetite for consumption including a widespread fondness for pharmaceuticals which is turn the u.s. into a nation of pill poppers we'll take a look at farmageddon next week on our t.v. but for now that will do it for more on the stories we covered go to our team dot

com slash usa or youtube dot com slash r t america you should follow me on twitter at christine for is now on she to have a very happy new year and a great night. you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so for lengthly you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harvey welcome to the big picture. movie.