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<a href="http://www.tehrantimes.com/Description.asp?Da=10/14/2004&Cat=14&Num=001" eudora="autourl">http://www.tehrantimes.com/Description.asp?Da=10/14/2004&Cat=14&Num=001<br><br>
</a></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3 color="#0000FF"><b>The
Hidden War<br>
</font><font face="Helvetica, Helvetica" size=3 color="#007700">By Juan
Cole<br>
</b></font><font size=3>Incredibly, American warplanes still routinely
bomb Baghdad, the capital of the country the U.S. conquered in April of
2003. Indeed, they blast any city where a significant guerrilla
resistance emerges, whether in the Sunni Arab northwest or in the Shiite
south. Although the interim president of Iraq, Ghazi al-Yawir, recently
denounced these tactics, the issue has passed virtually without remark on
the American political scene.<br><br>
Al-Yawir's outburst suggests that the behavior of the U.S. military
in Iraq may be emerging as a campaign issue within Iraq, as elections
loom in January of 2005. The bombing raids are mentioned only in passing
in the U.S. press, and U.S. television viewers seldom see footage of the
strikes or of the civilian casualties they produce. In contrast, Arab
satellite television channels frequently show wounded children in
hospital beds after the bombardment.<br><br>
The Bush administration has represented itself as fighting a
handful of foreign terrorists and local criminals or dead-enders. Arab
viewers know that most of the guerrilla opposition to the US is Iraqi,
and that many of the victims of U.S. attempts to destroy it are
civilians. A recent report by the Iraqi health ministry, revealed by
Knight Ridder, found that between April and September of this year, U.S.
military operations had killed twice as many civilians as had the
bombings and shootings carried out by the guerrillas.<br><br>
President al-Yawir said the images of wounded and dead women and
children being dragged from rubble after the U.S. raids reminded him of
scenes from Israeli-occupied Gaza. Any such comparison of Washington and
Tel Aviv by an Iraqi politician is highly inflammatory. Israeli military
actions in Gaza against the Palestinians are about as popular in the
Muslim world as Santa Ana's assault on the Alamo was in
nineteenth-century America.<br><br>
Al-Yawir implied that when you bomb a city repeatedly to get at a
guerrilla group hiding out there, you are implicitly punishing the
civilian population for the actions of the militants. Collective
punishment is an ugly tactic, famously practiced by the Nazis in Europe
to keep their conquered populations in line. It is forbidden by the
Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949.<br><br>
Nor is al-Yawir the only such voice. A British Muslim delegation
called on British Prime Minister Tony Blair to pressure President Bush to
halt the bombing of Iraqi cities, saying that it was hindering the
release of hostages. One member of the delegation called the bombings an
"indiscriminate" killing of Iraqi civilians, and said that many
Iraqis felt these were no less innocent victims than were the
hostages.<br><br>
On a single day in August, U.S. warplanes bombed the southern city
of Kut, killing 84 persons and wounding 176, according to the al-Zahra
Hospital. Its spokesman said that many of these were women and children.
The U.S. military explained that they had targeted the city quarter of
Sharqia because of intelligence that Mahdi Army fighters had congregated
in it. I watched U.S. television news all day on August 12, and never
heard Kut mentioned.<br><br>
You cannot bomb a densely settled city without killing civilians.
Military spokesmen speak of "clean" "precision
strikes" on "terrorist" "safehouses." This
antiseptic language misleads and covers up the reality. Even with very
good technology, not all bombs or missiles hit their targets with
precision. Even where that is possible, the military is dependent on
intelligence to know where guerrillas are congregating, intelligence that
is inevitably murky and of varying quality. Worse, even precision strikes
kill noncombatants, sometimes in fair numbers. When a five hundred pound
bomb hits a building, it turns the building itself into shrapnel. Glass,
stone and adobe fragments fly out, into eyes and into hearts, killing and
maiming for hundreds of feet around. Iraqis are organized in clans, and
are fiercely protective of their kin. Each innocent Iraqi death produced
by an American bomb creates another clan feud with the U.S.<br><br>
That the president of an Iraqi government more or less installed by
the United States should be so bluntly condemning his patrons over this
issue is remarkable, and alarming. Like many Iraqi politicians, al-Yawir
is positioning himself for the elections scheduled for January 2005. He
may well be a bellwether here, signaling that most Iraqi candidates will
run against the U.S..<br><br>
The Bush administration and the Pentagon have signaled that they
plan a major campaign against recalcitrant cities like Fallujah and
Ramadi in November, after the U.S. elections. Al-Yawir is unlikely to sit
quietly through a Dresden-like assault on his Sunni Arab constituents. In
the aftermath of such an attack, and a possible diplomatic rift with the
president and other high officials, the U.S. may find it is the real
loser in the January elections.<br><br>
------------------------------ Juan Cole teaches history at the
University of Michigan, is the author of Sacred Space and Holy War (IB
Tauris, 2002) and the daily web log,
<a href="http://www.juancole.com/" eudora="autourl">www.juancole.com<br><br>
<br>
</a></font><x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
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