Ya gotta love this one. When asked about the looting in Iraq:

"Looting, he added, was not uncommon for countries that experience significant social upheaval. "Stuff happens," Rumsfeld said."

Reefense Secretary Rumsfeld quote of the week

Well, we experienced that in LA at least twice that I can remember!

1] Infamous Watt Riots

2] I think during the Rodney King/Police Officers trial

of Bush Senior's quotes.  It's the "looting thing".

...the British defence secretary who, earlier in the week before the looting got as bad, described relieving the regime of it's office equipment etc as "good practice".  What an idiot!

I mean, we only have riots after sports championships, Democratic National Conventions, World Trade Organization Meetings, or lay in the street to disrupt traffic, or to try and stop shipments of weapons to our toops.

Sheesh, what the heck would happen here if we'd been under the boot of a tyrant for 24 years.  I'm kinda thinking all bets would be off.

There'd be a LOT of pissed off people running around trying to believe, comprehend, embrace or digest the fact that they don't have to wake up in fear for their life if they step out of line. Christ, personally, I'd want to skin one of the regime leaders alive.

I don't in any way shape or form condone, approve of or support looting, theft or the hacking into small bits of "holy men," but I totally understand why it's happening.

Yeah, and you gotta ask yourself, was the Bush administration prepared for this "looting thing" and did thay plan for it. The graphic images on TV of Iraqis running out of a bank in a northern Iraqi city, using money as confetti would seem to answer that question. MfSD.

views the looting as a sign of sucess. Few attempts have been made to curb the looting and a great effort has been made to tell the world about it.

Puleeeeze!  Sure! President Bush really wanted the looting to occur.  Just look at all the good publicity that the his administration is receiving because of it.  I don't feel that we were quite prepared for the level that is occurring, but remember, our troops are still going after members and supporters of Saddam's regime.  It's war.  War contains a lot of chaos.  All wars do.  I do agree that Rumsfield's comment damn sure was inappropriate.  It was a very poor choice of words.  I think that, overall, he is a good Secretary of Defense, but he certainly has made some mistakes.  In any case, the Bush administration certainly is not happy about the looting.  They are preparing to send approximately 1,200 military police into the area, as a start, to help restore some kind of order.  The Iraqis are experiencing emotions and thoughts that we in this country can not even begin to imagine.  The looting is certainly wrong, but let's not let cynicism about the President cloud our judgement.  Other than that, I have absolutely not opinion at all on the subject.

and protect the Baghdad museum.  It is a fix location unlike hospital sites which are many and spread all over town.

I understand that initial looting is inevitable and generally accept the decision of allowing the letting off of stream and the tough love of forcing the population to organize a form of neighborhood watch and self policing.

However, just like the coalition's painstaking plans to avoid damages to historic and archaeological sites, the planners should place more thoughts on protecting the Iraqi heritage displayed in the museum.  Those are artistic and historical treasures that belonged to all humanities.

Shouldn't the National Gallery or the Louvre be protected if similar situation happened in DC or Paris?

Sorry Nicole, hasn't had me chuckling all day long.

In addition to the numerous deaths of both civilian and military (on both both sides), the oncoming famine, the loss of water and power in Baghdad and other major cities with more death and disease surely to follow, you can add the loss of a world treasure. The National Museum of Iraq has been stripped of 170,000 artifacts and relics by looters (NYTimes.com, April 11, 2003). Archaeologists had long warned that the looting and pillaging resulting from the fall of Baghdad would result in this. If the U.S. would have sent in a limited force, the Museum could have been saved.

This loss ranks high in the history of world's tragedies, such as the fire that destroyed the great library at Alexandria, or the mass hysteria symbolized by the Nazi book burnings.

Well, we've sure put the Iraqis in their place. First, we bomb them into submission to liberate them. Then we destroy their historical records going back some 7000 years. Only, it's not just their heritage - it's ours too, but just a memory now.

Maybe I'll laugh some other day.

-- Modified on 4/12/2003 7:02:26 PM

comparison of our situation in Iraq and Patton's situation in WWII, not about the looting.

I think we can all agree that the loss of the National Museum's artifacts is a tragedy.

Bush did not want the looting and I am sure he does not support looting but as a political tool it could not have happened at a better time. Bush has delayed controlling the looting as a tool of war, knowing that internal unrest could only help our war and political efforts. Our military could have controlled looting two weeks ago but deliberately ignored the problem.

How many of you are aware that our cantankerous Secretary of Defense is also a poet. Yes his words resonate with a simplicity and spare beauty that is hard to dismiss.

I include this link as a sort of goof. I understand that some of you may take offense with the lack of basic tact demonstrated by those in charge of this war. At the same time I hope you can recognize that everything seems to have turned out almost exactly as they said it would and we appear to be on the verge of having pulled off a major international police action with a minimum loss of life and property and by all rights the Iraqi people seem to be in a much better position than they were a month ago. Not that this was our only intention. The US fought this war as a sort of 'honor killing' based on demonstrating to this war-like part of the world that we will simply NOT be fucked with. It is unfortunate that we had to dress it up in all this other secondary bullshit (Democracy, WMD..) But the fact is that we have just utterly dominated and conquered another nation and what we do from here on out will demonstrate that we can wield this sort of power in a humanistic and honorable way. The whole world is watching after all.

So my point is I guess that sometimes the people that are entrusted with these types of responsibilities will NOT be the type that can hold forth with charming repartee at the best cocktail parties. Except for Rummy of course. He seems to have a way with words if you ask me. "Stuff" does "Happen"!! What do you want the man to say?? I'd buy him a drink any day.

Thanks you for listening.

-- Modified on 4/12/2003 11:40:03 PM

-- Modified on 4/12/2003 11:41:23 PM

"Then we destroy their historical records going back some 7000 years".

We didn`t destroy it, the looters destroyed it. They acted, I`m sure, for a number of different reasons. Anger and greed being at the top of the list.

I only mention this because ultimately, the looters have to take responsibility for their actions. I find it odd that some of the same people who are preaching gloom and doom in Iraq because of the looting are some of the same people who gave a pass socially to the rioters in L.A. after the first Rodney King verdict because they felt that the oppressed could be expected to act in that manner. I don`t know your views 2sense, so I don`t include you in that observance.

This whole idea that if it weren`t for the big bad U.S. bringing grief to Iraq.... death...famine...loss of utilities...and disease...everything would be okay is ridiculous.
Saddam and the useless U.N. had the chance to stop it and failed.
Now were in the proccess of fixing it.

If you want to blame someone for the museum, blame some guy at home in Iraq whose useing some ancient treasure as a breadbox.

You are making some blanket statements here that are very inaccurate as references.

You say there is an oncoming famine as if it is an accepted and completely unavoidable certainty, where is your empirical evidence?

You state that, “Archaeologists had long warned that the looting and pillaging resulting from the fall of Baghdad would result in this” relative to the looting and purloining of artifacts in the national museum.  Can you point me to some sources please? I read a lot, but I haven’t been able to find those references yet.

You use the burning and destruction of the Royal Library at Alexandria as another example of tragic losses of knowledge.  In the case of the Royal Library it is generally attributed to one of three people

1. Julius Caesar – In 48 BC the library was supposedly burned down accidentally when a “clearing” fire set by Roman Troops went out of control and spread to the Library.

2. Theopholis - Was the Patriarch of Alexandria from 385 to 412 AD, and the Temple of Sarapis was converted to a Christian Church around 391 AD. Many documents are believed to have been destroyed at that time.

3. Caliph Omar - In 640 AD the Moslems took the city of Alexandria. The Caliph has been quoted as saying of the Library's holdings, "they will either contradict the Koran, in which case they are heresy, or they will agree with it, so they are superfluous.”  The story is that all the texts were destroyed by using them as tinder for the bathhouses of the city.

In none of the above cases is the destruction of the documents and knowledge contained within the Royal Library attributed to looters or rioting of recently liberated indigenous peoples.

The book burning by the Nazi’s was not symbolic of National Hysteria as you mention, but more a mechanism of a methodical and diabolical campaign to purge the Nazi-run, German state of any and all resources that ran anathema to their agenda.  The book burnings were generally conducted in University Towns, and well organized to specifically target books written by Jewish Authors, or those containing objectionable materials.

You state “Well, we've sure put the Iraqis in their place. First, we bomb them into submission to liberate them. Then we destroy their historical records going back some 7000 years. Only, it's not just their heritage - it's ours too, but just a memory now.”

I’m not aware that we (the Citizens, Armed Forces or anyone else from the USA) walked into their National Library and destroyed their history and legacy.  I’m pretty sure from what I saw that Iraqi citizens did it themselves.  

HPG

That was a very informative post HPG. I wish I could have put it so well.

The news out of Iraq just keeps getting better and better. Hopefully it will continue.

I remember seeing a news story where they showed an Iraqi looter in a library.... he/she wasn`t looting the books... he/she was throughing them on the ground to steal the shelves. Maybe they should think about reading some of them.

Exactly how would you have the President control the looting?  Would you have him order our officers in the field to use a platoon, a company, or a possibly an entire battalion of our soldiers to guard the museums and government buildings?  Be realistic.  This is a war.  We haven't even rooted out all of the snipers and pockets of resistance in Baghdad.  There is no way that we should weaken our position to save artifacts.  I know that it is a terrible tragedy that so many of the ancient articles of art have been looted, but there are much worse tragedies that occur in war.  We have been in Baghdad less than a week.  We are just beginning to increase the supply of water to people, and are just starting to work on the electrical plants for power.  But, then again, perhaps we should not have gone in militarily.  Perhaps, those more than a hundred children who refused to join the Baath Party Youth Group should still be in prison.  Perhaps we should have waited until after the next International Olympics, so that Iraqi athletes who failed to win a medal could be tortured upon their return to Iraq.  Plus, let's not forget about the children who were murdered by Iraq's version of Stalin and whose bodies were returned to their families with their eyes cut out.  Hmmmmmmm.....yes, perhaps we should have stayed home.  Then, we could all just put our heads in the sand and smile while living in some kind of goddamn fantasy world.  The terrible things that have happened over the last 3 1/2 weeks in this war are the reasons that whenever we go to war, we go in, get it over with as soon as possible, and then get out when the time is right.  I'm saddened by the loss of articles of ancient history, but I am more saddened by the loss of life which is a price for freedom that is paid from time to time over the course of history.  Freedom has never come cheap, and it will not be cheap in the future.  However, I will always avoid the leaders who chose Neville Chamberlain's path, and always chose to follow a path described by Winston Churchill.  Somehow, I think the future generations of Iraqis would agree.  Othere than that, I have absolutely no opinion on the subject.

My post was mostly in response to the post by 2sense who seems to think that had we sent in a limited military force, somehow the museum would not have been looted.  Not clear whether 2sense meant a limited military force for the invasion, or a limited military force to protect the museum.  The former makes no sense, and the latter was addressed in my last post.  
However, as far as WMD go, I would consider the extensive underground nuclear facility with very high RAD levels to fall in the catergory of WMD(not the lab itself, but what Saddam was developing there, of course).  I feel that we will find many more underground facilities relating to many different aspects of Saddam's rule.  I'm sure we will be able to thank the French for some of this, since they sold Saddam the type of tunneling equipment that was used to dig the Chunnel under the English Channel.  Kind of surprised that they haven't demanded that the name be changed to the French-English Channel, but the century is young.

I agrre with you position on the U.N. being involved with the rebuilding and policing of the post-war Iraq.  I like Dick Cheney, but I was not thrilled to read that a Halliburton(sp?) subsiduary seems to have gotten a contract to manage the fires on the oil wells without having to bid against other contractors.  That said, I am angry enough with the French Government that I don't want their involvement in the rebuilding of Iraq to begin until until that rebuilding is well under way.  I can respect their opinion on our military moves into Iraq, but the way that they did it was with such a lack of tact that, as far as I'm concerned, they can sit on the sidelines and watch for awhile.  I strongly suspect that we will find evidence that the French were dealing with Saddam on a level that smacks of strong support for his regime.  I feel the same way about the Russians, although their choice of words in their criticism didn't bother me as much as Chirac and his boys.  
I agree that our intelligence community could have done a much better job pre-9/11.  I think that a big problem there was the fact that there was not enough sharing of intelligence data between the CIA, FBI, and NSA.  I'm not surprised at this problem, considering the cuts in budgets and the way the hands of the CIA had been tied(a side effect of Vietnam that went on way too long IMHO).  When budget cuts and reductions take place as they did, an inevitable result is protecting of what is considered one's turf.  Thus, walls are built around these agencies.  Hopefully, that will not be as much of a problem in the future.  I suppose it is just like some of the side effects of downsizing in corporations.  People start protecting their own.  This war against terrorism, which is like no other war we have ever fought, will go on for a long, long time.  As long as extremists hijack religions and twist the real intentions of those religions to their own hateful purposes, we will be battling this threat.  The only religion I can think of myself that has not been used this way in history would be Buddhism.  That's a sad statement about humanity.  However, I agree with Tolstoy.  He believed that if evil men can work for their goals, good men can work and overcome that evil.  Hope I'm right on that one.  
We need a little more patience on both the left and the right.  I pray that Iraq will become a successful democracy.  One big key to that is real education for the people of Iraq, instead of indoctrination.