“Freedom From Fear”
I’ve beig picking on the NY Times, with good reason. The vast change in tone between today and yesterday indicates someone paid attention –far less doom, a few rays of hope. But that’s what I saw in Iraq in 2004.
Check out this Times article by John Burns.
Here’s Burns’ description of some young Iraqi boys, from a Sunni neighborhood:
On a day when the high voter turnout among Sunni Arabs was the main surprise, Ali and his posse of friends, unguarded as boys can be, acted like a chorus for the scene unfolding about them. A new willingness to distance themselves from the insurgency, an absence of hostility for Americans, a casual contempt for Saddam Hussein, a yearning for Sunnis to find a place for themselves in the post-Hussein Iraq - the boys’ themes were their parents’, too, only more boldly expressed.
Again, I encountered this last year.
But find the irritating word in this passage:
Iraqis aren’t used to democracy, we have to learn it,” he said, after carefully marking and folding his poster-sized ballot. And what were the crucial elements? “A government that works in the interests of Iraq and the Iraqi people, regardless of ethnicity or sect,” he said. “That would be democracy.”
Only months ago, the prospect of crowds of voters lining up in Adhamiya and hundreds of other Sunni neighborhoods across the country would have seemed illusionary to American officials and military commanders who have been asked to find a way toward political stability here, and toward the start, sometime in 2006, of a withdrawal of United States forces.
If you said “illusionary”– you’re right. “Visionary” is more appropriate. However, this is a fine, informative article. And here’s a paragraph that demonstrates why:
The freewheeling opinions among the Sunnis were hard, at times, to square with the hard-line views widely expressed to reporters on previous trips to Adhamiya, and with the inflexible attitudes common there when Mr. Hussein was still in power. The difference this time appeared to be less a matter of conversion than freedom from threat - the very thing that Ali, the schoolboy, hinted at when he celebrated having a day with his friends when they did not have to worry about the gunfire or bombs that had been common in Adhamiya.
For at least as long as the insurgent pullback to allow the Sunni voting lasted, people in the district seemed freed from intimidation, and the recurrent references to this sense of freedom reflected it.
Yes, with the terrorist’s gun pulled away from their heads, the people open up and speak their minds.
In my experience Burns is a well above average reporter, despite the prejudices of his employer. I believe he refused to have anything to with the minders when Saddam was in power. In November 2003 he wrote the following: “For now, to gauge the real mood of Iraqis, a visitor must listen carefully — especially when they gather in numbers, wary of what candor may cost if American troops are withdrawn before stability is established.” By quoting Iraqis talking in Miriya he showed why you had to keep listening as the layers of Iraqi opinion were peeled back to reveal different attitudes: When it was suggested that it would be impossible for Saddam to return they said things like this: “Nonsense! Saddam’s regime is not collapsing; Saddam is still there, he is still fighting, he will come back.” When asked if Saddam’s brutality and mass graves were realities they said things like this: “Well, O.K., we didn’t love Saddam, we have to be honest about it. He was a man of war, and only war: Because of him, I served 12 years in the army, I fought in Iran and Kuwait, I saw many of my fellow Iraqis killed, and what did we get? Nothing! It was a big mistake to attack Iran, and then to invade Kuwait, and it is as a result of that men like me have seen their lives waste away.” Then asked if they want the US out and an Iraqi government put in place they answer like this: “So tell the Americans that what we want is for them to bring a suitable man to power, an Iraqi the people can trust, a man who will govern us well. Only when they have done that should they leave, and they will do so with our blessing. We don’t want them to leave now. It would be chaos.” Sometimes Burns is more optimistic, sometime more pessimistic but unlike most MSM reporters I always read his writing with respect. In some case I think he is edited to fit the paper’s viewpoint - at least in the headline selection over which he has no control. But that may be ‘illusionary’.
Comment by lgude — 12/17/2005 @ 7:50 am