The US, UN & Iraq II

There was a reference to a poll (I'm not even sure that it was on this thread) which stated that 70% of americans support the president in his war on iraq.

Americans have rallied strongly around President Bush and accepted his call for war with Iraq as the only practical way to remove Saddam Hussein and end the threat posed by his weapons of mass destruction, according to a Washington Post-ABC News Poll conducted last night.

Seven in 10 said they supported Bush's televised call to go to war without the blessing of the United Nations unless Saddam Hussein and his sons leave Iraq within 48 hours.

An equally large majority believe that Bush has done enough to win support from other nations. More than two in three said his policies on Iraq are the right ones, although fewer than half are strongly convinced.
Poll: Support for Bush, War Grows

Dr Salih Ibrahim: Oppressed by Saddam, my family will now bear the brunt of this onslaught
19 March 2003


I fear I may have spoken to my sisters for the last time. At the weekend I tried to telephone Widad and Dhikra, who live in Baghdad, but I couldn't get through. And now America and Britain are preparing to bomb the city and the line will soon go dead for a long time.

What a bitter taste it leaves, knowing that my sisters are being made to endure this fresh atrocity. This assault on Iraq is unjustified and cruel and I oppose it totally. Martin Luther King said: "Wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows" and I feel this war will be no different.

I left Iraq in 1981, when I was 28, to study in Britain. My family were from Basra, where my older brother Ibrahim, his family, my friends and relatives still live. Although I live and work in Britain, I've always wanted to return. When I visited my homeland a few months ago I remember wishing things had been different. I looked at the pathology department in Basra where I trained and thought: "I should be teaching there." But they were still using the antiquated microscopes I used 31 years ago. In schools there was no glass in the windows and the lavatories were flooding.

Iraq deserves better than Saddam Hussein. Four of my cousins died in the Iran-Iraq war. Most Iraqis are mentally scarred. But this is not the right way to get rid of him. It is up to the people of a country to decide their rulers, not an outside power to impose its will.

The Americans talk of brilliant weapons such as "the mother of all bombs" (MOAB); people casually refer to "deaths in the thousands". Perhaps these deaths seem abstract to people when they watch the news, perhaps they can't imagine those terrible bombs actually landing on people. But when I hear of what the invasion force has planned I think of my young nephews and nieces: Safa, Marwa, Muna, Aya, Nawf, Hana, Noor and Reem and all Iraqi children. They are the ones who will bear the brunt of this war.

Many in the West seem to have difficulty accepting that Iraqis are real people, people who will grieve for the children. They are not expendable, they are not vermin. Why don't ordinary Iraqis leave Baghdad to get out of range of the bombs? But why should they leave? Four million people have already left Iraq, many because of sanctions, many because of President Saddam.

Military analysts talk about how his army will soon collapse, how soon it will be defeated by the hi-tech sophistication of America's forces, but they don't seem to appreciate that it is largely a conscript army. What do people expect these poor men to do? They feel they have to protect their homeland and it is likely they will die doing so.

What reason have the Iraqis to trust the Western powers who now come to "liberate" them? Western-imposed sanctions have killed thousands of Iraqis. America has sponsored dictators around the world. This invasion is just the latest in a long line of betrayals of the Iraqi people.
Dr Ibrahim is a consultant pathologist at St Peter's Hospital in Chertsey, Surrey.
http://argument.independent.co.uk/commentators/story.jsp?story=388542

RECORD REBELLION STILL A TRIUMPH FOR BLAIR

The House of Commons last night declared its support for British
involvement in a war on Iraq last night, despite a record rebellion
of 139 Labour MPs. This clears the way for conflict in the Gulf,
possibly within 24 hours, but most of this morning's newspapers are
more concerned with its significance for Tony Blair.

While the number of Labour rebels actually increased since last
month's vote on Iraq crisis, most papers see the vote as a triumph
for Mr Blair. The Guardian gives prominence to the education
secretary, Charles Clarke, who remarked that: "We won a majority in
parliament, a majority in the Labour party, and a majority of the
backbenchers".

The Telegraph rapturously acclaims the prime minister's speech to
parliament during a 10-hour debate. "It was not only the vote that
Tony Blair won in the House of Commons last night", it declares in a
leader column. "It was the argument, too. Any fair-minded person who
listened to last night's debate... must surely have concluded that he
was right and his opponents wrong."

The prime minister's oratorical skills are also praised by the paper's
sketch writer, Frank Johnson, who says Mr Blair deployed his
"tremulous 'Diana's funeral' voice" to win over doubters. The Times
suggests the tactic worked: "the prime minister was in complete
command of the chamber", it reports. Of the broadsheets, only the
Independent is truly sceptical, claiming the vote leaves Mr Blair
'vulnerable' should the war go badly.

The Guardian reminds its readers that the vote wasn't just won in the
chamber, describing a day of "high-octane rhetoric and low political
arm-twisting". The Mirror also reports backstage dealing, saying the
prime minister's wife was drafted in and "heaped pressure on
potential rebels in a series of phone calls."

* Blair battles past record rebellion
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12956,917298,00.html
* Simon Hoggart: Electrifying Blair goes into Churchill-Custer mode
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/columnist/story/0,9321,917109,00.html
* Telegraph: Master of the House
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml;$sessionid$3C3PFBHI1NKSPQFIQMFSFFOAVCBQ0IV0?xml=/opinion/2003/03/19/dl1901.xml&sSheet=/portal/2003/03/19/ixportal.html

Many in the West seem to have difficulty accepting that Iraqis are real people, people who will grieve for the children. They are not expendable, they are not vermin. quote]

Walter, sadly too true.