Norm Geras has a post that starts out detailing seven reports of atrocities committed in Iraq. Atrocities committed by terrorists on Iraqi civilians. He does this to introduce an opinion from the Guardian by columnist Gary Younge. Geras then proceeds to point out the problem with Younge's assessment.
That's just a small number of reports from June 2006. As is now all too well known, I could easily have added to them. (See here, for example, those links which are for incidents in Iraq.) But they suffice as a backdrop against which to highlight what I want to, which is an argument by Gary Younge from a couple of days ago. He's writing about 'the slew of alleged atrocities committed by the US military in Iraq', and in this context he says:
To treat even these few incidents as isolated chapters is to miss the broader, enduring narrative. For these are not the unfathomable offshoots of this war but the entirely foreseeable corollaries of it. This is what occupation is; this is what occupation does. There is nothing specifically American about it. Any nation that occupies another by force will meet resistance. For that resistance to be effective, it must have deep roots in local communities where opposition to the occupation is widespread. Unable to distinguish between insurgent and civilian, occupiers will regard all civilians as potential insurgents and all territory as enemy territory.
And he concludes:
If the wanton murder of civilians is what it takes to complete your mission, there is clearly something wrong with the mission.
Let me make it clear that my point in drawing attention to the reports with which I began is not to draw attention away from any atrocities that have been committed in Iraq by US soldiers. At Haditha and elsewhere, if there have been transgressions of the laws of war by American personnel, then they should be investigated and prosecuted. What is breathtaking about Younge's piece, however, is the structure of justifying advocacy it contains. He talks of the wanton murder of civilians in order to delegitimize the US occupation, while passing over the fact that, almost daily, wanton murder is being committed by forces opposed to the occupation, and as a way of defeating not only the occupation itself but also political arrangements democratically voted for by the Iraqi people. It's just as if this weren't happening or else had no troubling moral implications in Younge's head. No, on the other side of things, there is just 'resistance' – almost like a natural phenomenon, beyond right and wrong, good or evil. How come it doesn't occur to him that if 'the wanton murder of civilians' – week in and week out – is part of the resistance to occupation, then there is 'clearly something wrong' with this so-called resistance? And how come he doesn't then go on to ask what it would mean if this so-called resistance were to enjoy the triumph of bringing about a coalition withdrawal? How come there isn't a two-sided assessment of the aforesaid 'mission', informed by all those wanton murders with which I began? It seems that wanton murder in Iraq doesn't show up on Younge's radar unless it's Americans who are responsible for it. (Emphasis added.)
That is exactly the parameter that is being avoided by all the people who are decrying the American efforts in Iraq. This is not one-sided. There are truly bad elements on the other side who are doing their best to cause America to withdraw. How bad would it be in Iraq if the US does withdraw? Would it be better? I don't think it would. Geras doesn't think so, either.
