I spoke to a few Iraqis here in the prelude to the invasion. Since they
were in exile because of Saddam, many were all for regime change. They
weren't so keen on their relatives and friends in Iraq being bombed. And
many did not want a US occupation, either. When the library and museum in
Baghdad were allowed to be looted when the army reached Baghdad, their anger
was profound, and in retrospect it seems to have been a sign of what was to
come.
To be against the invasion was not equivalent to being for Saddam; there
were many much more nuanced arguments, to do with fears of what might happen
(most of which did and are happening) and horror at the idea of preemptive
war. That's an old libel, and an inaccurate one. I have often wondered
what happened to Hitchens around that time, that he could swallow such bad
faith.
Best
A
On 24/5/05 3:03 AM, "Christopher Walker" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> <snip>
> First I wonder just who this 'left' comprises.
> <snip>
>
> The internal opposition was, inevitably, difficult to read. Judging by the
> attitude of Iraqi exiles in my part of the world, the opposition was split.
> The (Shi'a) al-Khoei Foundation is a few minutes' walk from here. Sheikh
> Abdul Majid al-Khoei, who was the cleric hacked to death in Najaf, broadly
> supported the 'intervention'. There were many local Iraqis who did not. (I
> doubt if all of them were Sunni, either.) And there were several Iraqi
> commentators who predicted, ante bellum, precisely what has happened: a
> Sunni insurgency once Saddam was overthrown.
>
> I also don't recall anyone stressing 'the cost of the Iraq intervention as
> against the cost of domestic expenditure', as Hitchens appears to have
> claimed. Unless I've missed something (I may have done) that's a straw man.
>
> As to the Kurds, far from deciding to 'scab and blackleg on the Kurds',
> there were many who saw 'intervention' as very threatening to the Kurds.
> Mark, I seem to remember, suggested that very thing on this list. His
> thinking (I agreed with him) was typical of many who opposed the war even
> though, in the event, that has (so far) proved to be one of the less
> problematic parts of this business.
Alison Croggon
Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
Editor, Masthead: http://masthead.net.au
Home page: http://alisoncroggon.com
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