In the 21st century thus far, the United States of America first went to war to avenge the 2001 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon. The country we chose to go to war with had nothing at all to do with that attack, but we were told a variety of lies so the next thing Iraq knew, it was “shock and awe” brought to them by American defense contractors, the machinations of Dick Cheney and George W. Bush, and the lies told by Colin Powell at the United Nations.

A huge amount of money was spent, Halliburton got a lot of it, and not too long after that Bush declared “Mission Accomplished” after being flown in as a passenger to land on an aircraft carrier barely offshore. It had been a con job from the get-go, presented as a triumph, though the war dragged on for several more years with a few thousand deaths and lots and lots of life-changing injuries for American servicemen and women, along with a great many more deaths and injuries for Iraqis. But we had tracked down and then killed Saddam Hussein (ring a bell?). If not, he was the bad guy who had ruled over Iraq and didn’t like Dubya’s daddy, so it was all worth it. We had endured the odd experience of high-ranking American officials in the Bush administration arguing in defense of torture, redefined and euphemized as “enhanced interrogation.” We were “playing those mind games, forever.” As a result, we might be forgiven for losing our minds, and the century had barely begun.

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