Mixed feelings for general who led Australia in Iraq war

The general who led Australian troops in the Iraq conflict said Tuesday big mistakes were made by the United States in the post-Saddam Hussein era as he voiced mixed feelings about the war.

Peter Cosgrove was chief of the Australian Defence Force in 2003 when then-prime minister John Howard committed 2,000 Australian troops in support of the US-led invasion.

Launched with the stated goal of wiping out Saddam’s stores of weapons of mass destruction, the war aimed to enshrine a liberal democracy in the Middle East but instead unleashed sectarian violence and endless political disputes.

According to a new report by the Britain-based Iraq Body Count group on Sunday, at least 112,000 civilians have been killed since the invasion and in an interview with ABC radio, Cosgrove said it was a high price.

“Looking back you’d have mixed feelings about the whole episode and I suppose you’d cling to a few things -- a horrible dictator eventually was removed and the people of Iraq have a new chance, even though they’ve had enormous suffering,” he said.

“There’s been a lot of bloodshed along the way and that’s always horribly regrettable -- but all war is a mistake, all war.”

In hindsight, he said coalition forces made errors in failing to adequately plan for the post-Saddam era, particularly the policy to rid Iraq completely of the dictator’s legacy.