James, can you please provide the group with your documentation for your statement: "When this line first opened it was the military through orders of leadership who refused to guard precious treasures in the museums and libraries of Iraq." Do you have copies or evidence of orders given NOT to provide security and guards around 5,000 museums and historical sites, PLUS all the hospitals and other buildings? Especially, since the area was not totally secured and hostile action was still taking place in Baghdad. Could that statement be simply be personal bias and opinion? Thanks. Back in the battle...... John ----- Original Message ----- From: "James Schulte" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Saturday, May 10, 2003 7:21 AM Subject: Re: Iraqis, looting and the pressOk I promised to remain hush on this issue but I have to somewhatagreewith Deb. When this line first opened it was the military through ordersofleadership who refused to guard precious treasures in the museums and libraries of Iraq. As we all found out , experts in the field warned the Bush administration months before they invaded this country of this possibility and the need to protect these treasures. This went on deafearsand resulted in three resignations in protest to the Washington Comission.As time progressed it wasn't the citizens of Iraq attempting to smuggle these artifacts out of the country but a few foolhardy soldiersandnews coorespondants.As for the media sensationalizing this event , Ibelievethe media has sensationalized the war as a whole and will act upon this stoory and others.A question was posed on the group earlier in this line I believe and it was "How do we educate our children about this war?" I have sat back and contemplated this question because it is very complex. Whattoteach is the complexity.We have seen journalism reach a new level, we have seen what once was a coalition united separated, we have seen world organizations created for peace torn apart and used as a ploy and unfortuneately as an american we have thus far seen our President, his Secretary of State , and our Secretary of Defense use forged documants and irresponsible evidence to justify this objective and come up empty handed.Through all this I have still given Bush the benefit of the doubt, but daily this doubt decreases. We claim to be the worlds most powerful country, we claim to have had such conclusive evidence as to where allthiscrap Saddam Hussein stored and was building, but to maintain world peacewechose not to share this information with the United Nations. We chose nottolisten to the worlds experts as to the priceless artifacts and what would occur in an invasion. Well I'm sorry but when you have a Bush, Dick and Colon running a country are any of you surprised?I as an African Americanadmired Colin Powell, but have lost confidence in his leadershipcapabilitiesas of late because he played into this crap.The jouranlist do have a responsibility in this conflict and it is reporting, and normally it isbiasand geared to sympathy.As a historian I dont know what to teach children about this war, there are so many angles, so much information, I just hope it doesn't come down in a mandate from Bush administrations Department of Education ----- Original Message ----- From: "Deb Fuller" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Friday, May 09, 2003 9:43 PM Subject: Iraqis, looting and the pressYou know, I don't think I've seen one message in the whole lootingdiscussionabout how the press has really distorted this whole issue. Yet people onthislist - who are probably better educated than 99% of the world'spopulation -are quick to belive what they read and slam the US and the troops forfirst notprotecting the museum adequately and then for trying to gloss over thewholeincident. Could it be that the press - to use a quaint Southern expression - is"lettingits mockingbird mouth get ahead of its jaybird behind"? (Sanitized for propriety's sake. ;) I live in the Washington, DC area and during the sniper attacks of lastyear,got a very eye-opening view of how quickly the press is to jump on alittlefact, irregardless of its significance or validity, and make afull-blownstoryout of it. I had just been laid off so needless to say I wasn't sleepingwelland spent many nights flipping channels. After one attack, the vehicle description of the "sniper van" literally changed every hour. The mainsuspectvehicles for the whole incident were a white box truck or a white cargovan.For this shooting, it started out that way, then turned to a creamcoloredvan,then a cream colored van with right tail light out, then a cream coloredvanwith the left tail light out, then it was a cream colored van with justataillight out but also keep looking for that box truck and that ubiquitiouswhitecargo van. When the sniper was finally caught, he was in a blue Chevy hatchback. Yet the press had everyone in the area practically in a paniceverytime they saw a white cargo van, one of the most common vehicles on theroad.During the war, the press was criticized for reporting just the war anddoingvery little commentating on it. Wow, for once they were just doing theirjobs.It's kind of hard to spin information if you are on the battlefield andgettingshot at and have strict controls on what you are allowed to say. But nowitseems like the press is more than making up for it by latching on to anylittlestory and running with it. The US press is very liberal as a whole anddoesn'tlike Bush, Ashcroft, Rumsfeld or getting into this war but ralliedaroundthetroops like everyone else. Now the main fighting is over and they arebacktopicking on the troops, and the whole Bush administration. I'm sure someofitis warrented like the lack of planning for looting. But I'm reallyskepticalabout how blown off UNESCO experts were or how little the troops did tostopthe looting. Given that in the sniper case, a blue Chevy hatchback wasturnedinto a white box truck, cargo van and cream colored van with a taillightout,I'm not surprised to hear that the Iraqi museum went from completelystrippedto "Oh, sorry, we forgot we put all these artifacts down here. We reallyonlylost about 30 or 40." Loosing artifacts is tragic, don't get me wrong,butit'sa far cry from a bunch of troops sitting on their duffs while peopleblithelywalked in and carted off 4000 years of history. So people, please. Don't jump to conclusions about what is in the press.Likemost major happenings, the whole truth rarely comes out until many years afterwards when it can be looked at objectively from all angles. Rightnow,we're too close to the entire war to really understand what happened,whatwentwrong and the major impacts of it and probably won't be in a position to understand it for years to come. Deb __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo. http://search.yahoo.com ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located athttp://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mailmessageto [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read"help"(without the quotes).If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail messageto[log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read"SignoffMuseum-L" (without the quotes).========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located athttp://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes).If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to[log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes). ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes). If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).
The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes).
If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).