The War Dead

So, Ted Koppel’s going to read the names of all the U.S. combat

fatalities in Iraq on “Nightline” Friday night. My first reaction was

that his show’s ripping off the famous feature Life magazine did (on June 27,  1969) that pictured all, or nearly all, 242 U.S. servicemen killed in action during a single week. (The show’s producer acknowledges that Life was the inspiration.) My second reaction is that it’s a ripoff without the smarts or courage that marked what Life did. Here’s what the “Nightline” producers have to say about their

inspiration in their daily email:

“…We realized that we seemed to just be giving numbers. So many killed in

this incident, so many more in that attack. Whether you agree with the war or

not, these men and women are serving, are putting their lives on the line, in

our names. We think it is important to remember that those who have paid the

ultimate price all have faces, and names, and loved ones. We thought about doing

this on Memorial Day, but that’s a time when most media outlets do stories about

the military, and they are generally lost in the holiday crush of picnics and

all. We didn’t want this broadcast to get lost. Honestly, I don’t know if people

will watch this for thirty seconds, or ten minutes, or at all. That’s not the

point. We think this is important. These men and women have earned nothing

less.

An excerpt from Life’s introduction to “One Week’s Dead” made it clear that the editors were trying to refrain from making an explicit antiwar statement:

“It is not the intention of this article to speak for the dead. We cannot

tell with any precision what they thought of the political currents which drew

them across the world. From the letters of some, it is possible to tell they

felt strongly that they should be in Vietnam, that they had great sympathy for

the Vietnamese people and were appalled at their enormous suffering. Some had

voluntarily extended their tours of combat duty; some were desperate to come

home. Their families provided most of these photographs, and many expressed

their own feelings that their sons and husbands died in a necessary cause. Yet

in a time when the numbers of Americans killed in this war – 36,000 – though far

less than the Vietnamese losses,  have exceeded the dead in the Korean War, when

the nation continues week after week to be numbed by a three-digit statistic

which is translated to direct anguish in hundreds of homes all over the country,

we must pause to look into the faces. More than we must know how many, we must

know who. The faces of one week’s dead, unknown but to families and friends, are

suddenly recognized by all in this gallery of young American eyes….”

“We must pause to look into the faces.” Four years into the major combat phase of the war — and with a

long way and 22,000 more deaths to go — it was clear everywhere the price was appalling. The editors went on to note the division of opinion, even among the troops, about the war and what it was about. “The mother of one of the dead, whose son was the third of four to serve in the Army, insists with deep pride, ‘We are a patriotic family willing to pay that price.’ An aunt who had raised her nephew said of him, ‘He was really and truly a conscientious objector. He told me it was a terrible thought going into the Army and winding up in Vietnam and shooting people who hadn’t done anything to him…. Such a waste. Such a shame.’ “The overall effect of Life’s issue was to invite a deep consideration of the war and the price; not such a radical notion — this was nearly a year after the Democratic Convention in Chicago and just a few months before the huge Vietnam Moratorium marches; it was an issue everyone had to consider.

But what “Nightline” promises is something quite different. On one level, another solemn paean to our fighting men and women who have — the producers even use the cliche — “paid the ultimate price.” And

whether you’re for the war or agin it, you have to bow your head respectfully for that. But what we don’t get is a real appraisal of the cost or an invitation to consider it or a sober discussion of the future.

The “Nightline” reading sounds like a stunt — it’s funny that the right-wingers are already jumping on the idea because they think it’s an anti-war statement — because it repe ts the same mistake most major media have made since it became evident our semi-elected executive branch was determined to start this war: they’re behaving as if it’s fundamentally disloyal in our post-9/11 world to strenuously scrutinize the rationale for going to war or the motives of the people promoting it.

Where’s Your Flag Amendment Now?

A shocker from flag police at the, ahem, New Hampshire Gazette (hey — they’re looking for a free part-time copy editor; maybe that’s my next gig):
 

"The CBS Television Network and MTV collaborated on a Super Bowl half-time ‘entertainment’ featuring repeated crotch-grabbings and a gratuitous display of a mammary gland, but for the Flag Police, the true horror was watching this talent-challenged individual [Kid Rock]  use an American flag as an article of clothing."

Don’t Talk About the Weather

earthtemperature.jpgThe New York Times reports that NASA headquarters ordered its scientists to keep their mouths shut about questions arising from the upcoming climate-change blockbuster "The Day After Tomorrow" (with someone named Claude Laforce playing "UN Norwegian diplomat").

"No one from NASA is to do interviews or otherwise comment on anything having to do with" the film, said the April 1 message, which was sent by Goddard’s top press officer. "Any news media wanting to discuss science fiction vs. science fact about climate change will need to seek comment from individuals or organizations not associated with NASA."

The Times also reports that the space agency has called off the dogs and will now let its experts talk about climate stuff. Maybe that has something to do with some research results published last week on NASA’s own site, "Satellite Thermometers Show Earth Has a Fever." Keep it cute like that, so no one will get the idea that increased temperatures have anything to do with well, anything.

Austrian Housepainter

Living in a place that has its very own Austrian immigrant
fixing things for the Volk — I mean the people — I need to
acknowledge what I think every year on this date: that it’s Hitler’s
birthday. Der Fuehrer, 1889-1945. As the Franz Liebkind (crazy German
playwright) character says in "The Producers":

 

"Hitler! There was a painter! He could paint an entire apartment in a single afternoon. Two coats!"

Of course, unlike most housepainters — OK,
any other housepainter I can think of, though I haven’t checked
Stalin’s or Genghis Khan’s resumes —  this one got a commotion
going that killed 50 or 60 or 70 million people.

Mercenaries in Iraq

Good long feature
in Monday’s New York Times on the "private security companies"
operating in Iraq. Of course, when I think of "security companies" and
"security guards," I think of some poor guy taking lip from a
late-night patron of White Castle. But the Times piece makes it clear
that, semantics aside, these outfits in Iraq and their employees are
hardly distinguishable from the traditional picture of the mercenary:

 

With every week of insurgency in a war zone with no front, these
companies are becoming more deeply enmeshed in combat, in some cases
all but obliterating distinctions between professional troops and
private commandos. Company executives see a clear boundary between
their defensive roles as protectors and the offensive operations of the
military. But more and more, they give the appearance of private,
for-profit militias — by several estimates, a force of roughly 20,000
on top of an American military presence of 130,000. … By some recent government
estimates, security costs could claim up to 25 percent of the $18
billion budgeted for reconstruction, a huge and mostly unanticipated
expense that could delay or force the cancellation of billions of
dollars worth of projects to rebuild schools, water treatment plants,
electric lines and oil refineries."

Rich Fudgy Brownies

The Associated Press roundup on the MoveOn.org
bake sale (carried in the San Francisco Chronicle and a handful of
other papers) says that the activists put on about 1,000 or 1,100 bake
sales that brought in a total of about $250,000. Among the smattering
of other coverage, local stories in the Santa Cruz Sentinel and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. The Los Angeles Times had a squib or a squib and a half that I notice the Chicago Tribune picked up.

Bake Sales

Well, Kate and I spent a couple hours this morning walking around to MoveOn bake sales
in our general neighborhood. On one level, it seems like touchy-feely
naivete: Bake sales to defeat Bush? Yeah, right. On the other hand, it
was really encouraging to see the enthusiasm for the idea around town
and the determination people have that the small things they’re doing
in their own communities, and the money they’re gathering, could build
into something big. Of course, this is Berkeley, and you could get
people to do bake sales for nearly anything; at one gathering, someone
said there were 19 MoveOn bake sales around town; I’ll bet there were
even more. But I wonder how many there were in, say, Kansas.(I just
searched on the MoveOn site for future bake sales within 3 miles of our
zip code, and got five results. I checked for similar events coming up
within 300 miles of Wichita and got three hits. And actually, MoveOn has a map that illustrates where the bake sale hot spots were and weren’t) More on
this tomorrow.

Out of Compliance

Now here are some folks who know how to sling effective lingo: Our friends at Combined Joint Task Force Seven. They will not falter. They will not fail. And furthermore:

"CJTF-7 conducts offensive operations to defeat remaining noncompliant forces and neutralize destabilizing influences in the Area of Operations (AO) to create a secure environment in direct support
of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA). Concurrently, conducts stability operations which support the establishment of government and economic development to set the conditions for a transfer of operations to designated follow on military or civilian authorities."

"Remaining noncompliant forces." Beautiful.

‘Two-Bit Thug’

I feel kind of bad about it, but I can’t make myself watch or listen much to the Bush people running the Iraq excursion. Partly it’s anger about the unapologetic lying, disingenuous self-justification, and
relentless absolutist spin — good vs. evil, democracy vs. tyranny, clean, well-mannered Americans and chosen friends vs. the malodorous of the world — that characterizes our leaders’ approach to their mission. And partly, there’s something about these guys, from the president on down, that’s just creepy and ugly when they’re being challenged in any way.
The latest exhibit for both parts of my unease comes an unblinking, tight-jawed Harvard MBA named Dan Senor, who’s the mouthpiece for the Amercan president of Iraq, Paul Bremer. Senor’s bio, on the White House site, gives no clue what expertise in Iraqi affairs got him into the first U.S. civilian team sent to Iraq last April. But,
the guy can spout the evil-doer rhetoric with the best of them. The New York Times quotes his summing up of this Sadr fellow, the Shiite demagogue who’s managed to raise some genuinely troubling resistance to the occupiers.

“Mr. Bremer’s spokesman, Dan Senor, described Mr. Sadr at a news conference as a ‘two-bit thug’ despised by the majority of Iraqis and said he and his forces would be destroyed.”

Of course, the thug line is just part of the administration’s script. The president himself used it earlier this week (twice, actually — here and here;
and a quick search on the not-too-reliable whitehouse.gov site indicates Bush and his people have used “thug” or “thugs” on 81 public occasions in the last 14 months. But you know, even if you consider Sadr and his guys the scum of the Earth, doesn’t it seem a little intemperate to make statements like this in public again and again? Doesn’t it seem a little bit like emotion has gotten the better of the Iraq excursion team? I mean, what would be lost by turning it down a notch and using a less loaded but very clear word like, for instance, “enemy”?
I like the irony in Senor pointing out that Sadr is despised by the majority of his countrymen. If you go by the 2000 election results, that’s something he and George Bush have in common.

West Bank? Or Vietnam?

A year ago, I thought the question about Iraq was whether it would be another Vietnam (the quagmire scenario; the immediate answer was no) or a new version of the West Bank (the everlasting rebellion against the occupier; the first carbombing of American troops while the “major combat” was going on last year made me think about that parallel). But events today show we might have the worst of both worlds.

The West Bank part: A widespread nationalist-religious uprising. OK, I’m getting the “uprising” part from The New York Times in its story on what’s happening on the streets. But superficially, at least, this looks like it could be the beginning of an Iraqi intifada
— a challenge to the occupation’s overwhelming military force using small arms, weight of numbers and rage. Of course, what made the Palestinian uprising the phenomenon it was (and has been) is its longevity. So we won’t know whether we do have a real intifada on our hands for awhile.

The Vietnam part: I think this quote from Paul Bremer (as reported on the Washington Post site) is precious, a great window into the illusions of the true believers who launched the war:

“For the past 11 months, Iraq has been on the path to democracy and freedom — freedom of speech, freedom of assembly and freedom of the press. Those freedoms must be exercised peacefully. This
morning, a group of people in Najaf have crossed the line and moved to violence. . . . This will not be tolerated by the coalition, this will not be tolerated by the Iraqi people, and this will not be tolerated by
the Iraqi security forces.”

A rough breakdown on the wishful or out-of-touch thoughts here:

–“Iraq has been on the path to democracy and freedom.” Yes, we shocked and awed and brought in the heavy artillery and chased Saddam out and picked a committee of acceptable Iraqis to be the Founding Fathers (with a mom or two thrown in) of the new reality. That’s how you build democracy — you have an alien army unencumbered by knowledge of the complexity of the situation its dealing with, it smashes down the existing tyranny, then commands democracy to flourish, just like that.

–“Freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of the press.” Yes, compared to what Mr. Saddam allowed. But still subject to the best judgment of the people now in charge and the commissioner of Major
League Baseball.

–“This morning, a group of people in Najaf have crossed the line. …” Yes — it’s only a few isolated malcontents and miscreants and their evildoer pals who are behind all the trouble.

–“This will not be tolerated by the coalition …” Check. The president’s mad. Rummy’s mad. Bremer’s mad. The generals are mad. They’re stamping their feet. They won’t stand for this sort of behavior. And they’ve got the tanks and helicopters to show they mean business.

–“This will not be tolerated by the Iraqi people…” Aren’t those Iraqi people running around raising hell in the streets? They seem to be tolerating this. But yeah, they’re malcontents and miscreants and evildoers. We must be talking about the rest of the Iraqis — the same ones we consulted before we launched this whole adventure. All two or three dozen of them.

–“And this will not be tolerated by the Iraqi security forces.” First — what does “security” mean? And if it means what you think it means, then why are they called “security forces”?

I think Bremer’s statement illustrates the emerging Vietnam nature of the war in Iraq. Just as in South Vietnam, we seem to have talked ourselves into believing that great values, great intentions, and great
military resources are a shortcut to winning hearts and minds of an unknown populace to a great ideal (and coincidentally, our strategic ends). In the meantime, don’t let any contradictory evidence get in the
way of the vision: the apparent lack of consensus among the population about the future, the evident disdain among many for our presence, the extraordinary difficulty of fitting all Iraq’s competing interests and desires inside the pre-fab democracy we think we can set up.

What we’re doing in Iraq adds up to a fatal kind of arrogance. A terrible misuse of our power. A pointless sequel to our September 11th tragedy.