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Part Five--U.S. Military: Good Morning, Baghdad!
By: Lee Siu Hin
Without uniforms, they are the average "Joe" or "Jane"
you see on the streets of America. Some of those I talked to were
nice people, but some of them were nasty. Before they were called
to duty, some were students and government workers. One was even
a school teacher with two kids at home. Except for a few, most had
never seen battle or death before. However, with guns and power,
they became the "boss" of the streets in Iraq, just like
cops in the "hoods."
Most of those currently in Iraq arrived after the major combat
in late April. Marines and British troops are staying in southern
Iraq, Army personnel are stationed around Baghdad and Airborne units
are based in northern Iraq. Some of the troops are "regular
army" mobilized from Germany, but many are reservists called
to duty early this year. Initially, they were told they would be
in Iraq for a few just months, but now they are being told they
must stay in Iraq for a year until next spring.
At post-invasion Iraq, officially U.S. troops are not combat troops,
but rather "military police", and most of the tasks performed
by them these days involve street patrol or conducting raids to
catch what they call "the very bad people" from Saddam's
regime, social criminals or those attacking American troops. Amnesty
International's Curt Goerig criticizes many coalition soldiers who
engaged in post-invasion law enforcement duties in Iraq because
they "do not have basic skills and tools in civilian policing
and they are unaware of the law they are supposed to be applying,"
he says.
By luck, I was invited by the U.S. military to stay and visit the
1st Battalion, 37th Armored Division in Baghdad for a few days.
They've taken over Baghdad Island as their military base, the biggest
park in the city next to the Tigris River, and now the park is off-limits
to the Iraqis. There are over 1,000 troops occupying the Island,
including some soldiers from other battalions.
I interviewed many military personnel from the base, and, depending
upon which unit they're in, they come from anywhere in the country,
such as: California, Alaska to Arizona, Virginia, Pennsylvania,
Idaho, New York to Florida. Asking why they are here in Iraq, most
troops told me they are coming to overthrow Saddam, and to free
Iraqis from a dictator. Some, like private Scanlon from Hampton
Rds., Virginia, were very straightforward: "We are here because
we're told to [be], this is our job, you're here to do your
job, and move on."
During these interviews, I could clearly see signs of the internal
struggle these soldiers are going through, especially when seeing
their comrades injured or killed during ambushes by Iraqi resistance.
Many U.S. soldiers told me they are proud to have come to liberate
Iraq from Saddam, and restore social order. But acknowledged that
many Iraqis do not like them. Anthony Parrish is from task force
1st Battalion, 37th Armored Division and he says daily attacks in
Iraq against U.S. soldiers are common. Parrish is a native of England
who migrated to the United States, joined the army and became a
tank driver. He came to Iraq from Germany in May. He says about
his first couple of days in the base: "we got shot, we got
rounds coming at us, every time we went out, there's somebody yelling
[at us], everywhere people hanging chicken wire across the street,
dropping grenades off the bridges, shooting at you, even children.
We saw thirteen, fourteen-year-old children with weapons - AK-47s,
rifles, handguns."
Parrish recalls two of his friends from the base who were killed
recently, "The soldiers who died two people from the
1/36 [Armored Division] one was in Charlie company driving
a Humvee and other one was a scout ... and both got killed two weeks
apart, and it was from ambushes and sniper fire ... there's nothing
we can do about that I mean, we miss them, they were good
soldiers, both of them. But, that was part of the job when you sign
up."
According to the Department of Defense (DoD), for the first 4 months
of the U.S. invasion, there were approximately 300 U.S. and U.K.
soldiers killed from both combat- and "non-combat"-related
deaths. But both Iraqis and peace activists in Iraq are skeptical
about this figure. In fact, even the DoD acknowledges that U.S.
military estimates relate only to fighting in or near Baghdad. They
make no other figures available, and rarely report the number of
injured soldiers, which is several times higher than the death toll.
In many cases, they aggressively cover-up their casualties and do
not allow journalists to report them.
When I was on the military base on the morning of July 21st, two
Humvees from the base were ambushed and destroyed by rockets while
they were out on morning patrol near the base. One U.S. soldier
and an Iraqi interpreter were killed, and several others wounded.
Rescue crews came and transported the wounded back to the base,
where a helicopter was dispatched to transport them to the army
hospital. I filmed the injured soldiers being taken away by the
helicopter. According to the media agreement between the unit and
me I was allowed to film events like this as long as no soldier's
face was in the picture, and no mention was made of their identities.
One of the base's commanders saw me filming and got upset; he wanted
to confiscate my film. I reluctantly agreed to destroy the film
because I did not want to be kicked out of the base too soon with
no chance to interview the soldiers.
With the U.S. death toll rising and public support of the U.S.
occupation in Iraq waning, the military is making sure no negative
pictures of soldiers' dead bodies are shown on American primetime
TV. Surely this would cause the further deterioration of public
opinion as well as troop morale. No, what the military planners
want is more cheerleading for the GIs. There's a proposal from one
of the producers at Fox TV - the most-loved television station by
the troops - to produce "COPS, the Baghdad specials."
Most soldiers have expressed, either privately or publicly, that
they want to go home to be with their families. 37th Armored Division
tank driver Jason Gunn says the hardest thing is not the daily attacks
against the troops, but the forced separation from his loved ones.
"You can deal with being shot at a lot, because after a while
you just get used to it, and you don't really think about it, and
you just keep your mind on what your job is [because that's] what
you have to do. But actually, when you come back in and you're by
yourself, you just start to think about your family, your friends,
being away so long, what they are doing, what they have gone through,
and how they feel [while we are in Iraq]. You know, what they hear
on the news and you are not able to get in touch with them, and
they worry a lot. So that's probably the hardest thing, missing
friends and family." Gunn says.
There's no doubt that without Iraqi friends outside the base, a
soldier's life inside the base is almost like being in prison. It's
routine, dangerous, boring, hot, uncertain, and boring military
rations (it's not very bad taste, but will be tired if eating same
foods everyday).
With daily attacks against U.S. troops and their bases, GIs are
rarely loitering on the street outside the capital. But you will
see plenty of them around Baghdad, either going through the streets
with Humvees or tanks, or otherwise barricaded behind tanks bearing
machine guns at checkpoints across the city. When they do venture
off the base for personal reasons, they are only gone briefly, maybe
on the street shopping or checking email at a cyber cafe, but always
with tanks and guns. Not surprisingly, one of the reasons retail
business has surged in Baghdad these days is the tremendous buying
power of the GIs, their preferred purchases being smuggled electronic
appliances or pirated DVDs.
Beyond what they were told, the average soldier has very limited
knowledge of the history and culture of Iraq, or of the Islamic
faith.
At the base while they were watching DVD movies during a break,
I asked several young U.S. soldiers how much knowledge they have
about Islam and Iraq, they said not much. "Their [Iraqi] culture
is definitely a lot different than ours, different things in different
perspectives, that's for sure. Things we are taking for granted
I think they don't you know what I mean, they are just poor
people in a poor society trying to make it," PFC Stevens from
Jackson, Michigan says. They told me they learned much about Iraq
through a DoD publication, Iraq Handbook.
At my request, Rt. Col. Garry Bishop, Battalion Commander for 1st
Battalion, 37th Armored Division, gave me a copy. This book is given
to every U.S. soldier who comes to Iraq. Its 385 pages can be broken
down as follows: key facts and cultural information accounts for
24 pages; history, primarily focusing on the time period since Saddam's
rise to power, accounts for 17 pages; government, politics and economy
accounts for another 17 pages. By far, the largest part of this
book, 270 pages, is devoted to information about Iraqi military
and what kinds of weapons they use.
Without any social and family support network, the only "spiritual"
guidance GIs have is the army chaplain, who is a Christian. They
are issued guidebooks, such as "Prayers for Iron Soldiers"
or "Iron Soldiers' Spiritual Fitness Nuggets", which essentially
justify going to war and killing the enemy.
The army chaplain from the 37th Armored Division offers the religious
justification to fight in Iraq. "I walk though the facts that
when we are defending ourselves, when we are in position to protect
those who cannot help themselves, when we are dealing with people
who seek to take the lives of and endanger the people we are protecting,
as long as we are staying within the rules of engagement that we
have," he explains, "the Bible says we're OK." But
he didn't say "thou shall not kill", just "thou shall
not murder".
With complains against from the Iraqis, and soldier's moral in
crisis, Rt. Col. Garry Bishop defends they are coming to protect
Iraqi people, and many Iraqis do support them. "We are making
difference, we are seeing the process." He says.
To show that the U.S. Army is in complete control of Iraq, the
unit invited me to accompany them on one of their evening raids
in Baghdad's northern suburb to catch what they called three "very
bad people." They deployed at least 100 soldiers, dozens of
Humvees, tanks and helicopters, but they never caught the "bad
guys" they were looking for.
There have been several major military successes - for example,
the arrest of top former Iraqi military commanders and Ba'ath party
officials during the much-publicized "Operation Peninsula."
However, the number of failures of general U.S. operations in Iraq
is far more distinguished. According to the Baghdad-based English
newspaper Iraq Today, false intelligence resulted in the death of
at least two blameless men. It led to the tribal execution of an
informant allegedly handed over by U.S. forces, as well as to the
detention of hundreds of innocent Iraqi men and children who now
view the U.S. military with far more anger and indignation then
they ever did before.
Capped by the recent succession of bombings - the August 7th Jordanian
Embassy bombing, the August 19th bombing of the United Nations office
in Baghdad where the U.N. special representative in Iraq Sergio
Vieira de Mello was killed, the August 29th bombing in Najaf which
killed 100, including the most powerful Iraqi Shi'ite leader, Ayatollah
Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim - not only Iraqis, but Americans are growing
weary of the U.S. military's consistent failure to restore social
order and to end attacks by members of the Iraqi resistance. They
now view U.S. presence in Iraq as unambiguous military oppression.
Even when the military does, say, successfully catch a handful of
social criminals who have terrorized city neighborhoods, its customary
display of arrogance and its general lack of knowledge of the faith
and culture of the Iraqi people effectively nullify the win.
One example highlighting this ethnocentrism in the military's policy
is its extensive use of the body search, which is applied to men
and women alike. Iraqis feel American troops do not understand eastern
customs. Religious leaders are subject to searching, which is certainly
an affront. Even more egregious, though, is the search of Iraqi
women, which, in their culture and faith, is a great offense, so
much so that some are willing to die to protect against this violation.
Iraqi women have raised this issue with those in charge of the occupying
forces, to no avail. Although each U.S. patrol unit has female soldiers
to search women, according to Amnesty International's Elizabeth
Hodgkin, complaints have been made to U.S. and British authorities
because male soldiers have been allowed to search female prisoners
during detention.
There have also been accusations against U.S. troops of stealing
during searches. According to a recent issue of Baghdad's activist-run
newspaper Al-Muajaha (translated as "The Iraqi Witness"),
on June 30th in Baghdad's Hay Al-Resala Al-Oula district, a U.S.
solider (not related to the 37th Armored Division) allegedly stole
25,000 Iraqi dinars (equivalent to US$16) from supermarket owner
Samir Adbul Rasool Al-Humdani. When Al-Humdani protested this theft,
he was arrested by the troops. In another incident, according to
the Amnesty International report, on June 26th, an officer from
the 101st Airborne Division stole three million Iraqi dinars (equivalent
to US$2,000) from As'ad Ibrahim Mahdi's house.
Ironically, the most energetic in their welcome of U.S. troops
in Iraq are children under ten. You'll see a group of curious but
naïve Iraqi children surrounding GIs yelling, "Hey, Mister!
Mister!" waving and talking to them, and trying to touch their
guns. It's a charming moment, until you notice the backdrop of destroyed
buildings.
Useful links in Iraq (U.S. military and administrators in Iraq)
Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA)
http://www.cpa-iraq.org
Iraq Reconstruction Task Force
http://www.export.gov/iraq
CPA Rewards to capture Saddam Hussin
http://www.cpa-iraq.org/pressreleases/PSA23July03rewards.html
U.S. Department of Defense (DoD)
http://www.dod.mil
Defend America
U.S. DoD News About the War on Terrorism
http://www.defendamerica.mil
Sincerely
Lee Siu Hin
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