Resistance vs. Terrorism in Iraq

Resistance By Any Other Name

Axis of Logic, November 11, 2003

By Beth Henry

I watched the bombardment of Baghdad this past spring in horror. Later, and much worse, I saw pictures of Iraqis’ homes crushed into dust and jagged blocks, and of small Iraqi children wrapped in bloody cloths, lying in wooden coffins. I thought of my children, of my neighbors, and of their children.

How would I feel toward someone who would do this to us? What would I do?

How would I respond to their tanks rolling down my street, to their heavily armed troops raiding and searching our homes and setting up roadblocks at the entrance of our subdivision? How would I feel if we had to go about our business at gunpoint, stopped and challenged and frisked each time we crossed the boundaries of our neighborhood?

How would I respond if their bombs had deprived us of electricity during the steaming Texas summer; if we were confined to our hot, dark houses each night, listening to explosions and gunfire? How would I respond if we had no clean water, and our babies and toddlers were made sick from its lack, with no medical help available to save their lives?

How would I respond if most of the adults in our neighborhood were unemployed, unable to buy food for their families, while their corporations got contracts worth untold millions of dollars to do work we could and would do?

I would resist. I would do whatever I could to drive them out, to take back my home and my neighborhood and my country. And if I had lost children or other loved ones to their bombs and guns and landmines, I would be implacable in my rage and determination.

Were my neighbors and I to fight an occupying force, our actions would be legitimately called resistance, and no one on earth would blame us for it.

So how is Iraq different?

Saddam Hussein was a brutal and merciless dictator, yes. But how did he get into power, and how did he acquire so many of the weapons our government falsely claimed that he intended to use on us? It was our very own government, with our tax money, that enabled and empowered this despot, just as it has others throughout the world, Chile being a particularly horrifying example.

It was also our government, along with the UN, that inflicted more than ten years of cruelest economic sanctions in memory, punctuated with weekly bombings, that cost the lives of at least 500,000 Iraqi children.

Add to that the ruthless bombardment of Iraq this past spring, which killed thousands of Iraqis, and destroyed much of their life-supporting infrastructure. Are we actually so naďve and so arrogant as to expect gratitude?

Our leaders certainly are. They claim that our young people, coming home dead and wounded in increasing numbers as the violence in Iraq escalates, were attacked by foreigners, terrorists, insurgents, and die-hard remnants of Hussein’s regime. However, if some actual terrorists are in Iraq right now, which we have good reason to believe, they have only arrived since the U.S. attack on that country created optimal conditions in which they could operate.

Bush and his advisors would have us believe that terrorists, evil-doers who hate us and cannot stand the thought of a free and peaceful Iraq, are behind all of this carnage. They stubbornly stand by their claim that Iraqis love us, and are just tickled silly to be living under foreign occupation.

They want our news media to ignore the flag-draped boxes arriving almost daily in Dover, and to look at the good things that are happening in Iraq.

Their most recent way of telling us that 2+2=5 is to persuade news outlets in this country to use more acceptable terminology when they refer to those who attack our troops.

On November 3, 2003, Los Angeles Times assistant managing editor Melissa McCoy sent a memo to reporters covering the war in Iraq. These were her instructions:

“We have, in recent days, referred to those attacking American forces in Iraq as "resistance fighters." Although this term is not inaccurate on its face, it conveys unintended meaning. To many, it romanticizes the work and goals of those killing GIs. We should avoid using it outside of quoted material.

The terms "insurgents" and "guerrillas" are also accurate descriptors and are preferred in this context. Please use them instead.”

Note that she admits that the term “resistance fighters” is “not inaccurate on its face…” At least she admits that much. Our faux fly-boy of a President, however, constantly describes Iraq as the current front in the war on terror. Those who attack our troops could not possibly be Iraqis resisting the occupation of their country, enraged by the deaths of so many of their neighbors and family members, appalled at the destruction of their cities.

They must be terrorists.

Before the Bush regime got hold of it, the word terrorism had a very specific definition. It was used to describe people who attack largely civilian populations, intending not only to kill them, but also to use fear of such attacks as political leverage.

Now it is subject, verb, adjective, and adverb in every sentence in which Bush describes any opposition to his first-strike doctrine, or anyone who resists his stated intention to restructure the Middle East.

W’s Press Secretary Scott McClellan concluded the White House Press Briefing today (November 10, 2003), by stating that the aim of the invasion and occupation of Iraq “is central to prevailing in the war on terrorism and making the Middle East a place that is no longer a breeding ground for terrorism.”

Yes, foreigners have brought terrorism to Iraq. But not across its border with Syria. Not from Yemen or Saudi Arabia. Not in the beginning, anyway. Terrorism found its way into the Middle East from across the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea, when the United States and Europe decided that because they depend on Arab oil, they have a moral right to take it by any means necessary.

Zionist terrorism has made the Palestinians the world’s most persecuted refugees. U.S. terrorism is the means by which the Shah attained power in Iran, having overthrown a democratically elected leader. Terrorism accurately describes U.S. policy in any country to which troops are deployed in order to effect “regime change.”

So let’s at least be truthful with our terminology. When another country mounts an unprovoked campaign of bombing and invasion of another country with the goal of installing a government more to its advantage, that is terrorism. It is a criminal act, and when committed by a country as powerful as the United States, it is the act of a bully.

When people in the country under attack, or in neighboring countries who have good reason to believe they will be next in line, counter such an attack and occupation with violence, that is resistance.

You see, all we have to do is follow George W.’s inspirational advice. “Like your neighbor as you’d like to be liked yourself.” Don’t bomb them. Don’t throw them to the ground and put your boots on their necks. Don’t invade their houses and insult their culture and religion. Don’t starve their children. Put yourselves in their places.

Yes, put yourselves in what’s left of their homes, mourning what’s left of their loved ones. Remember how Saddam Hussein first came into power, and who supported him. Imagine watching helplessly as your home is ransacked and your children terrorized. Imagine the heavy boot of the occupation on your own neck.

Then draw your own conclusion. Are you a resistance fighter, or a terrorist?

Do you really even care what they call you, so long as they just get the hell out of your country?

Beth Henry lives near the Texas Gulf Coast with her husband and two children. She has worked as a technical writer and security analyst for NASA contractors. She does not hate neo-conservatives; she just feels better when they’re not in charge.

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printed from Resistance vs. Terrorism in Iraq on 2004-06-03 15:24:10