Publish to Newswire
Add an EventFrom the Open-Publishing Calendar
From the Open-Publishing Newswire
Indybay Feature
Counting the Dead in Iraq
Todd Chretien (Green Party candidate running for US Senate in California against Dianne Feinstein) criticizes the hypocrisy of Democrats who want to capitalize on widespread public disapproval of the war in Iraq by pretending to be for peace while laying plans for continuing the war. He also criticizes how Democrats also ignore the human cost of the war on the Iraqi people.
Counting the Dead in Iraq
By TODD CHRETIEN
Well over a year ago Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health released a report documenting 100,000 Iraqi dead as a consequence of the US invasion and occupation. At the time, they did not include the thousands of deaths in Falluja as part of their study because they did not want to skew the results upwards. Now, more than a year after the study, there are undoubtedly many thousands more Iraqi deaths. A recent article on CounterPunch by Andrew Cockburn argues that the real death figure may approach 500,000.
It is obvious why the Department of Defense refuses to keep count, they do not want to provide evidence for future war crimes tribunals. The US anti-war movement has rightly condemned the DoD for its disgraceful policy and has widely publicized the massacre of civilians carried out by the US military.
At the same time, the DoD has undercounted the number of American casualties by not adding soldiers whose wounds are inflicted in Iraq, but who die of their injuries later on German or American soil. As is also widely known, the Bush Administration has refused to allow the media to photograph coffins being unloaded at American airports, and the corporate media has largely played along with the administration's strictures against showing the real carnage in Iraq. Thus, the American public is being presented with a whitewashed version of the war.
The anti-war movement has been united in condemning this practice. However, there are some in the anti-war movement who seem reluctant to publicize all the dead in Iraq. This week, United for Peace and Justice put a "legislative alert" on their website's front page, written up by its legislative working group, which lists the following casualty figures in Iraq:
* over 28,000 Iraqi civilian lives (and some estimates are as high as 100,000 lives)
* over 2,300 U.S. military lives
* over 4,000 Iraqi police and military deaths
* over 16,500 U.S. troops wounded in combat
* $251 billion spent to date
* $1.3 trillion estimated long-term bill
UFPJ's legislative working group's figures raise a couple of questions. First, the 28,000 total for Iraqi civilian casualties is a full 5,000 short of what http://www.Iraqbodycount.org lists as the absolute minimum number of deaths. So where does UFPJ get its 28,000 figure for civilian deaths and why is that figure prioritized over the Johns Hopkins study (which was conducted as a national survey, based on a scientific sampling of households all over Iraq), which is presented as only an "estimate?"
Secondly, certainly it is proper to count the number of Iraqi police and military deaths in order to get an idea of the price being paid by these Iraqis for the American strategy of "handing over security operations," otherwise known as creating a puppet army. The stated US strategy is to push poorly trained and ill equipped Iraqis, who are desperate for a paycheck, into the front lines against the resistance. The poverty draft is alive and well in Iraq.
However, one group is suspiciously absent from the legislative working group's figures, namely, the number of Iraqi resistance fighters killed by the American military and the puppet Iraqi army. Certainly one does not have to agree with the military tactics pursued by every resistance group in Iraq in order to believe that their dead have as much right to be counted as those American soldiers who are used as cannon fodder for an illegal and unjust occupation.
So, why doesn't the legislative working group list the thousands (or tens of thousands) of resistance fighters killed? They might argue that there are no reliable numbers. This is true enough, but certainly at least an educated guess of "thousands" could be included with an explanatory note. I believe the real answer to this question lies in the so-called "peace legislation" the legislative working group is supporting, which prominently includes Rep. John Murtha's "strategic redeployment" plan.
Far from being a "peace" proposal, it is an argument for a different kind of war based on Marine special operations, a heavier reliance on the Iraqi puppet army and an escalation of the air war. None of this has anything to do with peace for the people of Iraq. It has everything to do with the Democratic Party trying to find a way to tap into the rising opposition here in America to the war so that they can ride the wave to mid-term victories in November. At the same time, the
Democrats want to make it plain to the oil corporations that they are every bit as committed to dominating the Middle East as the Republicans, even if they are willing to consider different military means to the same ends. They want to have their cake and eat it to.
Many member groups of UFPJ are strongly opposed to Murtha's proposal, but the legislative working group is supporting it and prominently promoting it. If they believe that a strong anti-war movement can be built by tailoring the facts of the occupation to the sensibilities of hawks like Murtha (which explains leaving out the Iraqi resistance casualties and highlighting the Iraqi puppet army casualties), they are setting in motion a repeat of the 2004 fiasco. Then, the anti-war movement demobilized in order to get behind John "Reporting for Duty" Kerry. In 2006, the line is to support John "Air War" Murtha. In 2008, the ground will be prepared to take a dive for Hillary Rodham "Let's Bomb Iran" Clinton.
Anti-colonial rebellions are brutal and bloody, and their suppression is even more brutal and bloody. From the American Revolution to the Algerian and Vietnamese wars for national self-determination, military occupations force those resisting it to fight asymmetrical battles, with only a fraction of the firepower at the disposal of the occupier. Thus, as the resistance leader in "The Battle of Algiers" told the French press corps when asked why they disguised bombs in baby carriages, "if the French air force will lend us their jet bombers, we will happily lend them our baby carriages."
The whole truth needs to be told about Iraq. Some elements of the resistance are sectarian and target civilians, but the majority of the young fighters who are dying in their thousands are no different than the American Minute Men of 1775 or the Algerian or Vietnamese National Liberation Front fighters. They fought and are fighting because a foreign colonial power has seized their homeland, abuses their families and terrorizes and tortures their communities.
We need to end the war. We need to bring our troops home now (not slip them over the border to occupy Iraq's neighbors) so that no more young Americans are killed or maimed. To do that, we need an anti-war movement that tells the whole truth. This war against the Iraqi people did not begin with George W. Bush. His father began this war in 1991. Bush I killed an estimated 200,000 Iraqis, civilian and soldiers. Bill Clinton killed thousands more in hundreds of bombing raids and missile strikes. Far more deadly were the starvation sanctions imposed by the Clinton administration, which targeted only civilians, and killed 1,000,000 of them. Now, Bush II is continuing the killing. In order to end it, we need to recognize that the people of Iraq have the right to run their own country, and that the Democrats do not have the rights to the anti-war movement's votes.
Todd Chretien is running for US Senate against Sen. Dianne Feinstein on the Green Party ticket in California. http://www.Todd4Senate.org
By TODD CHRETIEN
Well over a year ago Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health released a report documenting 100,000 Iraqi dead as a consequence of the US invasion and occupation. At the time, they did not include the thousands of deaths in Falluja as part of their study because they did not want to skew the results upwards. Now, more than a year after the study, there are undoubtedly many thousands more Iraqi deaths. A recent article on CounterPunch by Andrew Cockburn argues that the real death figure may approach 500,000.
It is obvious why the Department of Defense refuses to keep count, they do not want to provide evidence for future war crimes tribunals. The US anti-war movement has rightly condemned the DoD for its disgraceful policy and has widely publicized the massacre of civilians carried out by the US military.
At the same time, the DoD has undercounted the number of American casualties by not adding soldiers whose wounds are inflicted in Iraq, but who die of their injuries later on German or American soil. As is also widely known, the Bush Administration has refused to allow the media to photograph coffins being unloaded at American airports, and the corporate media has largely played along with the administration's strictures against showing the real carnage in Iraq. Thus, the American public is being presented with a whitewashed version of the war.
The anti-war movement has been united in condemning this practice. However, there are some in the anti-war movement who seem reluctant to publicize all the dead in Iraq. This week, United for Peace and Justice put a "legislative alert" on their website's front page, written up by its legislative working group, which lists the following casualty figures in Iraq:
* over 28,000 Iraqi civilian lives (and some estimates are as high as 100,000 lives)
* over 2,300 U.S. military lives
* over 4,000 Iraqi police and military deaths
* over 16,500 U.S. troops wounded in combat
* $251 billion spent to date
* $1.3 trillion estimated long-term bill
UFPJ's legislative working group's figures raise a couple of questions. First, the 28,000 total for Iraqi civilian casualties is a full 5,000 short of what http://www.Iraqbodycount.org lists as the absolute minimum number of deaths. So where does UFPJ get its 28,000 figure for civilian deaths and why is that figure prioritized over the Johns Hopkins study (which was conducted as a national survey, based on a scientific sampling of households all over Iraq), which is presented as only an "estimate?"
Secondly, certainly it is proper to count the number of Iraqi police and military deaths in order to get an idea of the price being paid by these Iraqis for the American strategy of "handing over security operations," otherwise known as creating a puppet army. The stated US strategy is to push poorly trained and ill equipped Iraqis, who are desperate for a paycheck, into the front lines against the resistance. The poverty draft is alive and well in Iraq.
However, one group is suspiciously absent from the legislative working group's figures, namely, the number of Iraqi resistance fighters killed by the American military and the puppet Iraqi army. Certainly one does not have to agree with the military tactics pursued by every resistance group in Iraq in order to believe that their dead have as much right to be counted as those American soldiers who are used as cannon fodder for an illegal and unjust occupation.
So, why doesn't the legislative working group list the thousands (or tens of thousands) of resistance fighters killed? They might argue that there are no reliable numbers. This is true enough, but certainly at least an educated guess of "thousands" could be included with an explanatory note. I believe the real answer to this question lies in the so-called "peace legislation" the legislative working group is supporting, which prominently includes Rep. John Murtha's "strategic redeployment" plan.
Far from being a "peace" proposal, it is an argument for a different kind of war based on Marine special operations, a heavier reliance on the Iraqi puppet army and an escalation of the air war. None of this has anything to do with peace for the people of Iraq. It has everything to do with the Democratic Party trying to find a way to tap into the rising opposition here in America to the war so that they can ride the wave to mid-term victories in November. At the same time, the
Democrats want to make it plain to the oil corporations that they are every bit as committed to dominating the Middle East as the Republicans, even if they are willing to consider different military means to the same ends. They want to have their cake and eat it to.
Many member groups of UFPJ are strongly opposed to Murtha's proposal, but the legislative working group is supporting it and prominently promoting it. If they believe that a strong anti-war movement can be built by tailoring the facts of the occupation to the sensibilities of hawks like Murtha (which explains leaving out the Iraqi resistance casualties and highlighting the Iraqi puppet army casualties), they are setting in motion a repeat of the 2004 fiasco. Then, the anti-war movement demobilized in order to get behind John "Reporting for Duty" Kerry. In 2006, the line is to support John "Air War" Murtha. In 2008, the ground will be prepared to take a dive for Hillary Rodham "Let's Bomb Iran" Clinton.
Anti-colonial rebellions are brutal and bloody, and their suppression is even more brutal and bloody. From the American Revolution to the Algerian and Vietnamese wars for national self-determination, military occupations force those resisting it to fight asymmetrical battles, with only a fraction of the firepower at the disposal of the occupier. Thus, as the resistance leader in "The Battle of Algiers" told the French press corps when asked why they disguised bombs in baby carriages, "if the French air force will lend us their jet bombers, we will happily lend them our baby carriages."
The whole truth needs to be told about Iraq. Some elements of the resistance are sectarian and target civilians, but the majority of the young fighters who are dying in their thousands are no different than the American Minute Men of 1775 or the Algerian or Vietnamese National Liberation Front fighters. They fought and are fighting because a foreign colonial power has seized their homeland, abuses their families and terrorizes and tortures their communities.
We need to end the war. We need to bring our troops home now (not slip them over the border to occupy Iraq's neighbors) so that no more young Americans are killed or maimed. To do that, we need an anti-war movement that tells the whole truth. This war against the Iraqi people did not begin with George W. Bush. His father began this war in 1991. Bush I killed an estimated 200,000 Iraqis, civilian and soldiers. Bill Clinton killed thousands more in hundreds of bombing raids and missile strikes. Far more deadly were the starvation sanctions imposed by the Clinton administration, which targeted only civilians, and killed 1,000,000 of them. Now, Bush II is continuing the killing. In order to end it, we need to recognize that the people of Iraq have the right to run their own country, and that the Democrats do not have the rights to the anti-war movement's votes.
Todd Chretien is running for US Senate against Sen. Dianne Feinstein on the Green Party ticket in California. http://www.Todd4Senate.org
For more information:
http://www.counterpunch.org/chretien031420...
Add Your Comments
Comments
(Hide Comments)
In this pamphlet I've written and posted on my website:
http://userhttp://www.sfsu.edu/%7Emotopu/attemptfixisonuts.htm
you will find some of Todd Chretien's sectarian rants against activists in the San Francisco State chapter of Students Against War.
Anticipating Todd shouting "red baiter" in response to this post, interested readers may view this thread to see my defense against recent ISO charges against me (see the comments section) and decide for themselves:
http://www.indybay.org/news/2006/02/1803611.php
With all Todd's talk of the evils of lesser evilism, I feel compelled to agree with him on this point. While Todd has a good reformist platform, he is a lesser evil, not a revolutionary (and I can’t see him as any sort of Green either). I know Matt Gonzalez is endorsing Todd, but it is a lesson learned. I'm really starting to see the senselessness of voting for a newer "better" boss to fix things from above for us.
Todd, I welcome your criticism of me, but I wonder if you can address any of the issues I raise in my writings rather than just sticking to your usual politician's talking points, and knee jerk hurling of the terms "red baiter" and "McCarthyite".
I've been labeled an "internet activist" with "too much time on my hands" by ISO folks attempting to dismiss my criticisms. That is a disingenuous attempt to negate the fact that I've been involved in action and theory for a while now, although admittedly, I've only just recently become more critical of Leninist Vanguard organizing tactics, the kind Todd and the ISO adhere to. No, this is not an attack on Socialism. The ISO tends to downplay that much of the criticism of their manipulative actions in "coalitions" (often really front groups) they participate in come from their left, not from red baiting McCarthyites, but from Left Communists, Situationist influenced people, anarchists, and people who don’t identify as any particular school of thought. This is not to say that criticisms from others don't have any merit, but it is to say that the criticism really is not always from their right.
I’ve noticed Todd often defends his positions by obfuscation, typically saying something about how he regrets anyone spending so much time criticizing his track record ---as seen in the ISOnuts pamphlet and the SAW listserv debate at:
http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=20050529001500670
and http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=20050531124816353&query=ISO%2Balienates%2B
and hopes they’ll spend more time doing something “positive”. This seems to be his way of avoiding actual debate, while attempting to appear to have more integrity than those calling him out for past actions and his rigid ideological stances.
If people believe the ISO claims that I'm some lone crusader, I encourage them to follow the many links in ISOnuts, and at the indybay link above. Criticisms of the ISO are too ubiquitous to be discounted as crank conspiracy theories. Rather they represent the efforts and views of many many people in an anti-authoritarian Left, which is very critical of bosses and vanguard parties like the ISO. This is not empty rhetoric, it is backed up by countless first hand accounts.
This is in no way meant as a defense of Feinstein who indeed has been pro-war. But ask yourself if Todd’s support for nationalist and border line Stalinist George Galloway, or his support for the ISO party line of “supporting the Iraqi resistance” (see Stephen Shalom’s dismantling of the ISO’s one dimensional position on this at Znet:http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=7933) really represent something more liberating than the Democrats.
Many of us are looking for a consistent class based critique of _all_ elites, and we see in Todd’s platform a sort of shallow “anti-imperialist” or “enemy of my enemy is my friend” stance that often turns a blind eye to the authoritarianism of opponents of the U.S. Of course U.S. imperialism has to be resisted, but it is part of a broader set of social relations that create elites in the first place.
Todd and the ISO always insist they have no idea what anyone is talking about when people chafe under the stifling organizational control of their group, and readers must decide for themselves whether all of these complaints are really coming from McCarthyites and Red Baiters, or whether there is something the ISO actually does to garner all of these criticisms.
For many, Todd represents another boss, another mediator of people’s desires, and not any sort of increase in self control over our own lives. Follow his advice and don’t settle for the lesser of two evils. Don’t vote Chretien for Senate.
Sincerely,
Dave Carr
http://userhttp://www.sfsu.edu/%7Emotopu/attemptfixisonuts.htm
you will find some of Todd Chretien's sectarian rants against activists in the San Francisco State chapter of Students Against War.
Anticipating Todd shouting "red baiter" in response to this post, interested readers may view this thread to see my defense against recent ISO charges against me (see the comments section) and decide for themselves:
http://www.indybay.org/news/2006/02/1803611.php
With all Todd's talk of the evils of lesser evilism, I feel compelled to agree with him on this point. While Todd has a good reformist platform, he is a lesser evil, not a revolutionary (and I can’t see him as any sort of Green either). I know Matt Gonzalez is endorsing Todd, but it is a lesson learned. I'm really starting to see the senselessness of voting for a newer "better" boss to fix things from above for us.
Todd, I welcome your criticism of me, but I wonder if you can address any of the issues I raise in my writings rather than just sticking to your usual politician's talking points, and knee jerk hurling of the terms "red baiter" and "McCarthyite".
I've been labeled an "internet activist" with "too much time on my hands" by ISO folks attempting to dismiss my criticisms. That is a disingenuous attempt to negate the fact that I've been involved in action and theory for a while now, although admittedly, I've only just recently become more critical of Leninist Vanguard organizing tactics, the kind Todd and the ISO adhere to. No, this is not an attack on Socialism. The ISO tends to downplay that much of the criticism of their manipulative actions in "coalitions" (often really front groups) they participate in come from their left, not from red baiting McCarthyites, but from Left Communists, Situationist influenced people, anarchists, and people who don’t identify as any particular school of thought. This is not to say that criticisms from others don't have any merit, but it is to say that the criticism really is not always from their right.
I’ve noticed Todd often defends his positions by obfuscation, typically saying something about how he regrets anyone spending so much time criticizing his track record ---as seen in the ISOnuts pamphlet and the SAW listserv debate at:
http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=20050529001500670
and http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=20050531124816353&query=ISO%2Balienates%2B
and hopes they’ll spend more time doing something “positive”. This seems to be his way of avoiding actual debate, while attempting to appear to have more integrity than those calling him out for past actions and his rigid ideological stances.
If people believe the ISO claims that I'm some lone crusader, I encourage them to follow the many links in ISOnuts, and at the indybay link above. Criticisms of the ISO are too ubiquitous to be discounted as crank conspiracy theories. Rather they represent the efforts and views of many many people in an anti-authoritarian Left, which is very critical of bosses and vanguard parties like the ISO. This is not empty rhetoric, it is backed up by countless first hand accounts.
This is in no way meant as a defense of Feinstein who indeed has been pro-war. But ask yourself if Todd’s support for nationalist and border line Stalinist George Galloway, or his support for the ISO party line of “supporting the Iraqi resistance” (see Stephen Shalom’s dismantling of the ISO’s one dimensional position on this at Znet:http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=7933) really represent something more liberating than the Democrats.
Many of us are looking for a consistent class based critique of _all_ elites, and we see in Todd’s platform a sort of shallow “anti-imperialist” or “enemy of my enemy is my friend” stance that often turns a blind eye to the authoritarianism of opponents of the U.S. Of course U.S. imperialism has to be resisted, but it is part of a broader set of social relations that create elites in the first place.
Todd and the ISO always insist they have no idea what anyone is talking about when people chafe under the stifling organizational control of their group, and readers must decide for themselves whether all of these complaints are really coming from McCarthyites and Red Baiters, or whether there is something the ISO actually does to garner all of these criticisms.
For many, Todd represents another boss, another mediator of people’s desires, and not any sort of increase in self control over our own lives. Follow his advice and don’t settle for the lesser of two evils. Don’t vote Chretien for Senate.
Sincerely,
Dave Carr
We are 100% volunteer and depend on your participation to sustain our efforts!
Donate
$210.00 donated
in the past month
Get Involved
If you'd like to help with maintaining or developing the website, contact us.
Publish
Publish your stories and upcoming events on Indybay.
Topics
More
Search Indybay's Archives
Advanced Search
►
▼
IMC Network