[casi] HOPING AMERICANS STAY FOREVER

["AS-ILAS" <AS-ILAS@DELETETHISgmx.de>]

Dear all,


Being left quite at a loss of a sound interpretation, I'd like to
submit the below article on Assyrian/Chaldean Christians in Iraq to your
critical consideration and comments.

Please see in this context also my earlier message of April 12, 2003:

[....]
"The Kenneth Joseph Story:
.....
Now, this is interesting:

An Assyrian priest (Ken Joseph) - Washington Times - Rev. Moon & the
Moonies - CIA - well-known right wing journalist and CIA asset Arnaud de
Borchgrave with special psyops missions [psychological operations missions
in (dis-)information warfare] - Iraq - genuine and not so genuine human
shields or so - etc etc ....
http://www.counterpunch.org/lipton04122003.html
April 12, 2003
[.....] "



Thanks in advance.

Best

Andreas

------------------------------

Source:
www.zindamagazine.com/magazine

June 02, 2003

By Rev. Ken Joseph.

HOPING AMERICANS STAY FOREVER


[Z-info: The Rev. Ken Joseph Jr. is an Assyrian and a minister who directs
Assyrianchristians.com.]

It is dusk in Baghdad and I am talking to the regular group of men who
gather near the house I am staying in to talk about the day's events.

"What do you think about the Americans? How long do you think they should
stay? Are they doing a good job?" I ask.

The answer is very complicated while at the same time very, very simple. It
is the "politically correct" thing to do to complain about the Americans,
say they are not wanted and tell them to "go home."

The reality, though, is very different.

As usually happens throughout Iraq, people look around before they tell
their true feelings. Simply put they are still afraid to speak the truth.
Before it was Saddam, now it is the Shiites and others who frighten them.

"The Americans are doing wonderfully. We want them to stay forever," I hear.

I am not surprised. It is exactly like I thought. When I was in Iraq before
the war, the reported feelings were that while the people of Iraq did not
like Saddam, they would fight for their country and were against the war.

As I said then, the people wanted the war to come so they could be liberated
from Saddam but were not free to talk. The same situation with a different
twist exists today.

It is not widely reported, nor fashionable to say the Americans are loved
and wanted in Iraq, but in fact as they were wanted before the war, they are
wanted now.

"We hope they stay forever" is the true feeling of the silent majority in
Iraq, contrary to what is reported.

The logic is very simple -- the Iraqis do not trust their leaders. Faced
with a very complicated situation of a 60 percent Shiite majority, a former
police state, Iran at their doorstep trying with all its might to
destabilize

their country, and desperately relieved and happy to be finally liberated
from nearly 30 years of Saddam, they want the United States to stay.

The greatest fear of the man on the street is that the Americans will tire
and leave. "We pray that they stay and stay forever" is the feeling of the
vast majority, but they look both ways before they say it.

Why? The answer is quite simple. The following is the translation of a
letter being given out throughout Iraq in various forms.

"'In the name of God the most merciful and compassionate'

"Do not adorn yourselves as illiterate women before Islam (From the Koran)
to this noble family,

We hope that the family will stand with brothers of Islam and follow the
basic Islamic rules of wearing the veil and possessing honorable teachings
of Islam that the Muslims have continued to follow from old times.

We are the Iraqi people, the Muslim people and do not accept any mistakes.

If not, and this message will be final, we will take the following actions:

1. Doing what one cannot endure (believed to be rape)
2. Killing
3. Kidnapping
4. Burning the house with its dwellers in it or exploding it.

This message is directed to the women of this family.

Signed."

This message from a Shiite Islamic organization says it all and explains in
a nutshell why, though finally liberated, the Iraqi people still live in
fear.

They are not in fear from the crime and looting that is reported in the
press. Of course, it troubles them that the electricity is not up and
running properly yet, garbage is still scattered and the schools are not yet
functioning, but these are all items that the Americans are working to fix.
It will take time, but they will be ultimately solved.

An interesting discussion followed one of the daily meetings we attended
with U.S. authorities to coordinate activities. Following a long litany of
things that do not work and a regular complaining, one Iraqi at the table
spoke up: "I think many of those did not work properly even before the war."

Suddenly there was silence at the table as the reality of his statement sunk
in.

The much reported anger of the Iraqis at the slowness of bringing Iraq up to
speed is much exaggerated. Of course, people are frustrated -- I am too when
the electricity suddenly goes off, the water is sporadic, or garbage sits in
the street.

At the same time, we just got through a war! Standing in front of the
Palestine Hotel watching a large group of Shiite Muslims complaining, I
asked a simple question: "Could you hold a demonstration like this before
the war?" There was a stunned silence and then a sheepish grin.

"No."

What people truly fear is the takeover of their finally liberated country by
a group of what they term simply "crazy" people. When fellow Muslims call
them "crazy" and they send letters like the above -- a similar one that came
to one of our bishops a few days ago -- one begins to understand their true
fear.

If there is one mistake being made by the Americans on the ground, it is
that they are just too "soft" on the "bad guys."

In the desire not to offend, the Americans in the view of the silent
majority have been too soft on the "crazies." If there was one single event
that put fear in the hearts of the regular people, it was when one crossed
the border into Iraq. A man that even Saddam Hussein would not let into Iraq
for 23 years -- the leader of the Shiite Muslims who had been living in Iran
as an exile, Ayatollah Mohammad Bakr Al Hakim.

Upon returning to Iraq, he promptly called for the creation of an Islamic
state, similar to Iran.

What can the United States do?

As one who was born and raised in Japan -- a mirror of what is happening in
Iraq took place 58 years ago -- I for one feel Japan's example can be a
"road map" for the future of Iraq.

My parents were among the thousands that responded to Gen. Douglas
MacArthur's call for 10,000 young people to help rebuild Japan following the
war.

They came with many others who gave their lives to see a war-mongering,
pseudo-religious police state transformed into the economic powerhouse and
leader for good in the world that Japan -- for all its many problems -- is
today.

Just like Iraq, immediately following its surrender, there were the voices
calling for more consideration for Japan's "culture" and leaving the basic
institutions in place.

Instead, strong accountability was put in place, war criminals punished and
executed, pre-war institutions that had created the war machine eliminated,
and a strong constitution put in place, which included a watertight
prohibition against any religious involvement by the state. This small but
critical U.S. presence 58 years following the war remains.

Why? As any Japanese will tell you, quietly because it is still "politically
incorrect," they want the Americans to stay.

As Iraqis told me before the war, "we are not afraid of the Americans'
bombing. There will be mistakes. People will be killed, but we do not
believe the Americans will ever purposely bomb us." People when they are
free to tell their true feelings inherently trust America.

They will all bring up the myriad of other interests they feel the United
States has in its cards -- oil, control of the world, and on and on -- but
at the end of the day they want America to stay involved and fear most of
all that the American people will grow tired and leave them to the
"crazies."

What can we do to ensure that Iraq will go on to become another "Japan" and
be a leader for good in the Middle East?

The answers come from the common people. I will never forget discussing with
many of the peace activists I originally supported before the war, asking
whether they had talked with the common people to ask what they wanted. "No,
we don't have to. We know what they want," was the response.

What do the "regular people" in Iraq want? Just like they wanted the
Americans to save them from Saddam and were ready to pay any price
personally to do so, their advice is simple and we ignore it at a price.

First, don't be soft on the Shiites! Don't listen to all the voices saying
be "culturally sensitive." People who say if you don't believe like we do,
we will rape, kill, kidnap or burn down your house, do not deserve to be
talked with. As the "regular people" say, "they are crazy and cannot be
talked with."

An important first step? Send Ayatollah Mohammed Bakr Hakim back to Iran,
where he spent his exile torturing Iraqis in Iranian prisons.

"Cut out the cancer that will destroy our country" is the feeling on the
street.

Second, immediately stop the daily cacophony of speakers that blare from
mosques across the country. This is not an issue of respecting religious
institutions. The use of massive speakers to blare out "calls to prayer" is
a recent phenomenon.

According to the "regular people," one of the best things the British troops
did in 1991 in the areas they controlled was to visit with each mosque and
tell the imam that there was complete religious freedom. They told him he
could do whatever he wanted, but the blaring of speakers all day long and
into the night was not religious but political and was banned, as has been
done in many other Islamic countries.

Even neighboring Jordan has banned all such blaring speakers except for one
in Amman.

This one move immediately changed the atmosphere for the "regular people"
and sent a strong message that there was a future and the British at that
time meant business about a secular Iraq with freedom and opportunity for
all.

There will be cries to be "culturally sensitive" on this issue but the
constant blaring is a constant political statement that says there is no
equality. It is the simplest but most single important step that can be
taken to give Iraqis hope that things will be different in the future.

In addition, the Islamic headdress, which we saw battled in Afghanistan and
is now an issue on the ground in Iraq, should be banned. Many other Islamic
nations have come to the simple conclusion that given the example of the
letter sent out and the reality of the weakness of the position of women,
there is no situation in which a woman can be thought to be in a position to
freely choose to wear the veil, covering of the head or the full body
covering.

The only solution is to ban it completely so it does not become an issue and
used by the "crazies" to impose their values by intimidating the weakest of
the population -- the women.

Third, begin immediate 24-hour television in Arabic, Kurdish and Assyrian --
the principle languages of Iraq. It is unbelievable that to date, it is not
up and running while neighboring Iran continues to blare unbelievable
messages into Iraq.

The "regular people" are confused and upset not at what they see -- in each
of the regular homes I have stayed in, the Americans tanks drive by
patrolling the streets at least three or four times each night -- it's what
they do not see.

What is most needed on the ground is information. In the absence of it, the
"crazies" get the edge. Television, newspapers and radio with information on
the progress of reconstruction, information on daily needs and encouragement
for the future are necessities.

Fourth, don't be so overly sensitive to Islamic issues. It will be the
"death knell" to success in Iraq. As was done in Japan, the "cancer" needs
to be rooted out. Virtually all the "crazy" positions that are imposed are
not in the Koran and have nothing to do with Islam.

The American position should be to respect the Koran as a religious book and
respect Islam as a religion, but to never tolerate anything done in the name
of either that defies the moral principles of international society.

"There shall not be compulsion in religion," states the Holy Koran; Part 3
Surah 2 al-Baqarah 256 Page 68.

The Americans shall strenuously support freedom of religion and the freedom
to openly propagate any religion, but will never tolerate any form of
intimidation or even implicit state support for any one religion. It was
this singular issue that guaranteed the success of postwar Japan.

Fifth, create a secular, non-religious constitution for Iraq. I do not mean
ask the Iraqis to do it -- after 30 years of intimidation and living in a
police state, they are psychologically incapable at this time of doing it

themselves. Exactly as in postwar Japan, we need the best and the brightest
minds of Americans and Iraqis together to do this. The best tool at this
time is the 1925 Iraqi constitution with the religious articles taken from
the Japanese constitution.

This is critical. On this one issue, our Iraq will fail or succeed. Don't
listen to the voices again about being "culturally sensitive." The United
States faces a simple and stark problem -- there is no "Islamic" nation
anywhere that constitutionally guarantees equal rights. Check it out.

One will be shocked, as I was to read constitution after constitution and
find out that one is not allowed by either constitution or law to leave
Islam. This allows a situation to be created where the most important human
right -- the right to freedom of thought -- is not allowed in any Islamic
country by virtue of the fact that individuals are not allowed to legally
leave the "religion" they were born into, nor allowed to specify "nothing"
when asked about their religious belief.

This is where Japan succeeded -- the Americans were vicious in their
complete elimination of any religious test or favoritism in the Constitution
and subsequent laws.

Sixth, create representative government. Don't do this in long, tedious
consultations. This needs to, as in Japan's case, be imposed with
consultation.

Special provisions must be made to include special rights for special people
who during Saddam's time were purposely spread thinly across the country to
make sure they would never be strong enough in any one area to be able to
affect representation.

The Assyrians, the indigenous people of Iraq -- the "Native Americans" if
you will of Iraq along with the Kurds and the Turkomans -- need to have
special autonomy in their homelands so they will feel they have a future and
stay to build Iraq, and exiles by the millions living abroad will see a
future to return.

Along with this representative government giving special rights to
indigenous people in their homelands, there must be a careful and complete
settlement of all outstanding claims for land. This was one of the other
major areas that caused postwar Japan to succeed -- the Americans were
vigorous in breaking up the illegal land situations that had developed over
the years. This situation is mirrored in Iraq.

Land must be returned completely to all those who had their land taken by
Saddam so individual Iraqis will have their own land and "own" a future.
There must never be any perception that Saddam's "friends," as those who
assisted in the nightmare that was Japan before and during World War II,
continue to benefit.

The elimination of the speakers at the mosques will show Iraqis on a
practical level that the United States is creating an equal playing field
for all Iraqis.

Finally, get telephones for the U.S. military and ORHA offices in Baghdad.
For those of us who interact with them, it borders on the absurd. Imagine a
whole "government in waiting" that cannot communicate across the few feet of
various agency offices.

This touches a greater issue -- let's not think we can set up an Iraq on the
"cheap."

Will it be expensive? Of course, it will. Is it worth it? Yes it is. Iraq is
a rich country. It has more than enough resources without using any of the
U.S. taxpayer's money. We must not forget that it took seven years of
post-war occupation in Japan to root out all the "bad guys" and set up a new
government.

Will it pay off? Has Japan "paid off"? It is a simple but critical
question -- do we want another "Japan" or do we want another "Iran?"

It is my prayer that the United States will have the courage to stay the
course -- it may take seven years of direct occupation and decades of
limited basing but it will be well worth it.

Now is the time to be strong, forceful and remember the lessons of the past.
Japan is our greatest example. As one who was born and raised in Japan, I
grew up regularly having someone out of nowhere shake my hand and say "thank
you for Gen. Douglas MacArthur and for what you did to Japan after the war."

It brought back memories as I stood with our neighbors on a dusty Baghdad
street at dusk and heard them reply to my question of how long should
America stay in Iraq.

"We hope the Americans will stay in Iraq forever."

Rev. Ken Joseph
Iraq








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