Bush's Blind Leadership
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by Derrick Z. Jackson
Published on Wednesday, May 26, 2004 by the Boston Globe
IN NEED OF blind obedience as he stays the course in Iraq, President Bush went to the Army War College in Carlisle, Pa., on Monday. Rows of military officers, with not a hint of dissent, clapped like choir boys as Bush said, "The terrorists and Saddam loyalists would rather see many Iraqis die than have any live in freedom."
This is the same Bush who chose to see between 4,000 and 11,000 Iraqi civilians die, according to human rights groups, in an invasion and occupation based on nonexistent weapons of mass destruction. Bush said he will stay the course for an Iraq that "protects basic rights," even as a stream of photos exposing prison camp abuse by American soldiers is released.
Bush said, "A free Iraq will always have a friend in the United States of America." At the rate we are going, it will be any wonder if we will have any friends left in Iraq by the time it is "free." Last week, 40 people died in a US military airstrike on a house. The White House said that it was a safe house for terrorists. Residents who lived nearby said it was the site of a wedding party.
A Reuters story from the site of the airstrike said, "Standing over 3-year-old Kholoud al-Mohammed, who held a cookie in her hand and cried, Mamdouh Harajee listed off the names of the dead from a complex web of relatives who attended.
" 'She lost her mother and father. Another family of eight lost six members. Another family lost four,' he said as he looked down on the bandaged child. `It was just a wedding.' "
The top American military spokesman in Iraq, Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, said: "There was no evidence of a wedding: no decorations, no musical instruments found, no large quantities of food or leftover servings one would expect from a wedding celebration. There may have been some kind of celebration. Bad people have celebrations, too."
But the Associated Press obtained a videotape it said was shot by the wedding cameraman, who was killed in the attack. The videotape, according to the AP, showed "fragments of musical instruments, pots and pans, and brightly colored beddings used for celebrations, scattered about the bombed out tent." The AP story said the tape captured the travel of "a dozen white pickup trucks speeding through the desert escorting the bridal car -- decorated with colorful ribbons. The bride wears a Western-style white bridal dress and veil."
On Monday, Kimmitt showed the press slides that he said indicated large amounts of illegal drugs, weapons, and materials to make bombs. "The activities that we saw happening on the ground were somewhat inconsistent with a wedding party," Kimmitt said. Furthermore, Kimmitt claimed, "we have no evidence of any children being killed on the ground."
But the AP actually interviews survivors, unlike the US government, which bombs them, waits for survivors to straggle into an office and then offers families an average of about $400 per dead Iraqi victim, compared to an average of $1.8 million being given to the victims of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Relatives said at least 10 children died in the airstrike. The bride and groom were said to have been killed.
As gruesome as any of the photos from the Abu Ghraib prison is the AP's interview with Haleema Shihab. When the bombing started, the 32-year-old Shihab said she started running, clutching her 7-month-old son Yousef in one arm, grabbing the hand of her 5-year-old son Hamza, and running alongside her 15-year-old son Ali. She fell and broke a leg. As she lay hurt, the explosion of another missile hurt her arm. Shihab said Hamza yelled "Mommy!" Ali, the oldest, said he was bleeding.
"That's the last time I heard him." Shihab said. "Hamza fell from my hand and was gone. Only Yousef stayed in my arms. Ali had been hit and killed. I couldn't go back."
Shahib said a stepdaughter found her. They hid in a bomb crater. "We were bleeding from 3 a.m. to sunrise." A US soldier came. Instead of asking for help, Shihab played dead as the soldier kicked her. She said the soldier was laughing. "I pretended I was dead so he wouldn't kill me," Shahib said.
This is called staying the course. The only course an immoral war can follow is one of unrelenting tragedy and permanent mistrust. It cannot be a surprise that a certain number of soldiers did not care about Iraqi prisoners when the commander in chief has yet to seriously acknowledge, let alone apologize for the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians. It cannot be a surprise that the military continues to make mistakes and then blithely tells the press the victims had evil intentions when the commander in chief has yet to apologize for a single mistake outside of the prison abuse scandal.
On Monday Bush issued a five-point plan to stabilize Iraq. No five-point plan can come from a president whose war had no point. Under him, staying the course will continue to mean the blowing to bits of brides, grooms, mothers, and children. The only credible plan is one where Bush announces that he has changed course -- right out of Iraq.
© Copyright 2004 Boston Globe Newspaper Company.
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