(Photo: AP Images / Petr David Josek )U.S. soldiers from the 3rd Brigade combat team of 101st Airborne Division question an Iraqi woman during their patrol mission in the town of Owesap, 20 kilometers (about 12,4 miles) south of Baghdad, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 23, 2007.
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The head of the Anglican Communion delivered his harshest criticism to date on U.S. foreign policy in Iraq in the latest issue of a British Muslim lifestyle magazine.
Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Williams denounced the United States for its “quick burst of violent action” creating the “worst of all worlds” in his interview with Emel magazine, which published Sunday.
The church leader compared America’s action in Iraq to that of the British Empire in the past.
“We have only one global hegemonic power,” he said according to London’s Telegraph newspaper. “It is not accumulating territory: it is trying to accumulate influence and control. That’s not working.
“It is one thing to take over a territory and then pour energy and resources in to administering it and normalizing it. Rightly or wrongly, that’s what the British Empire did in India, for example,” added Williams, who has been a long-time critic of the war in Iraq.
“It is another thing to go in on the assumption that a quick burst of violent action will somehow clear the decks and that you can move on and other people will put it back together – Iraq, for example.”
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Since the 2003 U.S.-led offensive, more than 3,800 U.S. soldiers, 300 from other coalition countries and more than 76,000 Iraqi civilians, and more than 28,000 have been wounded, according to the United Methodist Council of Bishops.
However, reports in November indicate that rocket and mortar attacks in Iraq have decreased to their lowest levels in more than 21 months, the U.S. military said, according to The Associated Press.
Moreover, U.S. and Iraqi deaths showed a sharp drop in recent months, according to AP figures. The number of American military deaths fell from 65 to at least 39 over the period of September to October.
Williams, nonetheless, criticized the United States for having lost its moral high grounds since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He also claimed that the violence is a “quick discharge of frustration” that does not solve problems or help anyone.
“A lot of pressure around the invasion of Iraq was ‘we’ve got to do something, then we’ll feel better.’ That’s very dangerous,” said the archbishop.
The Anglican head also condemned the Israeli security wall that cuts Bethlehem in two, mildly criticized Muslim world for offering political solutions that are “not the most impressive,” and said he was surprised that the small Christian community in Pakistan is viewed as “deeply threatened” by the Muslim majority, according to the Telegraph.
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