[lit-ideas] Re: Willie Pete, well, okay, a little bit

From: JimKandJulieB@xxxxxxx
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Thu, 17 Nov 2005 17:29:19 EST

Riverbend's take on it:

_Baghdad Burning_ (http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/)

<<Thursday, November 17, 2005

Conventional Terror...

_It sat on my PC desktop for five days. _
(http://www.rainews24.rai.it/ran24/inchiesta/video/fallujah_ING.wmv)

The first day I read about it on the internet, on some site, my heart sank.
White phosphorous in Falloojeh. I knew nothing about white phosphorous, of
course, and a part of me didnât want to know the details. I tried
downloading
the film four times and was almost relieved when I got disconnected all four
times.

E. had heard about the film too and one of his friends S. finally brought it
by on CD. He and E. shut themselves up in the room with the computer to
watch the brief documentary. E. came out half an hour later looking pale- his
lips tightened in a straight line, which is the way he looks when heâs
pensive... thinking about something he'd rather not discuss.

âHey- I want to see it tooââ I half-heartedly called out after him, as
he
walked S. to the door.

âItâs on the desktop- but you really donât want to see it.â E. said.

I avoided the computer for five days because every time I switched it on,
the file would catch my eye and call out to meâ now plaintively- begging to
be
watched, now angrily- condemning my indifference.

Except that it was never indifferenceâ it was a sort of dread that sat deep
in my stomach, making me feel like I had swallowed a dozen small stones. I
didnât want to see it because I knew it contained the images of the dead
civilians I had in my head.

Few Iraqis ever doubted the American use of chemical weapons in Falloojeh. We
âve been hearing the terrifying stories of people burnt to the bone for well
over a year now. I just didnât want it confirmed.

I didnât want it confirmed because confirming the atrocities that occurred
in Falloojeh means verifying how really lost we are as Iraqis under American
occupation and how incredibly useless the world is in general- the UN, Kofi
Annan, humanitarian organizations, clerics, the Pope, journalistsâ you name
it-
weâve lost faith in it.

I finally worked up enough courage to watch it and it has lived up to my
worst fears. Watching it was almost an invasive experience, because I felt
like
someone had crawled into my mind and brought my nightmares to life. Image
after image of men, women and children so burnt and scarred that the only way
you could tell the males apart from the females, and the children apart from
the adults, was by the clothes they are wearingâ the clothes which were
eerily
intact- like each corpse had been burnt to the bone, and then dressed up
lovingly in their everyday attire- the polka dot nightgown with a lace
collarâ
the baby girl in her cotton pajamas- little earrings dangling from little ears.

Some of them look like they died almost peacefully, in their sleepâ others
look like they suffered a great deal- skin burnt completely black and falling
away from scorched bones.

I imagine what it must have been like for some of them. They were probably
huddled in their houses- some of them- tens of thousands of them- couldnât
leave the city. They didnât have transport or they simply didnât have a
place
to go. They sat in their homes, hoping that what people said about Americans
was actually true- that in spite of their huge machines and endless weapons,
they were human too.

And then the rain of bombs would beginâ the wooooosh of the missiles as they
fell and the sound of the explosion as it hit its targetâ and no matter how
prepared you think you are for that explosion- it always makes you flinch. I
imagine their children covering their ears and some of them crying, trying to
cover up the mechanical sounds of war with their more human wails. I imagine
that as the tanks got closer, and the planes got lower- the fear increased-
and parents searched each otherâs faces for a solution, for a way out of the
horror. Some of them probably decided to wait it out in their homes, and
others must have been desperate to get out- fearing the rain of concrete and
steel and thinking their chances were better in the open air, than confined in
the homes that could at any moment turn into their tombs.

Thatâs what we were told before the Americans came- itâs safer to be
outside of the house during an air strike than it is to be inside of the
house.
Inside of the house, a missile nearby would turn the windows into millions of
little daggers and walls might come crashing down. In the garden, or even the
street, youâd only have to worry about shrapnel and debris if the bomb was
very close- but what were the chances of that?

That was before 2003â and certainly before Falloojeh.

That was before men, women and children left their homes only to be engulfed
in a rain of fire.

Last year I blogged about Falloojeh and said:

_âThere is talk of the use of cluster bombs and other forbidden weaponry.â
_
(http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/2004_11_01_riverbendblog_archive.html#110003558181121517)

I was immediately attacked with a barrage of emails from Americans telling
me I was a liar and that there was no proof and that there was no way
Americans would ever do something so appalling! I wonder how those same people
justify this now. Are they shocked? Or do they tell themselves that Iraqis
arenât
people? Or are they simply in denial?

The Pentagon spokesman recently said:

_"It's part of our conventional-weapons inventory and we use it like we use
any other conventional weapon,"_
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051116/pl_nm/iraq_usa_phosphorus_dc_2;_ylt=AgdFF_4lSCBbdFP64V7ORgZsbEwB;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mB
HNlYwMlJVRPUCUl)

This war has redefined âconventionalâ. It has taken atrocity to another
level. Everything we learned before has become obsolete. âConventionalâ
has
become synonymous with horrifying. Conventional weapons are those that eat
away
the skin in a white blaze; conventional interrogation methods are like those
practiced in Abu Ghraib and other occupation prisonsâ

Quite simplyâ conventional terror. >>

========Original Message========
Subj: [lit-ideas] Re: Willie Pete, well, okay, a little bit Date: 11/16/05
7:28:11 PM Central Standard Time From: _andreas@xxxxxxxxxxxx
(mailto:andreas@xxxxxxxxxxx) To: _lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
(mailto:lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx)
Sent on:
> Yet WP is not outlawed.

Use of white phosphorus is not specifically banned by any treaty. However,
there is a debate
on whether white phosphorous is a chemical weapon and thus outlawed by the
Chemical Weapons
Convention (CWC) which went into effect in April of 1997. The CWC is
monitored by the
Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. The spokesman for that
organization,
Peter Kaiser, stated that white phosphorus was not against the convention if
it was used as
a lighting agent, but "If on the other hand the toxic properties of white
phosphorus, the
caustic properties, are specifically intended to be used as a weapon, that
of course is
prohibited, because the way the Convention is structured or the way it is in
fact applied,
any chemicals used against humans or animals that cause harm or death
through the toxic
properties of the chemical are considered chemical weapons."

However, even when it is used as a weapon, it may be argued that it is not
the toxic
properties of white phosphorus, but the heat which is produced by its
deployment, and thus
white phosphorous is not a chemical weapon, but an incendiary weapon.

As to its use as an incendiary weapon, the 1980 Convention on Conventional
Weapons (Protocol
III) prohibits the use of air-delivered incendiary weapons against civilian
populations or
indiscriminate incendiary attacks against military forces co-located with
civilians.

However, the protocol also specifically excludes weapons whose incendiary
effect is
secondary, such as smoke grenades. This has been often read as excluding
white phosphorus
munitions from the protocol, as well.

The United States is among the nations that are parties to the convention
but have not
signed Protocol III.

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[lit-ideas] Re: Willie Pete, well, okay, a little bit

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