Stephen R. Shalom: The Anti-War Movement and Iraq

Today ZNet has published a major
article by Stephen Shalom, The Anti-War Movement and Iraq, that
explores contentious issues of debate about the occupation, Iraqi resistance, and the antiwar movement. It is long so please set aside some time when you go to read it.

========================================

The Anti-War Movement and Iraq

......... by Stephen R. Shalom May 24, 2005

A little over two years ago, anti-war demonstrations of unprecedented magnitude rocked the globe and the New York Times termed the anti-war movement "the world's second superpower." Unfortunately, no one could mistake the anti-war demonstrations that took place this spring for the "world's second superpower." On some level this fall-off from February 2003 was inevitable. Opposition to war then was a no-brainer, while the current occupation raises tough questions: now that the United States government has devastated Iraqi society, what should be done? Some of those who argue that the U.S. needs to stay in Iraq are unreconstructed imperialists, but some make this argument out of a genuine sense of concern for the Iraqi people.<1> But however sincere they may be, those who take this position are wrong in their belief that the occupation can help Iraqis, and the anti-war movement needs to explain to them why this is so.

Out Now! Aren't U.S. troops protecting Iraqis from awful violence, many ask? There is indeed gruesome violence in Iraq today, but U.S. forces are not keeping this violence in check. On the contrary, the brutality of the U.S. occupation is a major incitement to the violence. Can anyone doubt that the tortures at Abu Ghraib -- with their emphasis on humiliation -- have created thousands of hostile, even violently hostile, Iraqis? Or consider Fallujah. In the first assault, in April 2004, U.S. troops slaughtered hundreds in the city, a majority of whom, according to hospital officials, were women and children, with U.S. forces firing at ambulances, and blocking access to hospitals.<2> Then in November 2004, the U.S. essentially leveled the city, with who knows how many casualties because the press was kept out.

Today in Fallujah we can get some real insight into how the U.S. provides security for the Iraqi people. U.S. officials claim that "Fallujah is now the safest city in Iraq," but, as one resident noted, it's the safest city "because it's a prison."<3> More than two-thirds of the city's inhabitants are still refugees, and "here is a dawn-to-dusk curfew and a cordon around the city that only allows Fallujans who have registered with the U.S. military and received ID cards to enter and leave it."<4> Consider another example of U.S. conduct and imagine the contribution it is likely to have made to fueling the insurgency. Rory McCarthy from the Guardian writes:

"Last May <2004> I attended a vast family funeral in Ramadi where witness after witness described in detail how U.S. jet fighters attacked a village near the Syrian border after a wedding party and killed 42 people, among them women, children and even the musicians who had played for the bride and groom.

"Many of the dead were buried in a graveyard on the outskirts of Ramadi. One of the graves was marked with a square of roughly cut stone inscribed simply: 'The American bombing.'

"But a U.S. general in Baghdad insisted that the attack had been aimed at a gathering of 'foreign fighters' in a 'safe house' and, despite video footage of the party, said there had been no evidence of a wedding. Then, after a pause, he added with a smile: 'Bad people have celebrations too.' An inquiry was announced, but the military has yet to acknowledge that it made a mistake."<5>

long article, much more........