Most of us are still reeling from the despicable images of Iraqi prisoners being humiliated at Abu-Ghraib, Saddam's most infamous jail. The U.S. military has managed to rival the former Iraqi leader in the brutality stakes, forcing hooded detainees to disrobe, simulate depraved sexual acts or submit to being dragged around on a leash like a dog and told to bark. This is pure horror! Worse, those images are only the tip of the iceberg according to the Red Cross and Amnesty International, who say others have been left in the sun for hours in temperatures of 40 degrees or beaten to death. Other sickening photographs, this time showing the sexual abuse of Iraqi women, are circulating the Internet causing unprecedented Arab fury; such that the American President George W. Bush, the U.S. military's Commander-in-Chief was driven to apologize on Arabic-language networks. For most in the region, this was a hollow attempt at damage control, designed to dampen down the outrage of the American public during an election year.

Arab leaders should put pressure on the US and Britain in any way they can to hand over the reigns to the UN until Iraq can hold elections. Arabs should help their Iraqi brothers to find their way with friendship, advice and hard cash. The neo-imperialists have had their turn. The task should now be left to those with courage and vision, rather than long-held political agendas and a thirst for both oil and global hegemony. The game is up and the callous players should admit it before they slink off and lick their wounds. The so-called Western civilizations have lost the moral high ground - if they, indeed, ever had it - and it's time for curtains to fall on the last Act.

So who are those sadistic new imperialists?

In the spring of 1997 a group of American like-minded ideologues, politicians and military strategists - concerned with the erosion of U.S. global power- got together to form a think tank named 'The Project for a New American Century' (PNAC). Its report entitled 'Rebuilding America's Defences' recommended:

The fighting and winning of multiple simultaneous major theatre wars; maintaining US nuclear superiority; restoring military personnel strength; setting-up military bases in south-east Europe and south-east Asia; the development and deployment of global missile-defences; and the control of space and cyberspace.

The report advises the U.S. to take military control of the Gulf region whether or not Saddam Hussein is in power: "While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provide the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein." It also lauds the development of a "world-wide command-and-control system" to contain regimes such as North Korea, Libya, Syria and Iran. The document warns that unless its advice is heeded, the current Pax Americana (U.S. empire) could disintegrate.

Today, several of the founders of the PNAC are powerful incumbents of the White House and Pentagon, and include Vice-President Dick Cheney, Defence-Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Deputy Secretary of Defence Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle, formerly Chairman of the Defence Policy Board.

Other founders are Jeb Bush, the Governor of Florida - the swing-state during George W. Bush's election - and the influential columnist William Kristol. Elliot Abrams, forgiven by Bush for lying to Congress about Nicaragua and El Salvador, and now on the staff of Condoleeza Rice, was a member of PNAC.

Founder of Physicians for Social Responsibility and a nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize Dr. Helen Caldicott, called the report 'the new Mein Kampf", adding, "…only Hitler did not have nuclear weapons. It is the scariest report I have ever read in my life".

The British Labour Party MP Tam Dalyell described it as "garbage from right-wing think-tanks stuffed with chicken-hawks - men who have never seen the horror of war but are in love with the idea of war… This is a blueprint for US world domination - a new world order of their making."

But this was the second of such reports. Its little-known 1989 predecessor penned by Dick Cheney, Colin Powell and Paul Wolfowitz entitled the "Defence Planning Guidance" report advocated global U.S. military dominance. It called for the U.S. to prevent new rivals challenging its supremacy on the world's stage, and uses words like "pre-emptive" and military "forward presence". It called for U.S. dominance over friends and foes alike. Its conclusions were the U.S. should make itself "absolutely powerful".

In July 2002, Richard Perle invited Rand Corporation analyst Laurent Murawiec to give a 24-slide presentation to the Defence Policy Board. The last slide titled "Grand Strategy for the Middle East" states: "Iraq is the tactical pivot, Saudi Arabia the strategic pivot, Egypt the prize". Mid-East pundits are still trying to figure this out.

Since George W. Bush and his hawkish group came into office, one could be forgiven for believing they are studiously following the PNAC's blueprint. Bush began by tearing up the ABM treaty and embarking upon a missile defence shield. Unprecedented amounts of cash are being devoted to the U.S. military and there are new projects underway to develop smaller and lighter tactical nuclear weapons. The Patriot Act, introduced after the September 2001 attacks on New York and Washington allows the FBI to monitor cyberspace. The space programme, including a manned mission to Mars, has been pushed up the list of Bush's priorities. More importantly both Afghanistan and Iraq have been pre-emptively invaded while Syria and Iran have been touted as future targets.

In other words, the development of new weapons, control of cyberspace and space, simultaneous wars and the setting up of new military bases worldwide have been implemented by the Bush people as per PNAC doctrine.

A side effect of the attacks on America's symbols of power on September 11, 2001 was the paving of the way for the U.S. to spread its global influence. Bush told world leaders: "You are either with the U.S. or with the terrorists". Most jumped aboard the U.S. bandwagon but for different reasons. America's natural allies, such as Britain, France, Germany and Australia, felt it was their duty. Russia, struggling to cope with its new free market and democratic status and fending off criticism of Chechnya, decided it prudent and allowed the U.S. to set up bases in Uzbekistan and Kyrgistan. Nuclear Pakistan was subjected to bribes and threats to toe the line. China took a back seat in return for U.S. silence on its human rights record and support for a 'One-China' policy. The "War on Terror" was born.

Trumped up case against Iraq

Despite qualms held by some countries, the invasion of Afghanistan to oust the unpopular Taliban regime and to "bring justice" to Osama bin Laden was deemed appropriate. But in keeping with the PNAC's report that America should fight simultaneous wars, the U.S. President set his war-mongering sights on Iraq, which was at that time doing its best to get the U.S.-led sanctions lifted, mend fences with its neighbours and to re-join the community of nations.

And so the U.S. administration desperately needed a pretext to invade Iraq. Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and former White House 'terrorism tsar' Richard Clarke both say that from the day Bush moved into the White House Iraq was on his hit list. CIA chief George Tenet has told the 9-11 Commission that Bush asked him to find links between Saddam Hussein and Bin Laden. Donald Rumsfeld has been quoted as saying just a few days after 9-11 that Iraq had more targets than mountainous Afghanistan and was, thus, a better choice.

To press their trumped up case against Iraq, they used the babbling of self-interested Iraqi exiles such as Rumsfeld's buddy Ahmed Chalabi and called these 'intelligence'. They presented forged documentation concerning the alleged purchase by Iraq of uranium yellow cake from Niger. Britain produced "dodgy dossiers", one fraudulently alleging that Iraq's WMD could be utilised against British interests within 45-minutes of orders being given to do so. The other dossier was lifted off the Internet, typos and all, from a 12-year-old student's thesis. They insisted two trailers were mobile biological labs when they turned out to be connected with weather balloons. They said Al Qaeda was mobilising in northern Iraq when all that reporters found in that alleged base was a few old men and rotting tomatoes.

No weapons of mass destruction were unearthed despite the best efforts of UN inspectors Hans Blix and Mohammed ElBaradei in the run-up to the war and those of chief Iraq Survey Group weapons inspector David Kay after the conflict was supposed to have ended signalled by Bush's theatrical appearance on an aircraft carrier announcing "mission accomplished". We were almost all wrong, said Kay.

In other words we were all conned. Suddenly WMD took a back seat and their discovery no longer considered important. Instead, they attempted to re-write history and insist that the invasion was all about freeing the Iraqi people from a brutal dictator and the bringing of freedom and democracy to the region.

More than a year later and Iraq is in turmoil. The country still suffers from a lack of electricity and running water, jobs are scarce, cluster bombs are taking the lives and limbs of curious children while depleted uranium tank shells are leading to the increase of cancers in some areas.

The Iraqis have also woken up to the fact that the Bush administration's promise of a hand-over of sovereignty and democracy is a sham. The end of June is slated to witness this historic handover but, in fact, the country's day-to-day administration will be given to a puppet interim government, which will have no say over Iraq's economy, oil or defence. The U.S. will stay with its troops in Iraq for decades to come as the Bush administration's crony companies reap mega profits from reconstruction contracts, American oil companies grow fat on Iraq's reserves, the second largest in the world, OPEC's pricing control will be threatened and the growth of America's strategic competitor China can be curtailed, since it has no oil of its own.

The crumbling U.S.-led coalition

Many of America's allies have received a wake-up-call too. When France and Germany initially opposed the invasion of Iraq, they were termed by Rumsfeld as "Old Europe". The French were called "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" while French goods were boycotted.

Although 90 per cent of Spaniards and Italians were against the invasion, their right-wing leaders Jose Maria Aznar and Silvio Berlusconi turned deaf ears to their protests.

In March, the Spanish people got their own back by voting with their feet. After bombs went off on Madrid trains killing 192, the hawkish Aznar was ousted and replaced by Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero who vows to withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq unless the UN takes charge before June 30. Berlusconi, who once praised Mussolini as being a good leader, and is being investigated for corruption, is likely to receive the same fate.

As Iraq's WMD remain elusive, the violence in Iraq worsens, and the kidnapping of foreigners becomes the norm, some coalition members are having second thoughts. Viceroy Paul L. Bremer's bungling and America's collective punishment tactics, recently acquired from Israeli experts, have brought Sunnis and Shiites together against a common enemy.

South Korean President Roh Moo-Hyun said he would consider sending only 3,000, mostly non-combatant troops, to northern Iraq - far fewer than the U.S. requested. Even this has challenged South Korean public opinion, which wants their country's participation curtailed.

Poland, which was a staunch supporter of the Iraq war, has ruled out reinforcing the 2,500 troops it has in southern Iraq, who have clashed with insurgents recently.

Australia's main opposition party, which is likely to gain office since three-quarters of the Australian public is anti-war, has pledged to withdraw troops from Iraq if it wins elections towards the end of the year.

Britain's Tony Blair, however, is unwavering. At one time over 80 per cent of his people were against the invasion, a figure, which diminished once 'their boys' were in theatre. Blair, who heads a left of centre party has irrevocably joined hands with his far right counterpart across the pond and has been called by Bush 'a stand up guy'. Many believe Blair basks in the powerful shadow of the American president, almost as a deputy would, in the absence of Britain's own empire.

Israel is number one beneficiary

There is no doubt that Israel is one of the main beneficiaries of the 'endless war' policy. Its enemy number one Saddam Hussein has been put out of action, while Libya has thrown in the towel, agreed to dismantle its WMD programme and cooperate with the West. At the same time, the Palestinians have been weakened, bereft of Iraq's financial support; their leaders conveniently designated "terrorists" by both Israel and the U.S., and, thus, open to extra-judicial assassination.

Richard Perle, one of the Zionist founders of the PNAC, has written a book together with Bush's former speech writer David Frum (inventor of the 'Axis of Evil') titled: "An End to Evil: How to Win the War on Terror". In the Perle-Frum black-and-white worldview, the U.S. faces either "victory over evil or holocaust". They believe the road to victory entails forcing European nations to choose between Paris and Washington, special scrutiny of Muslims living in the US by law enforcement; the overthrow of the Iranian and Syrian governments; a blockade of North Korea; rejection of the United Nations Charter and the abandonment of any plan for a Palestinian state. Perle told WBR Radio that believes the US administration concurs.

Unless the 'endless war brigade' fails in its mission, and cooler heads prevail, the future for the region and the planet remains an unknown quantity. Bush has already changed his unilateral tune and looks to the UN and NATO for assistance in Iraq. The country is too dangerous for the hordes of high-paid foreign reconstruction workers to operate without protection from US$1,000 per day mercenaries. The Iraqi people become ever more determined to wave goodbye to the occupiers. This is not the hoped-for scenario. This was not the script and, with any luck, the neo-Cons and their vicious ideology will be given the boot once and for all.

Linda S. Heard is a specialist writer on Mid-East affairs and welcomes feedback at morgandewales@yahoo.co.uk