By
Hanady Kader,
Matt Lutton,
Trevor Klein
February 26, 2007
We expect a certain amount of safety as students, and fortunately, we get it. But not all college students across the world are so lucky, and we take this fact for granted. If school were a life and death situation each and every day, would we go?
Unfortunately for students in Iraq, going to school has turned into just that: having to make the choice between getting an education and staying alive. In a seemingly senseless act of violence in the midst of a senseless war, a suicide bomber blew himself up outside a college campus in Baghdad on Sunday in front of the business school at Mustansiriyah University, a school that also suffered explosions last month. A bomber, who had a belt rigged with explosives, attempted to get past security guards at the entrance, and the explosion rocked the area during a period of midterm examinations, killing dozens of students and injuring dozens more.
If the same thing happened to the UW School of Business outside of Balmer Hall, we would be in utter shock and disbelief. And we would be outraged. The amounts of disturbing news that come out of Iraq have become so commonplace for us that we barely flinch when we read the latest headlines sprinkled with body counts.
But as disturbing as bombings are, the problems in Iraq reach far beyond the explosions that occur on a nearly daily basis. The bombings are leading to a severe case of brain drain, and America's political decision-makers can talk about a pullout or troop build up until they turn blue in the face. But if they can't find a way to entice educated and trained Iraqis to stay in their own country, then what happens after the war dies down is a big question mark. Iraqis are leaving their country by the tens of thousands each month without looking back. Are Americans ready to face the fact that it does not appear there will be enough people to run the country once the violence stops?
As recently as the late 90s, Iraq was the thriving go-to place in the Middle East for its education and medical facilities. The country has a wealth of resources at its disposal: Besides the oil reserves it contains, it is also the world's Fertile Crescent, and if the country can get its act together with help from the United States and the international community, it could thrive again. The question is, do Americans want that for Iraq?
Our condolences go out to the friends and families of the Iraqi students who died this weekend in a senseless act of violence. Better security needs to be implemented to protect what is looking like the dimming future of Iraq.
1 Comments
#1 Brianna
on February 26, 2007 at 12:52 p.m.(Denver, CO | Unverified Name)
Headlines routinely blare the horror that besets the people of Iraq.
January 16- “100 Killed and 245 Wounded in Baghdadâ€
January 22 – “Market Bombs Kill 100 in 2 Iraqi citiesâ€
February 6 – “Dozens Killed As Baghdad Crackdown Nearsâ€
In this country, political leaders and pundits of all stripes speak of the terrible violence tearing at Iraq as if the US invasion and occupation have had nothing to do with it. Neo-conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer wrote recently that “Iraqis were given their freedom, and yet many have chosen civil war. Among all these religious prejudices, ancient wounds, social resentments and tribal antagonisms, who gets the blame for the rivers of blood? You can always count on some to find the blame in America.â€
An essential point for Krauthammer – “freedom†is not “given†through military invasion and occupation. For almost four full years now, the people in Iraq have been living a recurring nightmare of death and destruction that commenced with the U.S. invasion in March 2003. The British medical journal Lancet recently published a study which indicated that 655,000 people – children, women, and men – who would not have died otherwise have died as a result of the caldron of devastation and violence that has torn through Iraq in those four years. This is what the policies and military of the Bush Regime have brought to Iraq.
It is true that deep seated and complex conflicts have erupted in Iraq. It is quite possible – even likely - that some of this violence could increase in the context of a U.S. withdrawal.
But the most fundamental problem confronting the people of Iraq is that it is under military occupation by a foreign power. And it is an irrefutable fact that the torrents of violence ripping at Iraq began and were triggered when it was invaded by the US military. One thing that must be understood – the US military is not occupying Iraq as a “peacekeeping†force. American troops have not been thrown into a civil war. American troops were sent to invade and conquer Iraq by George W. Bush and his regime. The American military has been directly responsible for the death and torture of countless Iraqi people. And nothing good can come out of this situation for the people of Iraq while its occupation by the US military continues.
American troops are not being sent to referee a civil war. George Bush and his crew are not sending more soldiers to mediate a conflict that somehow materialized despite his “good intentionsâ€. The American military is the primary source of the violence that has taken so many lives in Iraq. The American military, carrying out the Bush Regime policies of invasion and occupation, is the primary source of perpetrating and perpetuating that violence.
This is the truth. And the sooner people in this country confront that truth, and act on it by doing everything in their power to end the war and impeach Bush for war crimes. Now.
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