By IRNA,
London : The illegal US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 turned the country into a “highly unstable political structure” with a “horrific cost” for the people of America, a British political scientist said on Wednesday.
Toby Dodge, professor of international politics at Queen Mary University of London, also said that the huge military presence of the United States in Iraq has jeopardised the “sovereignty” of the country while leading to heightened “sectarian tensions” among the Shiites and Sunnis.
Speaking in a conference on “Post-American Iraq” in Chatham House, he said thousands of civilians died and billions of dollars spent on invading Iraq.
“We should be cautious about the US success in Iraq as described by Barack Obama. The costs of this war two billion dollars a week are exorbitant.”
Criticising the US invasion of Iraq, Dodge said that billions of dollars have been spent on “building instability and unstable political structure” in Iraq.
He said less than 30 per cent of political elite in Iraq are “insiders” while the rest has been brought back by the United States after the 2003 invasion, leaving the country in a “highly unstable state”.
“This is not a great legacy that an important state at the heart of the Middle East is left unstable [after seven years of occupation]”, he said.
Dodge said Iraqi people are still grappling with the “horrific costs” of the US occupation which pushed the country into “hell and violence” especially during 2005 and 2008.
“The Bush administration acted so ambitiously and radically. As a professional analyst, I am not optimistic about the future of Iraq.”