CPTnet
26 May 2005
IRAQ REFLECTION: The self-fulfilling prophecy of occupation
by Joe Carr
This morning, a man told us about his brother who's been detained without
charges by Americans for over six months now. He was arrested when a car
bomb went off in front of the restaurant he worked in. We frequently hear
that when car bombs go off near military convoys, traumatized soldiers shoot
or arrest everyone in the vicinity.
After the interview, we went by the residency office. The process for
obtaining a visa has changed repeatedly and one usually must make multiple
trips to get it finished. I'm told that this run-around is the new Iraqi
government's attempt to fight the resistance by keeping close track of
foreigners. But all the "foreign fighters" have fake Iraqi IDs and would
never go to a residency office, so all the process does is make life harder
for regular people, and thereby fuel hatred for the government.
Our landlord told us during a chat one day that the electricity was supposed
to get better the next day because one of the pipelines bombed by the
resistance had been repaired. The resistance targets the pipelines because
they want to keep Iraq in chaos and encourage resistance to the occupation.
U.S. contractors are making profits by repairing damage caused by bombs
manufactured by other U.S. contractors. The resistance thus targets
contractors because of their war profiteering.
The resistance attacks are far from the only thing keeping the electricity
marginal. In the first Bush War, the U.S. bombed every major electricity and
water facility as well as many key bridges; people say the attacks on Iraq's
infrastructure were far worse in that war than this one. While under strict
U.S. sanctions, Saddam Hussein managed to get the electricity back up after
three months, but the most powerful nation in the world has made little
progress in two years. U.S. contractors have repeatedly cut corners to
maximize their profits, taking advantage of the absence of law and
oversight.
Many factories have shut down because they can't get reliable electricity,
putting people out of work, driving them further into poverty, and thus
rendering them more open to recruitment by resistance groups.
To sum it up, Iraqis are poor, thirsty and in the dark. They're subject to
indiscriminate detention and violence. They suffer intolerable delays on the
roads and in government institutions.
Occupation forces use terrorism to "fight terrorism" and only create more
terrorists. We see this in both the Israeli and U.S. occupations. I don't
believe that this policy is an accident or an oversight of high-level
military strategists, but an intentional strategy used to maintain chaos and
justify ongoing occupation. Occupation becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy,
using "security" to exploit, dominate, and colonize.
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