Re: [casi] RE: Iraq - Potential Consequences of War

["Dirk Adriaensens" <dirk.adriaensens@DELETETHISskynet.be>]

Dear Felicity,
Beautiful words. The situation doesn't look too good for our Iraqi friends.
But there is a lot of solidarity with the Iraqi people, and actions against
the war. That should give us a little hopein these difficult times.
Can I add a letter from Joe Quandt (Voices in the Wilderness) who is in
Baghdad now.
Yours in solidarity and struggle for peace.
Dirk Adriaensens
www.irak.be
You can see Joe Quandt live on this link:
http://www.msnbc.com/local/wnyt/M231364.asp
WE ARE HERE TODAY:  OCTOBER 26, 2002
                            FROM BAGHDAD

                                by Joe Quandt


We are in Washington today to protest the foreign and domestic policies of
our government.
     We are in Baghdad today to protest the foreign and domestic policies of
our government.
     We are in Albany today to protest the foreign and domestic policies of
our government.
     Let us have no illusions.
     In Baghdad, people ask me point blank, "Joe, the war.....when is it
coming?" At 1st,  I thought the question fatalistic. But the 8-year war with
Iran in which 200,000 died, the Gulf War, which took possibly another
300,000, besides wrecking the entire infrastructure, the U.N. sanctions,
which in 12 years have cost them an additional million and a half lives-22
years of sustained economic and military conflict have made Iraqis immune to
illusions, in the matter of war.
     Let us, like the Iraqis, have no illusions.
     I was in the states a month ago when the House of Representatives sold
the birthright of 1776. I was in Baghdad when the Senate followed suit. They
have begun the process of making George II king in all but name. Every day
we watch the extraordinarily creative posturing of the French and Russian
governments, who in the end will cut a handsome deal with our government,
and then think they've done very well for themselves.
     Political activist Ghazwan Al-Muhkti says that U.S. coercion and deal
making is rendering the U.N. irrelevant. Former U.N. head of Iraqi relief
programs Dennis Halliday was even more blunt: "The U.N. is dying."
     Have no illusions; the U.N. is not going to come to the rescue.
     You are here today perhaps because you understand how deeply your civil
rights are being slashed at, and recreated in the image of the New World
Order.
     Or you grasp all too well that U.S. arms sales around the world make
inevitable the endless cycle of big and little wars to come, for the next
hundred years.
     You realize that all future treaties are things of convenience, to be
abrogated when their purpose has been served.
     That the International Criminal Court, the Kyoto Accords, bans on
nuclear and conventional weapon testing, research into alternative energy
sources, all of these are only impediments to the agendas of this
administration.
     That the War on Terrorism is simply a convenient place to focus
American fears now that Communism is dead, and that this war on terrorism,
the war on Afghanistan, the war for the oil of Iraq, are only the opening
gambits in the U.S. bid to secure the fossil fuel reserves of the entire
planet in order that they may dictate terms to the rest of the
industrialized world.
     Ask the shoeshine boys, the art dealers, the cafe operators, the hotel
staff, ask anyone in Iraq why the United States is coming here. They have no
illusions.
     How many countries have been attacked by Iraq in the last 12
years?......................
     How many countries have been attacked by the United States in the last
12 years? In the case of Iraq, it has been on a weekly basis.
     Lives mean nothing to this administration, yours or the Iraqis'. Have
no illusions.
     So why are we here today?

     We are here because we must be.
     We are here because, in the words of Scott Ritter, "There's a drunk at
the wheel, and we've got to get the keys away from him."
     We are here because the right of assembly has not been taken away from
us....yet.
     We are here because our government is ruining the good name of the
American people.
     We are here because we have children.....and parents.....and loved
ones.....and cherished ideals, and everywhere our government drops a bomb,
an Osama bin Laden seed is sown.
     We are here because the answer to war is only more war.
     We are here because we have problems in our schools, in Corporate
America, in our inner cities, problems of violence, ignorance, and greed,
and 100 billion dollars spent on brutalizing our brothers and sisters in
another country would be better spent on our own problems than in
legitimizing the theft of that nation's natural resources, to fill the
pockets of the vultures who are running this country.

     As I wrote this last evening, I watched the sun setting over the Tigris
River. Here, in the Cradle of Civilization, one is, perhaps, more keenly
aware of the historical imprudence of our government's actions.
     We are here today because we must be. Because our hearts tell us that
the clock is ticking, not quite as loudly as it's ticking for the Iraqis,
but time is running out on the American Dream. Have no illusions: An attack
against Iraq will be one of the cataclysmic events in American history, on a
par with The Civil War and the Great Depression, because it will signal to
the world that democratic principals and republican humanism have no more
meaning in the American ethos than they did in Nazi Germany. And to send
that message is to invite a return to barbarism, but on a scale we must
shudder to contemplate.
     We are here today because we believe that the Battle Of Iraq will not
signal the end of civilization as we have dreamt it, but rather, that it
will be but the opening skirmish, for us here today, in the long overdo
American War On Greed.


Thank You

----- Original Message -----
From: "farbuthnot" <asceptic@freenetname.co.uk>
To: "Colin Rowat" <c.rowat@espero.org.uk>; "discussion list Discussion CASI"
<casi-discuss@lists.casi.org.uk>
Sent: Saturday, November 09, 2002 5:16 PM
Subject: Re: [casi] RE: Iraq - Potential Consequences of War


>
> Hi - I know I am terminally bolshy, but nevertheless I find suggestions of
> 'rationally' being forced to overthrow a legitimate regime - however
woeful
> -  appalling. I'd like to overthrow George Bush, could care less what
> happens to him, the man's also a terrifying nightmare in my personal
opinion
> and may plunge the world into nuclear war, but it does not make my wishes
> legal. As for 'relatively few deaths' 56,000 military and 3,500 civilians.
> Well the latter is why possibly the dimmest US President ever elected has
> gone on his never to end, illegal 'war on terrorism' - about exactly the
> number who died in the WTC - but these were only Iraqi innocents, so don't
> count.56,000 is just over eleven times the entire town of Dunblane. But
they
> are only youthful Iraqi conscripts, so who cares?
> Every life has a name, each is some mother's son or daughter, not a
> statistic.
> I left the UK for Iraq last month with even taxi drivers saying to me:
'what
> has Iraq done this time?' I arrived in Iraq to people saying" 'what have
we
> done this time?' We know. What they have done is to be unfortunate enough
to
> be born in a country 'floating on a sea of oil'. Less statistics and more
> humanity, for the sake of all our humanity, are needed, I feel. best, f.
>
>
>
> >> A contact recommended the following briefing paper:...
> >> Paul Rogers, "Iraq: Consequences of War", Oxford Research Group,
October
> >> 2002, http://www.oxfordresearchgroup.org.uk/Iraqbriefing.pdf
> >
> > Thank you Nathaniel.
> >
> >> War with Iraq:
> >> * is likely to result in the deaths of many thousands of innocent Iraqi
> >> civilians ...
> >> * the regime will aim to draw the US forces into urban warfare in
Baghdad.
> >> A civilian death toll of at least 10,000 is likely, three times as many
as
> >> died in the 11 September attacks; this is a low estimate, the
experience
> >> of urban warfare in Beirut and elsewhere suggests even higher
casualties;
> >
> > I think that it has been recognised on the list that members of the
Iraqi
> > regime may act 'rationally' if faced with a certain US attack, and
depose
> > the existing leadership.  If this occurs - and I have no idea what
> > likelihood to assign to this (but guess that vague US signals as to what
it
> > regards as acceptable in Iraq decrease it) - then the Rogers scenarios
are
> > avoided.
> >
> > If, on the other hand, it does come to war, then Rogers' report may
> > underestimate the human consequences by focussing on the direct
consequences
> > of military action.  One of the consistent lessons to arise from the
1991
> > war was that the majority of civilian casualties were indirect.  Beth
> > Osborne Daponte's study (http://www.ippnw.org/MGS/PSRQV3N2Daponte.html),
the
> > best that I know of, found that:
> >
> > <begins>
> > According to the methods described in this paper, the number of Iraqis
who
> > died in 1991 from effects of the Gulf war or postwar turmoil
approximates
> > 205,500. There were relatively few deaths (approximately 56,000 to
military
> > personnel and 3,500 to civilians) from direct war effects. Postwar
violence
> > accounted for approximately 35,000 deaths. The largest component of
deaths
> > in this reconstruction derives from the 111,000 attributable to postwar
> > adverse health effects. Of the total excess deaths in the Iraqi
population,
> > approximately 109,000 were to men, 23,000 to women, 74,000 to children
(6).
> > <ends>
> >
> > Note that even the direct military consequences exceed US deaths in
Vietnam,
> > which took place over more than a decade rather than few months and to a
> > country ten times Iraq's population.
> >
> > The "postwar adverse health effects" reflect the damage done to Iraq's
> > infrastructure, in which its electrical grid played a central role.  It
is
> > hard to imagine it not again being one of the first targets in a new
> > campaign.  Further, Iraq's infrastructure is generally less robust now
than
> > it was in 1991: spit and baling wire hold much of it together.  On top
of
> > this, the Iraqi civilian population may also have fewer coping
mechanisms
> > for dealing with the loss of services: private savings may have
recovered
> > for some in Baghdad in recent years, but I think that the vast majority
of
> > Iraqis have experienced a decade of deep poverty.
> >
> > In 1991 it was recognised that targeting infrastructure put civilians at
> > risk, but the US expectation seemed to be that Saddam would fall and a
new
> > government would allow a negotiated solution.  The infrastructural
damage
> > would give the US leverage over it.  Gordon and Trainor quote Lt. Col.
David
> > Deptula, one of the air war planners, as saying, "Hey, your lights will
come
> > back on as soon as you get rid of Saddam".  (Brig. Gen. Buster Glosson's
> > explanation for targeting the infrastructure was that he wanted "to put
> > every household in an autonomous mode and make them feel they were
isolated.
> > ... I wanted to play with their psyche."  For perhaps 111,000 Iraqis,
his
> > playing was fatal.)
> >
> > Iraqi Kurdistan has certain advantages, but will face at least two
> > disadvantages.  First, the military situation there will likely be more
> > chaotic, with the possibility of clashes between Turkish and Kurdish
forces.
> > Second, the UN staff currently responsible for distributing the 'oil for
> > food' rations will leave very quickly; further, the warehouses are in
> > South/Central Iraq.  This harvest has been a good one, so there may be
> > private savings.
> >
> > Best,
> >
> > Colin Rowat
> >
> > work | Room 406, Department of Economics | The University of Birmingham
|
> > Birmingham, B15 2TT, UK | web.bham.ac.uk/c.rowat | (+44/0) 121 414 3754
|
> > (+44/0) 121 414 7377 (fax) | c.rowat@bham.ac.uk
> >
> > personal | (+44/0) 7768 056 984 (mobile) | (+44/0) 7092 378 517 (fax) |
> > (707) 221 3672 (US fax) | c.rowat@espero.org.uk
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> >
>
> _______________________________________________
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>



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