Mahatma Gandhi, once said: "What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?" In the post-9/11 world, it is quite obvious that we face great uncertainty and confusion about the future direction of the US, Iraq, Afghanistan, terrorism, war, and peace. Through an increasingly concentrated, corporate owned and managed channel of mass communication, we are continuously bombarded with sophisticated propaganda techniques aimed at furthering the political-economic agendas of an elite, of rulers of the global village. Hence, we are often unable to distinguish between right and wrong, truth and fact, or reality and fiction. During his campaign for reelection, President George W. Bush repeatedly invoked the grim memories of 9/11 and has said that “freedom is on the march” in Iraq and that the US and the world are now safer than before 9/11. Meanwhile, the United Nations Secretary General, Kofi Annan, has said repeatedly that the American-led invasion of Iraq was illegal, that we have created a more dangerous world, and that we are less safe than before 9/11. Quite naturally, people throughout the world prefer freedom to oppression, prosperity to poverty, sanitation to filth, health to sickness, employment to unemployment, and justice to injustice. Contrary to the ongoing political rhetoric which has been used to sugarcoat the miserable and chaotic conditions in Iraq and Afghanistan, democracy is not a product that can be imported or exported like a bar of soap or an automobile. It has to be cultivated and grown from within through careful planning, continuous nurturing, and education. In other words, a free and democratic system requires a particular environment, mind-set, culture, and socio-economic-political system that does not exist in Afghanistan, Iraq—and unfortunately—in most of the developing nations. Democracy, according to Abraham Lincoln, is a government “of the people, by the people, for the people.” Can we claim that our nation’s domestic and international conduct have been based on the ideals of the Constitution on which this great nation was founded? Can we claim that we have captured the essence of freedom and democracy at home? George Bernard Shaw, once said, “Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.” Ah, democracy—it’s easier said than done. It is quite evident that the war on Iraq has not been about “human rights,” “freedom,” and “democracy,” but about access to oil resources, exertion of regional and global control, establishment of military bases, enhancement of the economic interests of the transnational corporations, and expansion of the imperial power of America. Peace, Yahya R. Kamalipour