March 18, 2007
Sounds A Bit Like the War on Drugs
Government price controls in Iraq have led to major shortages and an ensuing black market in oil. Up to 70% of oil in Iraq is now sold on the black market and has become a major source of insurgent funding. Capt. Kwenton Kuhlman (pictured below) had this to say about US efforts to fight corruption steming oil smuggling:
"Disrupting the insurgent funding is our main job," says Capt. Kuhlman. "I'm under no illusions -- we can't stop it. It's too big. But we can try to disrupt it."
Posted by Peter Mork at 1:36 PM | Comments | TrackBack
January 18, 2007
Lost in Translation
This article is a must read from the front page of the WSJ today:
AMMAN, Jordan -- Cocky, cheerful Ali Adil thought he found his calling as an interpreter with the Third Marines, patrolling Iraq's most dangerous ground. The pay was good and he loved bantering about women and rock 'n' roll with young Americans. By helping Marines root out insurgents, he believed he was building a peaceful and just Iraq.
But since July -- when a suicide bomber drove an explosives-filled tanker into a building his unit was guarding -- the 20-year-old Mr. Adil has faced a different future. After suffering severe burns, he has undergone nine skin grafts at a hospital in Amman and lives in a dormitory with a dozen other wounded Iraqi interpreters -- "Terps" as the Americans call them.
Looking to avoid adding refugees, Jordan wants the Iraqis to leave the country when they are released from the hospital and no longer need postoperative treatment. The interpreters look at a return to Iraq as a death sentence. Their absence from home already may have endangered their families. "When someone is gone for a while, and nobody knows if he's really dead, the militias start asking, 'Is he with the Americans?' " says Mr. Adil, who says his family routinely receives death threats from Shiite militias in his old Basra neighborhood…
Hobbling on crutches or rolling through their days in wheelchairs, the Terps see themselves as combat veterans of America's war, which should entitle them to medical care, pensions and safety. Most want to emigrate to the U.S.
After lobbying by the U.S. Marine Corps, Congress approved a special immigration program for translators in 2005. But just 50 slots a year were granted, which must be shared between Iraqi and Afghan applicants with at least a year's service with U.S. combat troops. More than 5,000 locals have served in Iraq as interpreters…
The wounded Terps sent here for treatment -- about 100 last year -- stay weeks or months. The hospital's management asked that the facility's name not be published for fear of attack.
Amputees are the norm. Diyer Hassan arrived in November, still in a coma after leaving Iraq, where he had been on a predawn Baghdad patrol with the U.S. Army's 26th Infantry. The 20-year-old awoke in a hospital room to discover his legs amputated just below the pelvis. He had been working to raise cash to finish at Baghdad University and earn an accounting degree.
In a nearby room is one of the oldest Terps, Rabeh Khafaji, a 52-year-old Shiite nicknamed "Marcos." He was close to troops he patrolled with and says he "adopted" his 23-year-old platoon leader, Lt. Emily Perez. Told recently that she died in the same explosion that took both his lower legs, the former merchant seaman clutched Ms. Perez's photo to his chest and sobbed, "My beautiful child."…
…pressured to leave Jordan, unable to return to Iraq, where they fear their names already are on a hit list, but barred from the U.S.
"If I tell [doctors in Iraq] how I am wounded, I am killed in one day," said a 27-year-old translator from Karbala, who requested that only his first name, Haider, appear in print. "The militias rule the hospitals in Iraq," he added, as fellow exiles in the Amman dormitory nodded in agreement...
Terps are especially vulnerable, says Enrique Kelly, casualty manager for U.S. defense contractor Titan. "The interpreters are on no one's side," the retired U.S. soldier says. "The Shi'a hate them, the Sunnis hate them. The Americans don't trust them because they could be infiltrators. As soon as they lose our protection they'll be hunted down."
Mr. Adil and his brother figure they'll never qualify for visas. Neither knows any senior military officials, and Amjad doesn't plan to stay in Iraq long enough to apply. He wants to move to Syria where several Terps already have found haven. "I told my mother this was the end for me," he said as he prepared to return to his Marine base after a vacation in December. "She cried. She doesn't want any of us to do this anymore."
For his part, Ali expects to leave Amman by the end of this month. Rather than return to a translator job in Iraq, he plans to wait for his settlement, which he figures will be about $20,000. He thinks that ought to be enough to hire a smuggler who will lead him to a path other Iraqis have followed to Tijuana, Mexico, then on to San Diego.
There he's confident he'll be allowed to petition U.S. authorities for asylum, or at least find someone in Southern California's growing Iraqi community to put up bond if he's jailed. He's also counting on help from former Marine mates, many of whom live in San Diego County.
"I risked my life with the Marines," he says. "How can they refuse me?"
Posted by Peter Mork at 9:46 AM | Comments | TrackBack
October 9, 2006
An Article Worth Reading
From the NYT:
In a Long-Ago Revolution, Echoes for TodayFUNNY with history, how remote it can seem, and how close, even in teeming Times Square, scarcely an oasis of retrospection. Charles Legendy recalled being there the other day when his gaze turned to a black-and-white billboard of a tank emblazoned with the words “1956 Hungary” and, beneath that, “Our Revolution Was Not a Movie.”
His wife, Annemarie, also looked up, and the elegant young man on the left of the tank in a European city rising in revolutionary ire against the Soviet empire caught her eye. She knew him, she felt, with a certain intimacy. “Charlie,” she said, grabbing her husband and pointing at the photograph, “that’s you!”
Posted by Peter Mork at 8:06 AM | Comments | TrackBack
April 20, 2005
Marla Ruzicka
"We are helping lots of kids with medical care -- this place continues to break my heart -- need to get out of here -- but hard!" ---Marla Ruzicka, from an email to a friend sent on the day of her death
Catching up on email this morning, which I've neglected for the last few days, I came upon some depressing news. An email from my sister informed me that her friend Marla Ruzicka had been killed in Iraq.
Over the last few days I'd heard on the news, and even discussed with friends, the story of a humanitarian aid worker who died at the hands of a suicide bomber. But until this morning I had not put two and two together and realized that this individual was a friend of our family.
Marla and my sister lived together on a coffee cooperative in Machakos, Kenya in 1997. That year, when my family traveled to Kenya to spend the holidays with my sister, I had the pleasure of meeting her. She definitely stood out among the other students. Talking and joking with her on our first night in Kenya, it was clear that although we came from opposite ends of the political spectrum, there was no doubting her passion and determination to make this world a better place for the unfortunate. Reading over her amazing accomplishments since I've seen her last, it's clear she transformed that passion into a reality.
If you have not done so yet read some of the tributes to her life at Slate, CNN, the WSJ, and Sen. Leahy's speech on the Senate floor.
Her parents are also also asking for donations to her organization, Civic Worldwide, in her memory to keep her work going.
My condolences go out to her family, friends, and all those whose lives were touched by this amazing individual.
Update: Tom Palmer links to another CNN story that is really worth a read and will bring tears to your eyes.
Posted by Peter Mork at 1:19 PM | Comments | TrackBack
February 24, 2005
Dominos: Part 2
"We are with the Muslims, the Druze, together for a free Lebanon," said one member of a Christian militia. "Tell America we are waiting for them to invade, all of us."
Major events are unfolding in the Middle East and I am surprised they are not getting more play from the major media outlets. The assassination of Rafiq Hariri set off a massive protest, unheard of in Beirut, that seems to have forced the Syrian government into withdrawing from Lebanon. This cry for freedom has direct parallels to both the recent "Orange Revolution" in Ukraine, as well the Iraqi elections that took place less than a month ago.
This article from the Washington Times remarks on the inspiration the protesters have drawn from Ukraine. As their "tent city" grows, we can only hope that the outcome is resolved as peacefully.
Inspired by December's Orange Revolution in Ukraine and the Rose Revolution in Georgia a year earlier, the protesters have begun to call their action the "Cedar Revolt" in a tribute to the tree that adorns the Lebanese flag.
A member of the banned FPM, who identified himself only by the pseudonym "Pascal," said the protesters were considering another large demonstration tomorrow, "but the plan is to remain peaceful until Monday."
If the no-confidence vote "fails or is blocked by the Syrian lackeys, then Monday we will escalate the protests."
A constant stream of mourners and protesters swells the camp population in the evenings. Food and water are brought in by supporters, while a nearby Dunkin' Donuts and a Virgin Megastore provide bathroom facilities.
As during Monday's mass demonstration, the police and army are keeping a respectful distance from these protesters and seem unwilling to use violence against them. Only those directly in front of the parliament have ammunition clips in their rifles.
Another piece from a few days ago shows that the Iraqi elections are an equal source of inspiration. David Ignatius in the Washington Post relays an interview he conducted this week with Walid Jumblatt, a Lebanese leader who used to accommodate the Syrian occupation, and has been a vocal critic of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. With that in mind, this quote is very telling:
"It's strange for me to say it, but this process of change has started because of the American invasion of Iraq," explains Jumblatt. "I was cynical about Iraq. But when I saw the Iraqi people voting three weeks ago, 8 million of them, it was the start of a new Arab world." Jumblatt says this spark of democratic revolt is spreading. "The Syrian people, the Egyptian people, all say that something is changing. The Berlin Wall has fallen. We can see it."
It appears Bush's domino theory is working. Much as a free Poland was the dagger in the heart of the USSR, a democratic Iraq may mean an end to the dictatorships of the Middle East. But the question remains, what will be the next step? Will country after country begin to go through peaceful transfers to democratic states? or will violence accompany the struggle for freedom? It should be noted that if not for a few military officials in the Ukraine, we now know the protests in Kiev could have easily turned into a bloodbath.
In his State of the Union, Bush predicted that the elections in Iraq would "inspire democratic reformers from Damascus to Tehran." He also made it clear to the people of Iran that "As you stand for your own liberty, America stands with you." It was a bold and powerful statement.
But what if these governments refuse to back down? There is a real possibility for violence and calls for the U.S. to back up these pledges. At that point the American public must decide how closely they equate the freedom of the people in the Middle East with that of their own. It's a decision we may be facing sooner than we think.
Thanks to TIA Daily the many links above.
Posted by Peter Mork at 5:44 PM | Comments | TrackBack
January 30, 2005
Photos From Iraq
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January 28, 2005
The Countdown to Elections in Iraq
"Everyone in Iraq just wants one thing; we want to have a stable prosperous state. It doesn't really matter who wins, what matters is building this country in the way that God and his prophet want. It would have been better to have elections in peaceful times. Those terrorist will kill lots of people on election day with their bombs." ---Ayoub Sadoon, 70, Retired
This Sunday will most likely be a bloody day for Iraqis as they head to the polls.
I truly hope that this is not the case, but I think it is sadly inevitable. The religious fundamentalists who are using barbaric violence to thwart this election no doubt have the most to lose and they understand what is at stake. For when people can freely elect their leaders, liberty, for the most part, is secured for all. In such an environment they will be marginalized, and this is what they fear.
This piece by John Podhoretz from earlier in the week makes this point well:
Now, it will certainly be tragic if Sunnis who wish to vote are forcibly prevented from doing so by the terrorists in their midst. But those Sunnis' best chance to secure their freedom to vote at a later date will emerge from a viable result in Sunday's elections.
Why? Because once a legitimately elected Iraqi assembly is seated, the insurgents will have no argument left with which to advance their cause except for the open hatred of liberty.
The latest tape from Iraq's terrorist master, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, made that point crystal clear. "We have declared a fierce war on this evil principle of democracy and those who follow this wrong ideology," Zarkawi says. "Anyone who tries to help set up this system is part of it."
Note that Zarqawi doesn't say he's fighting imperialism, or foreign invaders on Iraqi soil, or any other (and far more seductive) argument. He is waging war on democracy inside Iraq on the right of Iraqis to choose their own leaders and structure their own governments.
Zarqawi is a very frightening and very evil man, a destructive force with hundreds of gallons of American and Iraqi blood on his hands. Iraqis and Americans alike have reason to be concerned about his declaration of war. But calling democracy "evil" is a self-defeating exercise. By doing so, he is including among the evildoers all Iraqis who go to the polls.
His fight will no longer be with Western devils, but with Iraqi patriots. There is a very real likelihood that under such conditions, his insurgency will collapse from the inside or will merely transition into becoming a brutal gang of parasites who use kidnapping and the threat of terrorism to extort money, pure and simple.
Another point to remember is that that the struggle for democracy is seldom easy. This piece by Jeff Fischer in the Washington Post makes an interesting comparison between the elections in East Timor five years ago and those in Iraq this weekend:
I served as chief electoral officer for the [East Timor independence] referendum, or 'popular consultation,' as it was officially called. Carlos Valenzuela was my deputy. After the election, thousands of people were killed and thousands more displaced by the militia fighters and their Indonesian military masters. To my knowledge, this election was marked by the largest loss of life in history--far larger than Iraq's so far, in numbers and percentage of the total population.
Now Carlos and I are in Baghdad. Carlos is the chief of the international assistance team and the U.N. representative on the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq. I am serving as one of his advisers. We face a challenge here similar to what we experienced in East Timor -- to demonstrate that an election is the alternative to violence as a means of achieving a democratic goal.
Last week I was informed that a man named Riyadh, who was a professor of English working as an interpreter here, was targeted by the insurgents and killed. Riyadh, like Alvaro, was my friend. In his own way, he symbolized the modest aspirations of ordinary Iraqis who simply want to build a peaceful and free society, and who see the elections as a starting point toward this goal. He was gunned down for his belief. For Iraq, as for East Timor, there are broken houses on democracy's road. I will not forget the sacrifice of people such as Alvaro and Riyadh and the commitment to democracy that their sacrifices represent.
Best of luck to all those serving to keep the peace and to those braving the violence to take part in the election.
Hat Tip: Jeff Jarvis, & TIA Daily
Posted by Peter Mork at 3:58 PM | Comments | TrackBack
November 15, 2004
Helprin and Art
Last week my brother met Mark Helprin, one of my favorite authors, at a book signing in the Bay Area. Apart from being an imaginative story writer, Helprin incorporates artwork into his novels in a way that makes me wish he was an art history professor back when I was in college.
With the current state of affairs in Iraq, I was reminded of the conclusion of this essay where he gives a special meaning to one of Winslow Homer's masterpieces:
When I was in the army, many years ago, I was an infantryman, and in the course of what I saw, and did, and came to understand, I was broken. Sometime after I had returned to the United States and my life had resumed, I rounded a corner in the Metropolitan Museum in New York and saw a painting I had known all my life but which I had not until that moment been able to understand. This was Winslow Homer’s masterfully restrained portrait of a veteran returning to his fields. The generation touched by fire in the Civil War understood the great import of this painting, they knew why the veteran had his back turned to the painter, why he was alone, why he worked in utter quiet, why the light was so clear, the scene so tranquil. After years of war and destruction, they understood, and after having passed this painting for the first time as a man, so did I.
As if there had never been a Gettysburg, an Antietam, or a Chancellorsville, the light struck the soil and the wheat grew. The world was the same. The essential rules had not changed. Devastation had not triumphed. The veteran could return to his fields, and the answer to his tentativeness was that, as if by a miracle, they were now even richer than he had remembered them.
Update: My brother just forwarded along another relevant quote from Helprin. It is from a speech called "Defend Civilization Itself" and is equally poetic and powerful:
If civilization can be attacked on many fronts, it can also be defended on many fronts, and to do so you need not necessarily drop into Afghanistan by parachute or found a political party. Last summer, in Venice, I was walking from room to room in the Accademia, which, unlike timid American museums, throws its windows wide open to the light and air of day. As if to bring even further alive the greatness and truth of the Bellinis and the Giorgiones on the walls, the galleries were flooded with music. As is most everything in Italy, it was unofficial. It came from a guitarist and a soprano on a side street. He played while she sang gloriously Bach, Handel, Mozart, and anonymous folk songs of the 18th Century. Because it was music, I cannot properly convey to you how beautiful it was, but it was accomplished, precise, and infused with the ineffable quality that lifts great art above that which merely aspires to or pretends to be great art. I could not see them from the windows, but when, several hours later, I went outside, they had neither ceased, nor skipped a beat, nor produced a single false note.
They were impoverished Poles, who appeared to be in their late twenties. She was thin, sharp-featured, and hauntingly beautiful. Most people simply passed them by, some dropped a few coins in a basket at her feet, and the visitors to the Accademia had no idea who they were, but she sang as if she were bathed in the footlights of La Scala, where she should have been, and where someday she may be. It did not matter that they were unrecognized, that they sang on the street, or that they were desperately poor, because that day in Venice they rose above everyone else, except perhaps the saints. In this they shared a brotherhood with the American soldier who made the first parachute jump, in the dark, into Afghanistan. For they and he were defending the civilization of the West, and they and he are inextricably linked. Without the soldier, they could not exist except in subjugation, and without them, he would not have enough to fight for.
Posted by Peter Mork at 7:02 AM | Comments | TrackBack
October 15, 2004
10,000 Germans Can't Be Wrong
In a debate that was supposed to cover domestic policy this week, the two candidates still found ample time to talk about the war in Iraq. Throughout the three debates, when the subject turned towards Iraq, Bush and Kerry often sparred over whether or not we had a proper coalition prior to invading the country. For instance, in the first debate Kerry said:
We know that he promised America that he was going to build this coalition. I just described the coalition. It is not the kind of coalition we were described when we were talking about voting for this.
Bush in the same debate stated:
My opponent says we didn't have any allies in this war. What's he say to Tony Blair? What's he say to Alexander Kwasniewski of Poland?
How does one define a proper coalition in the first place? More importantly, can a proper coalition (if defined) justify going to war? Perhaps it is clearer if we pose the questions in a different manner:
The point is a standard of right and wrong, not popular support, must be used to evaluate something as serious as a war.
To put this in the context of Iraq, it seems Kerry's main concern is that we went to war without the support of our Western European allies Germany and France. Yes Russia and China, members of the U.N. Security Council, opposed the Iraqi war as well. But one should note that these two countries also failed to support using military force against Yugoslavia in 1999, a war Sen. John Kerry supported.
So if Germany, for instance, had supported the war in Iraq this would seem to diminish Kerry's stance that we did not compile a proper coalition. As such, the war would be justified in the eyes of many.
Such a situation was less than 10,000 German votes away.
In 2002, as the world debated the use of military force against Iraq, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder of Germany was in an extremely tight election race with challenger Edmund Stoiber. Stoiber made clear he would back the U.S. on Iraq and even went so far as to say that Schroeder's opposition to the war reflected "isolationism". As I stated above, this election was decided by 10,000 votes. Did this slim margin determine whether it was right or wrong to send U.S. troops into harm's way?
Rights and wrongs are not defined by the majority. There are plenty of reasons to oppose the preemptive use of military force. However, if one uses the lack of international support as the foundation of their argument, it gives them almost no ground to stand on when the pendulum swings the other way. As history has shown this can often happen quicker than you think.
Posted by Peter Mork at 5:41 PM | Comments | TrackBack
October 7, 2004
Oil for Politicians
Bush is taking some heat over the latest report by the Iraq Survey Group. But you have to note that France, Russia and the UN aren't comming out of this thing looking too good either. The Financial Times reports:
Saddam Hussein personally oversaw a scheme that directed secret oil gifts to hundreds of individuals and companies around the world that he believed could help have United Nations sanctions lifted, according to the chief US weapons inspector.
A report from Charles Duelfer, head of the Iraq Survey Group charged with looking for weapons of mass destruction after last year's US-led invasion, describes the granting of oil allocations as part of an effort to give others an economic stake in the regime's survival.
Recipients included prominent politicians in several countries, including France, Russia and Indonesia, the report says - as well as the senior UN official charged with managing Iraq's $64bn (£36bn) "oil-for-food" programme.
U.S. companies and individuals were also mentioned but due to U.S. privacy laws their names were not released.
Posted by Peter Mork at 6:16 PM | Comments | TrackBack
October 1, 2004
Information, Ideas, and Debates
"...The biggest need we have here is information of the right sort. When I put the U.S. Constitution (in Arabic) in the hands of the Iraqi citizen who had asked me about it previously, tears filled his eyes. He shook my hand and held onto it for a long time with his head down and then looked at me and said thank you. This is the man who two weeks ago was warned not to continue working with the Americans. The man whose wife is 5 months pregnant. He is one of the people here, desperate to learn and to influence the process of political development..." Joe Kane - Baghdad
The theme of last night's debate was foreign policy and as such the topic of Iraq was center stage. At the conclusion, my initial impression was that it was basically a draw with Bush coming out slightly ahead. Judging from reactions of friends on both sides of the political spectrum, along with the media analysis, it's clear I'm in a small minority.
Hat Tip for Quote: TIA Daily
I thought Bush got the better of Kerry on both the Iran and North Korea exchanges while he made a decent case for Iraq. Yeah Bush stammered and was not as articulate as Kerry in the process but that's what I expected.
Possibly the problem I have is that I "misunderestimate" the guy (i.e. I set a pretty low bar). The last image I have of Bush answering questions on Iraq was at a hyped press conference back in April. During this Q&A I thought he looked so bad that it made me wonder if posts like this had some credence.
The general feeling I got from people was that Kerry sounded professional and presidential. Bush the other hand:
1) was perceived as emotional (I though this would be a plus in the eyes of the viewers as it showed that, right or wrong, he has conviction in his beliefs... I was mistaken)
2) looked like he was running out of material as he kept falling back on the same lines "Wrong war, wrong place, wrong time..." and "Iraq is hard work" (I was waiting for Kerry to look him in the eyes and say: "It's not work Mr. President... this is a war.")
and 3) Bush wasn't providing enough specifics to back up his accusations
But while commentators after the debate kept referring to the fact that the candidates had just laid out a "clear choice for voters" I fail to see the difference. Neither candidate made it clear to me in how they differ from their opponent in terms of exiting Iraq. Nor did they distinguish themselves in how they would deal with future threats. Bush prefers diplomacy along with 30 some odd countries. Kerry likes the same approach but he would throw in France and Germany.
Bush got us into Iraq, but neither Kerry nor Bush is going to take a radically different approach in getting us out. What the debate did make evident was that the success of Iraq is ultimately going to be determined by brave individuals armed with ideas like those in the quote that starts this post. I'm crossing my fingers.
Posted by Peter Mork at 5:24 PM | Comments | TrackBack
June 11, 2004
Dominos
This from Time in 1992:
According to aides who shared their leaders' view of the world, Reagan and John Paul II refused to accept a fundamental political fact of their lifetimes: the division of Europe as mandated at Yalta and the communist dominance of Eastern Europe. A free, non communist Poland, they were convinced, would be a dagger to the heart of the Soviet empire; and if Poland became democratic, other East European states would follow.
I could not help but notice the similarities to the view of G.W. Bush's administration with regards to Iraq and the Middle East. Just switch the countries and you can imagine an article in Time in 2014:
A free, non-Bathist Iraq, they were convinced, would be a dagger to the heart of the tyrannies of the Middle East; and if Iraq became democratic, other Middle Eastern states would follow.