<a href="{data}/news/old_attachments/images/telnaes_2003_04_03.gif"><img src="{data}/news/old_attachments/images/telnaes_2003_04_03_tn.gif" alt="Ann Telnaes editorial - 2003-03-27" align="left"></a>I was going to write an all gloom-and-doom article (to which I'm sure you've grown accustomed), but it seems the war suddenly got a lot easier and it's become the cake-walk that Rummy and Shrub have been saying it was/would be all along. As US troops steam into Baghdad, meeting <iq> meeting surprisingly light resistance</iq> (NY Times), does anyone else get a bad feeling? Maybe I've seen too many movies, but when it goes from 'laying siege to Baghdad' to 'surprisingly little resistance', either there's a trap being laid or the lying from our side has increased in intensity by an order of magnitude. So in less than two weeks, the enemy has gone from just Saddam to include the people of Iraq, whom we are supposedly liberating. It seems they don't want to be liberated by the US; and for that, they must suffer. Apparently the US media doesn't have quite the same power there as in the US proper, where they have adequately convinced the American people that we are, once again, on a mission of purest altruism. An altruism which is being so rudely rejected by its beneficiaries, despite the loss of American lives and the massive outlay of cash. That's not making the US soldiers happy. That means they can go into their somewhat standard, "well, if you don't appreciate me trying to help, then fuck you" attitude, which invariably dehumanizes the Iraqis, who aren't even decent enough to accept a helping hand, so who cares what happens to them? As documented in <a href="http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0325-01.htm">Marines Losing the Battle for Hearts and Minds</a>, with villages of Iraqis fighting rather than cheering US troops, are we going for another Vietnam here? A war in which the US liberates a nation by killing all the people in it? Extreme pessimism, you may acuse, because just on TV tonight, they showed an Iraqi family 'escorted' from their home to make sure they aren't harboring any soldiers as the US Marines 'secure the area'. They didn't shoot anybody and it was only the littlest that were crying, unable to understand that they were being saved. I saw the exact same family on 4 different channels --- it's relatively obvious that in this war, the news is released in carefully controlled droplets. That's embedded reporting for you. Fair, objective, awesome. Thank goodness the embedding doesn't seem to have affected this stalwart reporter <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2892493.stm">[i]n the line of fire</a>. He in fact doesn't seem to have come under fire here, though he's fair shitting his pants the whole time that he just might; as if the most horrible thing that could happen is for Nick Parker to come under fire in the war zone. He paints a rosy picture of people happy to be liberated from a <iq>grim and dangerous wasteland haunted by Saddam Hussein's henchmen</iq>. This war of liberation is now easily referred to as <iq>Iraq's guerrilla war</iq> because, of course, Iraqi troops are hiding behind buildings instead of standing in the streets and surrendering. He does point out that the people, though delighted by the British presence, do seem to be suffering somewhat more in this war of liberation for them. <iq>The war's toll of suffering looks certain to increase as Red Cross engineers struggle to reconnect bombed out water supplies</iq>. Even though we know intellectually that water, electricity and warehouses have been bombed by US and British forces (and delivery of food stopped due to the invasion), Nick, in the same breath, has no problem blaming the lack of supplies on <iq>Iraqi thugs block[ing] the passage of aid</iq>. This is particularly deft considering the billions and billions in aid blocked over the last decade by the US/British blockade. He makes sure to place any folk who are still anti-war firmly on the side of evil by beatifying the soldiers, who ask innocently, <iq>What's happening back home? Do they support us now?</iq>. He assures them <iq>the whole country was backing our troops 100%</iq>, and how can you break his heart now? This is the same <iq>lad</iq> who must now try to liberate these poor beknighted citizens despite themselves and <iq>against a cunning enemy shielded by innocent civilians</iq>. The final stroke making sure we are prepared once the city fighting starts killing civilians directly, as it certainly will, since many civilians seem to be taking up arms to resist the invasion. Only a week into it and we already had those impatient that it's not going fast enough, and, unfortunately, we'll have to harden our hearts and accept more civilian losses in Iraq. <a href="http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/ny-vpboy273193487mar27,0,1423335.story?coll=ny%2Dviewpoints%2Dheadlines">We Can't Be PC on the Battlefield</a>, also on the <a href="http://www.newsday.com/">New York Newsday</a>, has a column by <iq>Walter J. Boyne, a retired Air Force colonel</iq>: <bq>The precisely aimed explosions in Baghdad have demonstrated both the technical ability and the good intentions of the United States, but as good as the new weapons are, there is no way that the absolute safety of every Iraqi non-combatant can be guaranteed. ... Yet questions about Iraqi civilian casualties are beginning to dominate press conferences, getting far more attention than genuine war crimes, such as Iraqi soldiers waving white flags of surrender and then opening fire, or dressing in civilian clothes to attack rear echelon forces. ... It is time to get real about warfare. The first incident in Iraq of these illegal tactics should have ended all concern about collateral damage. From that moment on, our commanders should have insisted on the obliteration of any forces before them by massive air and artillery attacks.</bq> Isn't that a great analysis? We have to behave ourselves as we invade another country, until some of those sleazy people being attacked hoodwink our innocent forces. Of course it sucks that Iraqis are pretending to surrender, then attacking US soldiers. Of course it's against the rules. It's also against the rules to attack a sovereign nation. Remember who these people are doing this. They are citizens of Iraq. They are not soldiers. They are people defending their homes from invading forces. They don't buy the bullshit that they are being liberated. Put yourself in their shoes and you wouldn't fight fair either. But as soon as they don't fight fair, then, well, the kid gloves are off and they deserve whatever they get. If they don't want our helping hand, fuck 'em. They deserve to die if that's how they want to be. I quote heavily from this article so that you can see it for what it is, to be able to better see when these types of advocations are clothed in more soothing terms. They are advocations that will be increasingly made as the war is not finished in a timely enough fashion (about two weeks, no?) and the nation of Iraq fails to herald its liberator properly. <bq>If there is resistance, it must be crushed by any means, using any weapons, to avoid sending our troops into the trap of urban warfare. Open, unrestrained and utterly merciless action is needed to grind Saddam Hussein and his dreams into history, even at the cost of collateral damage.</bq> This is taking the same tack as we did in Vietnam, where we also ran into problem with the local populace in South Vietnam. There the espoused policy was to basically keep killing the populace until they saw the light. I predict that this is exactly the policy that will be increasingly pressed, either, as specified above, <iq>to avoid sending our troops into the trap of urban warfare</iq>, which would incur heavy losses, or because they deserve it for being Saddam supporters, completely losing sight of the fact that we are there to liberate them...or so we say. We are liberators only if the oil wells are liberatable citizens of Iraq since <iq>[a] paramount U.S. objective in the north is to seize the valuable oil fields near the city of Kirkuk</iq>. It will easily be argued that it is far better, and more moral, to kill thousands of civilian Iraqis who <i>might</i> have killed a US soldier than to lose too many soldiers who are part of an invading force. It serves them right for resisting our liberation. Neither the US nor Britain wants to lose soldiers, so we hear in <a href="http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/iraq/ny-wobaghdad0328,0,1753619.story?coll=ny%2Dtop%2Dheadlines">'Bunker Buster' Bombs Fall on Baghdad</a> that: <bq>U.S. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, briefing congressional committees in Washington, suggested American troops might lay siege to Baghdad rather than invade, in hopes its citizens would rebel against the government. Rumsfeld drew comparisons with Basra, where British troops have delayed an assault in hopes Iraqi defenders give up or are toppled by anti-Saddam civilians.</bq> British Troops have delayed a troop-assault, but, according to Robert Fisk (currently in Baghdad) in <a href="http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=36&ItemID=3323">Un-Embedded Journalist</a> on <a href="www.zmag.org/">Z-Net</a>, <iq>we've already got a situation down in Basra where the British army have admitted firing artillery into the city of Basra.</iq> The city of Basra, remember has already had their electricity and water cut off (partially restored now, hail the conquering heroes) and is composed, at last count of 45% children. <bq>... the British are firing artillery shells into the heavily populated city of Basra. When the British were fired upon with mortars or with snipers from the cragg on the state or the bogside in Delhi and in Northern Ireland, they did not use artillery, but here, apparently, it is ok to use artillery on a crowded city. What on Earth is the British army doing in Iraq firing artillery into a city after invading the country?</bq> The latest reports that US forces have 'destroyed' the 'elite' Republican Guard are nothing short of irresponsible. They are made purely, I feel, to give the purveyors of the war a boost as people are convinced that the war is going well and it nearly over. What happens when it turns out to be untrue? When it turns out that aerial bombing doesn't have the 35% to 85% reduction of capacity on the Iraqi forces that are claimed? What happens when the soldiers are asked to act on these lies and enter Baghdad and are themselves destroyed? If this same Republican Guard could rise up and crush the Shi-ite rebellion after 6 weeks of bombing (at the end of the last Gulf War, US forces were ordered to just stand by instead of to aid the overthrow of Saddam, because the resulting government would have undoubtedly been a far-too-resistant Islamic one), then what are the odds that two weeks of bombing have reduced their capabilities by 85%? Even if they're not dead yet, they're on their way: <bq>[An] official acknowledged that Hussein's regime has been "pretty resilient" in the face of punishing allied attacks so far. But he said key Iraqi cities such as Basra and An Nasiriyah are reaching a "tipping point," with Iraqis closer to turning on the regime, as U.S. officials had hoped.</bq> That's an interesting theory. So, the Iraqis are digging in and, not exactly supporting Saddam, but actively fighting invasion --- but, after sufficient pounding and death, they will 'turn on the regime'? I hardly think they will join forces with the US/Britain and do that. They may give up. They may scatter. They may all be dead. But the likelihood that they will join the US in overthrowing Saddam is pretty much nil. The only ones willing to do that are opportunists without any concrete allegiances, who are usually the people we enjoy working with when entering a new country, but are certainly not peole who will aid us in setting up our purported democracy. For every soldier whose reaction is this: <bq>Did you see all that?" he asked, his eyes filled with tears. "Did you see that little baby girl? I carried her body and buried it as best I could but I had no time. It really gets to me to see children being killed like this, but we had no choice.</bq> there is one whose reaction is this: <bq>The Iraqis are sick people and we are the chemotherapy," said Corporal Ryan Dupre. "I am starting to hate this country. Wait till I get hold of a friggin' Iraqi. No, I won't get hold of one. I'll just kill him.</bq> <span class="notes">Source: <a href="http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0330-11.htm">US Marines Turn Fire on Civilians at the Bridge of Death</a>.</span>