Yesterday evening while driving to a friend's house, I switched on my XM Radio, which I usually do when I get bored of listening to my iPod. I put on the BBC World Service channel, which I normally listen to get the latest world news, or even listen to programs which are quite unique.
And what I heard yesterday was unique. What I heard yesterday confirmed my feelings for the current state of affairs happening between us, the USA, and Iraq. What I heard yesterday was a personal account of the "cancer" that was enveloping Iraq.
The program I was listening to was World Drama, which showcases radio adaptations of popular stories or plays from around the world.
The play that was showcased was "Baghdad Burning", the first hand account of a girl using the pen name "Riverbend", from Iraq whose blog has caught a lot of attention. The international attention has made her blog a dramatic play.
Listening to the play, I could see the scenes being painted, as much as my imagination would let me. I could feel the anger, the pain, the anguish, and the sadness that Riverbend was conveying. The change of the Iraqi landscape and the livelihoods of people have changed forever. I'm not condoning Saddam's dead regime, but at least the majority of the Iraqi people had a life. Now they live in a living hell.
No, of course I'm not an Arab nor Muslim trying to sympathize with my "brothers" and "sisters". I'm just another human being who can't understand what drives people to make certain decisions which have nothing to do with the propaganda led efforts, when in reality the underlining reason is something else. It's sad how we follow the other sheep when the dogs start barking at us, scaring us into believing that going that certain direction is the right way.
It also makes me wonder about the war mongers and Neo-cons who think the American hegemony will change the Middle East along with the rest of the world overnight. That change however overlooks the years of ethnic divisions and traditional rivalries. How soon we forget that there was a reason why we had learnt World History in school as well as college.
Yes, we are great. But as Americans we shouldn't be the aggressors I feel. Afghanistan made sense. Iraq didn't, and it still doesn't. But now we can't leave. Abandoning the mess would put egg on our face. Whatever we do now, the curses will continue to grow as adjectives akin to describing us Americans. It's a classical Catch-22 situation. To put it bluntly, we are screwed.
For my fellow readers, I feel you must listen to this play on the BBC. Please do listen to it, as it does show the reality of what has happened to Iraq. I am not sure how long the play will be available online, so I would advise you to listen to it ASAP.
Thankfully you can still visit Riverbend's blog, where she continues to report on her daily life in Baghdad.
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4 comments:
While I won't argue the points that we were misled on the reasons behind this war and that it is basically unwinnable, I will argue that the "living hell" of Iraq today is worse than under Saddam. This man was a Hitler to his own countrymen. We put our blinders on once before when a dictator killed 6 million people -- and we're doing it again in other places -- so, in my mind, anytime we can stop someone who is intent on mass genocide and the wiping out of a specific group of people, we should do it. And just by doing it, we have made life better.
So dogbone, why are we not in Cuba, Zimbabwe, Pakistan, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, and countless other countries where dictators rule with an iron fist?
As I said in my post, we're putting our blinders on in other places right now. But that is not the point I was addressing. I questioned your lableing Iraq a worse place now than under Saadam. That's like saying Europe was worse following WWII then when Hitler was rounding up 6 million people and killing them. I guess if you are in the majority and have no fear for your life, you are right. But if you turn away when they come for your lesser known brethren, expect others to turn away when they come for you.
So, my point is we should rally the world to put a stop to any dictator who is practicing mass genocide. But let's be careful here...there is a far cry from ruling with an "iron fist" and attempting to wipe out class of people based on their ethnicity or religion.
dawg...I don't disagree with you on Saddam. He was a ruthless dictator nonetheless, but if you listen to what the Iraqi people are saying (those who even hated Saddam), they are saying that it's become worse for them. I'm only writing on what I have been seeing and hearing for the last few months. I don't know if you listened to that piece from the link I posted, but that is the general Iraqi attitude towards the situation.
Should they be grateful for us "liberating" them from Saddam? Perhaps. But I don't think we went in there realizing the dire consequences we would be facing now. And trust me, we were warned.
Germany was a different issue all together. Everyone who was involved in the war had a stake in it. Us, the UK and the French took the West, while the Russians took the East. Rebuilding the country was easier, especially with the inception of the Marshall Plan.
Here pretty much we don't have any other major country helping us (a fleeting interest by the Brits who are on their way out). Also, there wasn't a huge ethnic divide in Germany as we see in Iraq today. And with our economy not in the greatest health, there's no real "Marshall" type plan to bring prosperity back to Iraq.
Maybe we need to look at both sides of the story rather than just listening to Faux News or CNN. There's more to it than what we see.
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