“A totally unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq”: former US President George W. Bush’s slip of the tongue about the Russian invasion of Ukraine made his audience laugh, but rekindled the anger of Internet users in Iraq.
Wednesday evening, Mr. Bush wanted to talk about the Ukrainian conflict and the Russian offensive, during an event organized by the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Texas. When his tongue forked.
“The one-man decision to launch a totally unwarranted and brutal invasion of Iraq — I mean Ukraine,” he corrected during a speech, his slip-up met with laughter from support.
“75 years old,” he continued, alluding to his age, prompting another burst of laughter.
The video extract was picked up by all Arab media and shared on social networks by many journalists and researchers working on the region.
The authorities and senior Iraqi politicians have not commented on the blunder, but for Iraqi Internet users, this derisive slip has a bitter taste.
“The specter of the invasion of Iraq and its destruction haunts Bush Jr. His subconscious exposed it when it took over his tongue,” tweeted Iraqi journalist Omar al-Janabi. “Yes it is a brutal and unjustified invasion which will remain your worst nightmare”, he added.
“The hour of truth has come the invasion of Iraq is a nightmare you live with […] and torments your conscience,” Iraqi user Hamza Qusai wrote on Facebook.
If the 2003 US invasion, launched under President Bush, overthrew dictator Saddam Hussein, it ushered in one of the bloodiest periods in Iraq’s modern history, marked by sectarian warfare and the rise of jihadists.
Between 2003 and 2011, the date of the American withdrawal, more than 100,000 civilians were killed, according to the organization Iraq Body Count. The United States mourned nearly 4,500 deaths.
The US-British military intervention began on March 20, 2003 after accusations against Saddam Hussein’s regime that it possessed “weapons of mass destruction (WMD)”. But no ADM was ever found.