Iraq war – Page 5 – Engaging Peace

A feeling that something was wrong (A Marine remembers, Part 2)

Posted on May 24, 2012May 23, 2012 by kathiemm

[A continuing series by guest author Ross Caputi.]

Smoke rises from fighting in Fallujah, Iraq. Image in public domain.

It was tormenting and too vague to put into words; but even if I could, I would have been too afraid to talk about it. Whatever it was, I knew that the consequences of saying it out loud would have been enormous.

It had something to do with Fallujah. It had something to do with the Marine Corps, my platoon, and my country. It was a feeling that something was wrong, but I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what it was. And it seemed as if nobody felt it but me.

That feeling began in Fallujah. There were moments during the fighting when I felt disgusted with what I was seeing, and there were moments when I picked up my gun and tried to be the hero that I joined the Marine Corps to be.

Most of the time I felt torn between the things that I had joined the Marine Corps for—glory, adventure, and the GI Bill—and a very clear truth about what we were doing to the people of Fallujah. In those moments an uneasy feeling materialized inside of me, and it continued for a long time afterwards.

When friends from my unit told war stories about Fallujah, I would fake a smile, or laugh, or do whatever seemed appropriate; and that feeling would creep into my gut.

When people thanked me for my service, I would bite my tongue and not say what was really on my mind; and that feeling would be there, gnawing at me.

Ross Caputi, former Marine, founder of the Justice for Fallujah Project, and former president of the Boston University Anti-War Coalition

Us versus them (Portraying “the Other,” Part 1)

Posted on May 7, 2012March 11, 2021 by kathiemm

[By guest author, John Hess.]

I was stunned by the title of a post on Engaging Peace. “Recovery through forgiveness” contrasts so greatly with Regeneration through violence: The mythology of the American frontier, 1600-1860, the first volume of Richard Slotkin’s trilogy on American culture.

Slotkin’s argument is similar to that advanced by Christopher Hedges in War is a force that gives us meaning.

Specifically, nations often seek to work out pressing internal problems and bring about national unity through violence directed at an adversary who is portrayed as “the Other,” an embodiment of evil.

The U.S. used this approach in justifying the “War on Terror,” and later the Iraq War:

Us against them
Good against evil
War against those who hate our way of life and want to destroy it.

The first major example Slotkin discusses in Regeneration is King Philip’s War. That 1675-6 conflict is said to have been, relatively speaking, the most destructive war ever fought on (what became) American soil.

Puritanism was then in the throes of a spiritual crisis, with many of the more intransigent ministers claiming there had been a “falling away” from the fervor and purity of the original colonists. At the same time, the New England colonies were rapidly expanding, which led to a demand for more land. This in turn brought them more and more into conflict with the Native tribes, who were on land the Puritans desired.

Puritan thinkers increasingly came to portray the Natives as their direct opposites:

Where the English were Christian, the Natives were pagan
Where the English were civilized, the Natives were savage
Where the English were the new Chosen People, the Natives were not
Where the English were doing God’s will, the Natives were certainly on the other side.

John Hess, Senior Lecturer in English and American Studies, University of Massachusetts, Boston

$300 billion in social costs (Cost of war, Part 4)

Posted on April 9, 2012April 24, 2012 by kathiemm

[The final post in the series by guest author Neta Crawford]

Now we come to the fourth reason our estimates for the dollar costs of these wars have been too low. Federal spending is not the entire cost of the Iraq war. There are several other huge categories of economic costs.

Targeting military spending; photo by Joe Mabel. Used under CC Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. From Wikimedia Commons.

There will be at least $300 billion in social costs of these wars, much of it borne by the close family members of injured veterans.

There are the macro-economic effects of borrowing for war, namely increased interest. Further, there is the opportunity cost of military spending.

The two largest opportunity costs are the consequences of the deferred maintenance of U.S. infrastructure and the potential jobs created by other forms of federal spending.

We are constantly told that military spending creates jobs. Indeed, every $1 billion in military spending creates about 11,200 jobs. If there were tax cuts instead and people spent that money themselves, more than 15,000 jobs could be created.

Indeed, military spending produces fewer jobs compared with spending on housing or non-residential construction, health care, or education.

Americans have been told at least three times — in May 2003 when the mission was “accomplished”; in September 2010 when the “combat” phase was over, and in December 2011 — that the Iraq war was won and over. All that was left was promoting democratization and stability.

But is the war really over for either Iraqis or Americans? Iraq remains extremely violent. Thousands of U.S. State Department and private contractors will remain in Iraq for the indefinite future. As Catherine Lutz wrote recently in Foreign Policy, “5,500 security personnel join 4,500 ‘general life support’ contractors who will be working to provide food, health care, and aviation services to those employed in Iraq, and approximately 6,000 US federal employees from State and other agencies.”

The dollar costs of war, as Eisenhower said more than a half-century ago, means dreams deferred or lost for millions. A few years before that, George Orwell’s main character in 1984, Winston Smith, wrote, “All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary.”

The next step in a full picture of the Iraq war’s toll would be to account for the death, displacement, and economic devastation the war has caused in Iraq and the region.

Neta C. Crawford is a Professor of Political Science at Boston University and co-director of the Costs of War study (www.costsofwar.org).

Ending the Iraq war?

Posted on October 24, 2011October 24, 2011 by kathiemm

On Friday, just a little more than a year since President Obama declared an end to the U.S. combat role in Iraq, the President announced that the last American troops in Iraq will be gone by January 1.

V-J Day celebration in Times Square (Photo in public domain)

The war in Iraq will effectively, finally, be over, he says–the longed-for goal of most Americans.

When President Truman declared the complete end of World War II on August 15, 1945 (V-J Day), American citizens went wild; office buildings emptied out; there was dancing (and kissing) in the streets.

The world was safe for democracy; fascism had been defeated. Joy abounded.

The WWII troops came home not just to countless celebrations but to the GI bill, with its new opportunities for education, job training, and home ownership.

What will be the aftermath to the end of the Iraq war? Will the troops come home to enthusiastic receptions and opportunities that they tried to earn through their service to their country?

Will the troops stay home or be redeployed to Afghanistan? Is the war really over for them?

Will the ever-growing financial costs for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, always visible in our sidebar, start decreasing, or will the costs in Afghanistan increase more than the costs in Iraq decrease?

Will any money saved by ending the occupation of Iraq help the recently recognized 99% of the population, including our veterans, service personnel, teachers, doctors, social workers, laborers, etc., find jobs, safeguard their health, and keep their homes?

What will it take to make people feel good again about being Americans? What will it take to make the US safe for democracy and a beacon of justice and fairness? Please send us your ideas.

And if you want to be inspired, read some of the stories at 7billionactions.org of people making a difference. Add your own story there and here. We all count.

Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology