Tuesday, March 30, 2004
Life During Wartime
The 'real deal' on the ground in Iraq continues to be poignantly detailed by Riverbend, the girl blogger of Baghdad.
Her story about uncovering a tale of corruption, woe and brutality comes to light during a mundane visit to a family friend.
Indeed, much of what she conveys is so deeply meaningful because of the absurdity of blackouts, mistaken arrests, kidnappings, and terror politics that surrounds the mundanity of people celebrating birthdays, sending kids off to school for the very first time, and negotiating life with pesky, nosy neighbors. Kind of like your and my life, but with Humvees, carbombs, power outages, and lots and lots of automatic weapons thrown in to spice things up.
This particular episode she recounts about a young girl's arrest, along with her mother and five brothers (most of whom are still being detained), highlights the problems we will continue to have as long as we are in Iraq. Here's how this miscarriage of justice came about:
"M. and her uncle later learned that a certain neighbor had made the false accusation against her family. The neighbor's 20-year-old son was still bitter over a fight he had several years ago with one of M.'s brothers. All he had to do was contact a certain translator who worked for the troops and give M.'s address. It was that easy."
We detain these people and we get the blame, even though it was clear that the US troops were as duped as anyone in this whole affair. But does anyone think that is absolving the US military or US government in the eyes of those wrongfully accused or their families?
Riverbend concludes that the US has got a long way to go when speaking of the girl's Iraqi guards in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison.
"By the end of her tale, M. was crying silently and my mother and Umm Hassen were hastily wiping away tears. All I could do was repeat, "I'm so sorry... I'm really sorry..." and a lot of other useless words. She shook her head and waved away my words of sympathy, "It's ok- really- I'm one of the lucky ones... all they did was beat me."
Think about this girl's story the next time you hear folks ask, "Why do they hate us?" "How could they strap on bombs and kill themselves and other innocent people?" Ask yourself, and maybe those folks asking the questions, how much could you take, how much could you experience, and how much could you witness before anger, anguish, and despair would push you into utterly irrational action?
That's by no means an excuse, but it starts toward an explanation and an understanding. Contrary to TeamBush opinion, if we don't try to understand, we're never going to be able to win, no matter how much will and sheer power we manage to exert across the world.
The 'real deal' on the ground in Iraq continues to be poignantly detailed by Riverbend, the girl blogger of Baghdad.
Her story about uncovering a tale of corruption, woe and brutality comes to light during a mundane visit to a family friend.
Indeed, much of what she conveys is so deeply meaningful because of the absurdity of blackouts, mistaken arrests, kidnappings, and terror politics that surrounds the mundanity of people celebrating birthdays, sending kids off to school for the very first time, and negotiating life with pesky, nosy neighbors. Kind of like your and my life, but with Humvees, carbombs, power outages, and lots and lots of automatic weapons thrown in to spice things up.
This particular episode she recounts about a young girl's arrest, along with her mother and five brothers (most of whom are still being detained), highlights the problems we will continue to have as long as we are in Iraq. Here's how this miscarriage of justice came about:
"M. and her uncle later learned that a certain neighbor had made the false accusation against her family. The neighbor's 20-year-old son was still bitter over a fight he had several years ago with one of M.'s brothers. All he had to do was contact a certain translator who worked for the troops and give M.'s address. It was that easy."
We detain these people and we get the blame, even though it was clear that the US troops were as duped as anyone in this whole affair. But does anyone think that is absolving the US military or US government in the eyes of those wrongfully accused or their families?
Riverbend concludes that the US has got a long way to go when speaking of the girl's Iraqi guards in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison.
"By the end of her tale, M. was crying silently and my mother and Umm Hassen were hastily wiping away tears. All I could do was repeat, "I'm so sorry... I'm really sorry..." and a lot of other useless words. She shook her head and waved away my words of sympathy, "It's ok- really- I'm one of the lucky ones... all they did was beat me."
Think about this girl's story the next time you hear folks ask, "Why do they hate us?" "How could they strap on bombs and kill themselves and other innocent people?" Ask yourself, and maybe those folks asking the questions, how much could you take, how much could you experience, and how much could you witness before anger, anguish, and despair would push you into utterly irrational action?
That's by no means an excuse, but it starts toward an explanation and an understanding. Contrary to TeamBush opinion, if we don't try to understand, we're never going to be able to win, no matter how much will and sheer power we manage to exert across the world.
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