Justifiable Hatred for Us

As I said in an earlier post I was busy over the weekend and yesterday so I really didn’t get any time to cruise around my favorite blogs until last night. I discovered that I had missed a terrific but emotional discussion on Firedoglake on Sunday night, where an Iraqi medical relief worker who cares for war orphans, Dr. Maryam, told us very bluntly what we didn't want to hear:

Stop telling lies to yourself American. We know that your racist brutal murdering war criminal troops came from your society and reflect its values. We know that because we see how they behave and have to bury their victims. If you are stupid enough to think we feel anything but hatred and contempt for your soldiers and the country that sent them to make war on my people then you are a fool.

As to Saddam bad though he was your country is far worse.

And then there was this:

Irak is a better transliteration. The quote you are referring to is this:

“The only thing these sand niggers understand is force and I’m about to introduce them to it.”

And is from a senior American officer. It is a perfect example of how your troops regard us. Which is why we highlight it.

Dr. Maryam has been in the middle of our created hell since 1991 when the first American bombings began. She has and is seeing the effects of depleted uranium weapons on the children of her country. She has seen first hand some of the estimated 1.5 million Iraqi deaths this occupation as caused and it creates comments like this:

As I am an Iraki and as my job is to treat children maimed and deformed by the weapons your country uses and then prevented me from getting the medicines used to treat those cancers you will forgive me if I tell you that you too are telling lies to yourself. What we know is that when it comes murdering Iraki civilians that there is no difference between the cynical and corrupt party called the Democrats and the cynical and corrupt party called the Republicans. Both are infected with the belief that America has the right to behave as it wishes especially when the people being killed are not white.

Our woefully misguided and criminal leadership has placed our military an absolutely untenable position. Because of our actions we have reduced a whole country that while not the garden spot of the world, was at least reasonably peaceful and civilized. Iraq, before our arrival, was a place where people could go to work each day without fear of being bombed or shot and it was a place where children went to school and grew up to be doctors and scientists and good business people. It was a country with basic services like electricity, water, hospitals and sufficient food. We have created a country today that suffers daily from a violent and brutal civil war where there are multiple bombings, rocket attacks and random murders. Not only have we created this hell hole on earth but we are keeping our soldiers there caught in the middle when every poll of Iraqis tells us that they don’t want us there. Add to this farce the fact that the majority of the American people want our troops home now and yet Bush increases our presence, and does it by sending in incompletely trained troops and troops on short rotation.

Why are we surprised in this situation that a few otherwise sane people are losing it? They are being deployed over and over again into an impossible situation to try to “win” something that is not even being defined by the people sending them there. It’s a miracle that so many of them are able to keep their sanity at all. We are far beyond the point where appeals to honor and duty will turn the tide and soothe their conscience. How hollow do such appeals sound when issued by the likes of Bush and Cheney…men without a shred of honor or sense of duty?

Not only do we need to get out of Iraq for myriad moral and national security reasons but for what has been done in our name as Americans. It is criminal on every level you can imagine. This misbegotten imperialistic adventure is very rapidly destroying the hairspring constitutional balance that has kept us (though not always) from abusing our position of power and acting on our baser instincts. The same idiots that got us into this mess are making noises about Iran!

As we look into the mirror so effectively held up before us by Dr. Maryam we should make a bargain with ourselves to make every effort to eliminate from public discourse the concept that we as Americans, or any other country for that matter, have the right to use force to tell another people what to do with their lives especially while wrapping it in the lies of bringing them “democracy” and “liberty”.

We, as Americans, are complicit in the tragedy that is Iraq and each of us needs to ask ourselves what more we could have done to stop this blundering tragedy. We need to remember as we go along each day with our regular tasks what is being done in our name and for which we will forever more be held to account. None of us can use the excuse that the media is shielding us from the truth and we didn't know...the truth is, it is too unpleasant to know, but we do know.

For every day that we hesitate to hold our elected representatives accountable and allow them to "chicken dance" around doing what is required to end this tragic occupation more people suffer and more people die. Our failure to effect change means more children for Dr. Maryam's hospital and more carnage to fuel her fully justified hate of America and Americans.