Iraq War Vet: "U.S. Troops The Problem, Not The Solution In Iraq"

CounterPunch
May 5, 2005

An Interview with Patrick Resta of Iraq Veterans Against the War
"Sent Into Combat Unequipped and Unprepared"
By KEVIN ZEESE

The voices of veterans who have served in Iraq is among the most important in convincing the public and government officials that the war in Iraq is wrong and the occupation must be ended. The interview below is with Patrick Resta of Iraq Veterans against the War. Patrick, who served as a combat medic in Iraq, is 26 years old and been married for five years. He grew up in central New Jersey and now lives in Philadelphia. He is a full time nursing student at the Community College of Philadelphia. His aunt and uncle were killed in the World Trade Center on September 11th and about three weeks later he was called to active duty as part of homeland security. He served for one year at Ft. Jackson, SC. Then when he began to get his life back to normal and less than one year after leaving Ft. Jackson he found out that he was being deployed again, this time to Iraq.


Zeese: What did you see in Iraq that convinced you that the U.S. should leave?

Resta: Pretty much everything I saw in Iraq convinced that US forces needed to leave. The in your face hypocrisy of this occupation was the most disturbing thing for me. Being told I was risking my life to help the Iraqi people and then getting over there and being told the Pentagon had set policy so no Iraqi could be treated unless they were about to die. The hypocrisy of the occupation was evident when I was told we were going to help rebuild Iraq and then watched as the only things being rebuilt were Saddam's military bases to prepare for a permanent US military presence. Every reason this administration gave to justify our presence in Iraq was the exact opposite of what was going on. While in the towns I would talk to Iraqis hoping to hear something that would make the sacrifices of my fellow soldiers worth it. What I found is that we are neither wanted nor welcome. The Iraqi people don't trust us and they don't want us there. Poll after poll has made that clear.

Zeese: The major argument for staying in Iraq is if the U.S. leaves there will be greater chaos. How do you see this -- is the U.S. minimizing the chaos in Iraq?

Resta: I always ask people to describe the situation now. Is it not chaos? To me the definition of a civil war is when people from a country kill other people from that country. That's what happening now in Iraq. US troops are the problem, not the solution. We are reliving the Vietnam War now and it's sad. We're reliving it because the people in power didn't learn anything from that event. They were too busy dreaming up ways to dodge the draft.

Tank battalions will never rebuild power and water purification plants no matter how long they stay in Iraq. Halliburton and Bechtel didn't build Iraq, so why are they rebuilding it? If you really want Iraqis to have democracy let them run their own affairs. When you break something in a store you don't sit there with crazy glue trying to piece it back together. And you most certainly don't run around with a bat breaking more things. What you do is apologize, write them a check, and get out before you do anymore damage.


Kevin Zeese is a director of DemocracyRising.US. You can comment on this blog by visiting his blog spot at http://www:DemocracyRising.US

http://www.counterpunch.org/zeese05052005.html

Too bad so many are in denial about this important fact.

"We're reliving it because the people in power didn't learn anything from that event. They were too busy dreaming up ways to dodge the draft."

Kick and nominated.

That's a bright young man.

Another great line:

"When you break something in a store you don't sit there with crazy glue trying to piece it back together. And you most certainly don't run around with a bat breaking more things. What you do is apologize, write them a check, and get out before you do anymore damage."

Yes. I loved his response to those who say we "broke Iraq and now must stay to fix it". That always seemed like a pretty lame defense of the continued occupation of Iraq. The same kind of argument was used to defend the war in Vietnam.

Just want to thank you for your posts. The occupation apologists should be along soon to defend the bloodshed.

Unfortunately the article appeared on CounterPunch. And everyone knows that CounterPunch is hurting Democratic politicians who support Bush's war, appointments and legislative bills like the bankruptcy act.

That's terrible. Progressives don't attack any Democrats no matter how much those Democrats may support the Bush government and function as Bush enablers!

Just because they voted for the invasion, vote to fund the occupation and yell "we can't cut and run" from Iraq is not a good reason to criticize them on Iraq. That's petty!

Americans are in SUCH TRAGIC DENIAL of what is being done by their troops in Iraq. Delgado's disclosures to Bob Herbert are a quantum leap in reality check. "Lord of the Flies" ain't got nuthin' on this.

American troops, under orders, many too many fueled by group-think exceptionalism and racism, are committing unspeakable horrors DAILY. The trauma that they have unleashed WILL return to America's shores. The only "support" they require in the short term is that which ships their butts HOME to their families.

Patrick is an excellent spokesman for IVAW.

I'll just leave it at that, because I don't want to sully his statements with commentary of my own.