http://shieldofachilles.blogspot.com...hs-about-iraq-...

Here are just some of the ways the media either misunderstands Iraq,
or deliberately distorts it:


Myth 1) We are losing the war
The war is actually a stalemate right now. If we are losing then the
terrorists must be winning. Problem is, they don't dare openly
control
any territory and disappear pretty quickly whenever any coalition
forces or ISF (Iraqi Security Forces) show up. Moreover, they haven't
achieved any of their objectives other than terrorizing the
population. Casualty wise, we are certainly winning. And while we
have
captured thousands of insurgents, they have captured only a very
small
handful of US soldiers. We made a great deal of progress initially,
but then it stagnated. So why aren't we doing better? Progress now is
difficult because we are simply too divorced from the culture,
language, and society. We can't blend in with the population or go
deep undercover to root out the insurgents from their lairs. We don't
spend much time socializing with the locals and hearing the latest
rumors. We're getting better, but its always been hard for us to
always know what's going on, even just outside the gates to our
bases.
Part of the reason for this is on us, but part of it is simply Iraqi
culture. In any case, for this reason, the Iraqis really do have to
be
in charge (and they are), but they can't do it alone. Not yet.


Myth 2) Every time we kill/capture an insurgent, more just takes his
place, so the war is just creating more terrorists.
This is true to a point, but there is also the other side of the
coin.
Every time terrorists kill an Iraqi national, it drives his family
members to want to fight the terrorists - many join the ISF (Iraqi
security forces) for this reason, and are among the best and most
loyal I have ever met. Unfortunately, many join a competing terrorist
group to take out their revenge instead.


Myth 3) Iraq is in a Civil War/Not in a Civil War
Neither is exactly a myth; This is actually entirely how you define
civil war. It certainly isn't what you imagine as a classical example
of Civil War, such as the US or Spanish Civil Wars. There aren't two
clearly definable sides to the conflict. Each insurgent group (and
there are many) is either Sunni or Shia, never mixed. But even these
groups fight among themselves and both fight against US troops or
Iraqi forces. If the US completely pulled out, my prediction is that
it would turn into open civil war, with more easily definable sides
as
factions join together to create as large a force as possible. The
danger is that the surrounding nations would also get involved, and
could be a very messy war.


Myth 4) It's a scandal that we didn't have more body armor for the
troops or vehicles at the start of the war
This one really galls me and I hear it a lot. Its strange that people
who allege this didn't see it also as a scandal that Clinton didn't
have body armor for soldiers in Somalia, Bosnia, or for that matter,
any President in any prior war in US history (we have had flak
jackets
since Vietnam, but they stop shrapnel only - they aren't
bulletproof).
The reason why not every soldier had the IBA at the start was that it
was just being introduced for the very first time when the invasion
took place! Now there is some misunderstanding on this among the
public - if police departments have had bulletproof vests for a long
time, why did it take the military so long to get them? The types of
vests that police use would be pretty useless out here. Police vests
stop handguns only, they don't stop any rifles unless they are of a
very low caliber, and can't stop armor piercing bullets at all. The
IBA is capable of stopping almost every kind of bullet there is (at
least for a few hits). But it is bulky and hot as hell in the
summertime!! Incredibly, some people are calling for more armor, like
full arm and leg protection... I would ask them to try themselves
going through an Iraqi Summer with all that on!! Also incredibly,
sometimes the press is still claiming we don't have enough body
armor,
which hasn't been true for the last three years.
Vehicle armor is a little different issue, and to be fair, plenty of
soldiers don't agree with me here. I feel the administration could
have done more, but not much. If, before the war, Rumsfeld tried to
budget hundreds of millions for armor upgrade kits for Humvees,
congress would have slammed him for it, and rightly so. There was no
justifiable reason to spend millions of $$ to put armor on a vehicles
that still couldn't stand up to even the weakest Iraqi tank. Keep in
mind that Humvees were meant to be military cars, like jeeps. They
weren't supposed to be armored fighting vehicles. For that job we
already had the Abrams tank, the Bradley, or the M113. But shortly
after the invasion, it was decided that these vehicles were not ideal
for regularly patrolling city streets, so they decided to go with
Humvees for some patrols. I guess they could have waited a couple
months until more uparmored Humvees were available, but that would
have given the insurgents a faster head start. I'm not sure if there
really is a perfect answer here.


Myth 5) The war was illegal
It may have been immoral, if that's your opinion (not mine), but the
war was technically legal. The UN had a mandatory resolution (no.
687)
on Iraq authorizing the use of force if they didn't comply with
inspections. Saddam didn't comply for 10 years and we let him get
away
with it (although we bombed him sporadically during the Clinton
years). After such a long period of time, maybe it would have been
better to get another resolution, but that's another story.


Myth 6) Bush is to blame for all this violence
Bush is certainly most to blame or credit for the invasion, but
primary blame for sectarian violence is on those who actually commit
it. I saw this same attitude a couple years ago when so many
commentators blamed French society for the riots in Paris. I think
there is an element of racism here; as if Arabs or Muslims in general
just by nature can't help rioting or bombing other people, and so
Bush's war set them all off and now of course that's all they will
do.
But that's wrong. They can help it. They don't have to kill each
other
if they don't want to. If they don't want the US there, the Iraqi
government can now simply ask us to leave. Even if they were
justified
in attacking coalition forces, what justification is there for them
to
blow up oil pipelines, hospitals and even crowded market places? That
doesn't hurt us, it only hurts them.
Around May of 2006, there was a very shocking murder in the Monsour
neighborhood right next to ours. An 8 year-old boy was found dead
with
drill holes in his body and head. Let me say this plainly: an EIGHT
year old boy (same age as my daughter) was not just murdered, but
tortured several times with a power drill. I'm sorry if that sounds
upsetting (it upset me greatly) but there's no way to sugar coat it.
It was almost certainly done by the Jaysh Al Mahdi (Sadr's militia),
since drill torture is one of their trademark techniques. Now there's
no possible way this little boy was involved in terrorism. The only
purpose of this torture and murder was to terrorize that particular
Sunni neighborhood, and I'm sure it worked. Now in spite of all their
religious justifications (it's weird how every threatening letter
here
is signed "in the name of Allah, the compassionate, the merciful"!),
the terrorists are human beings and deep down even they know they are
doing something wrong. Of the hundreds of prisoners I have dealt
with,
some of whom were literally caught in the act, I have yet to see one
proudly admit he is fighting a just cause, or doing something right.
You know what insurgents do when they get caught? They cry, cry, cry
and deny, deny deny. Even if they are caught with overwhelming
evidence, they make the most ludicrous stories about their situation
(one guy claimed he was setting off bombs only to protect children
because children kept trying to play with them!!!), or they will
claim
they were forced to join the terrorists because of threats to their
family. It's usually not true, but even if true, I don't believe that
being threatened is a justifiable excuse for murdering innocent
people. Strangely, for all their ferocity, they are extremely docile
after capture and almost always spill their information very freely.
If they truly believed they were fighting a just cause, I believe
they
would resist capture a little more and be proud of their role, not
trying to deny it.


Myth 7) Soldiers rape, murder and torture
They do, but so do people everywhere. Certainly not at the rates you
see in the press. My experiences here have forced me to challenge
some
of my past assumptions. For example, years ago when I saw the movie
"Platoon", like everyone else I took it for granted that just like in
the film, soldiers in Vietnam regularly tortured/raped/killed
civilians, and got away with it. Now I am much more skeptical of
these
claims; I'm sure they happened, but I believe it may have been much
more rare than people assume. In my experience, only about 30% of
what
you see in the media about Iraq is accurate, especially for very
recent reports. I can't tell you how often a news report said
civilians were killed here or there in Baghdad, when I was there and
no such thing happened at all. Or three were killed but the news
outlets say 30. Or they label the dead as "civilians" when more
accurately they were actually armed insurgents in civilian clothes.
Moreover, there is no balance at all. On the very rare occasions when
a soldier was accused of rape, it makes front pages everywhere. Yet,
there have only been a handful of rape allegations in Iraq and even
fewer verdicts. Moreover, anytime you have between 100-200 thousand
people in one place, you are likely to have some incidents of rape
and
sexual assault. In fact, the rate out here is probably lower than the
US average. Heck, once in 2003 my unit stopped a rape in progress at
an Iraqi home. Did the press report it? Of course not, that's not
newsworthy to them.
In fact, going back to the murdered boy I spoke about earlier: the
press didn't report that either. And why should they? It happens here
every day. But one incident alone was far more egregious than all of
the "tortures" done at Abu Gharayb put together, yet Abu Gharayb was
splashed on the front page of the NYT at least two dozen times.
Speaking of Abu Gharayb, I have had Iraqi prisoners sent there on my
orders. A few of them were later released and I met them again (they
sometimes come back trying to find out what happened to other
prisoners, or looking for their missing belongings or some such).
This
was both before and after the big scandal broke. I asked them how
they
were treated, and not a single one of them told me he was abused
there. They did have plenty of complaints about the food, the length
of time, visitation, etc. But not abuse.
In any case, I think a lot of this distortion is because people want
to discredit Bush, and so they do it by criticizing the military,
like
they are one and the same. But I need to emphasize this: It is NOT
George W Bush's military! We are not his personal force. I have
served
since the Clinton years and seen very little difference in the way
the
military is run then and now. Bush is the Commander in Chief, but he
actually scarcely gets involved in the day to day operations.


Myth 8) We armed Saddam in the first place
I see this falsehood repeated a lot, and a lot of authors have tried
to cash in on it. The US did provide some assistance, but we never
directly sold weapons to Saddam. The US did sell some artillery
pieces
to Iraq, but the last was in 1967, before Saddam's time. During the
Iran-Iraq war, the US also sold some unarmed helicopters, and some US
companies sold chemicals, some of which were deceitfully used by
Saddam to help make chemical weapons later. But the chemicals
themselves were perfectly legal to sell, and Saddam was also buying
them from other countries anyway. Some other nations, had no such
qualms about weapon sales, and for some reason, are rarely criticized
for it. For example, France sold Saddam Roland missiles, Mirage
fighters and Super Etendard bombers, while Argentina sold thousands
of
anti-personnel mines. One popular weapon of choice among insurgents
is
a particular Italian-made anti-tank mine, which I myself saw dozens
of
times in Baghdad.


Myth 9) The US used chemical weapons in Fallujah
This was a huge lie spread over a year ago in a short film by RAI, an
Italian company, and was debunked, but not loudly enough in my
opinion. They showed footage of blackened bodies with Iraqis claiming
that it was done by napalm and white phosphorous from US attacks. But
they didn't seem to notice that the bodies still had clothes on them,
and the clothes weren't burnt at all! The bodies were actually dug
from the ground and were black from decomposition, not burning. In
any
case, napalm has never been used here to my knowledge, and in the
desert it wouldn't be very useful anyway. White phosphorous has been
used to smoke out insurgents, since it makes a lot of smoke, but it
doesn't work well as a weapon. But even if it was used as a weapon,
it
is not a chemical weapon under any international agreement. This is
an
important distinction, because every weapon on Earth, whether
bullets,
knives or bombs, uses chemicals.


Myth 10) The Iraqi people hate Americans and want to kill each other
I see this attitude among a lot of soldiers too. But believe it or
not, we still get cheers when we drive through Baghdad streets. The
locals know that at least while we are rolling through, the militias
and kidnappers will leave the area. The truth is, probably less than
1% of Iraqis want to kill Americans, and over 90% want the violence
to
end. But even 1% in a nation of 23 million is 230,000 people, so it's
still a lot of people! That's more than the coalition forces
combined.
The point is however, the vast majority of Iraqis are decent people,
and they really do want and end to the fighting and just to be able
to
live in a respectable country. I'm not just saying this in some
obligatory way. I have met many Iraqis that astounded me with their
character and courage. There are also several Iraqis that I still
keep
in contact with, am very proud to call my good friends, and would be
welcome in my home anytime. Believe it or don't.


Myth 11) No WMDs were found
It's true that no WMD making capability, or any brand new weapons
were
found. But saying "no WMDs were found" might be a surprise to the
convoy who had a sarin gas artillery shell IED explode on them in May
2004. It was on highway 8, in the middle of Baghdad, on a section of
road that coincidentally, my unit, the 1-1 Cavalry Squadron, had
turned over to 1-7 Cav just two months before. That was not the only
one either; hundreds of other shells were found, and there were brief
press releases about it. I have read much more of the reports, but
since most are still secret for some reason, I can't discuss them.
But
the bottom line is, while it probably won't appease critics of the
war, illegal WMDs were found.