Anyone that knows me from long ago knows that I wanted to go into journalism at one point. That all changed when I started taking note of how journalism really works. Intrusions into other people's lives. Lack of privacy. Untruths. Slanted stories.
That last one is particularly true today. And it is one of the major reasons that I do not like to engage in discussions on the war in Iraq. My view tends to differ from what is reported by news and media outlets as the "Typical American View." I'm not going to go into what that is, because unless you've been living under a rock for the past five years, you should be well aware of what it is.
Here is my view. I understand why we went there. It's a shame that it happened the way that it did, but we're there now, and we're taking responsibility and working to clean up the mess. I understand what we're trying to accomplish, I just think that it is disgusting that the people over there are unwilling to work to make lives better for themselves. The average citizen just wants life to get better, but is unwilling to stand up against the few that terrorize and bully them into submission. I'm pretty much disgusted with the whole country because of that, and wish that I could hop on a plane, land there and start grabbing people by the shoulders and shaking sense into them. I want to scream that they just need to stop all the crap that's happening, put down their weapons and work together to create better lives for themselves and their future generations. I want to scream that they could have great wealth, riches and stability if only they would stop being so damned petty and quit all the squabbling. If I were their mother, I would make them kiss and make up, and if I heard any other bickering, they'd be grounded indefinitely. Period.
My heart just breaks when I think of the average citizen that is afraid to set foot out of their house because they might get caught in crossfire, or kidnapped and killed…just because of their belief. Or their name. Or their tribe. It is just so sad. And I am truly blessed to be living the life that I live, because I don't have to worry about stupid shit like that.
I am disgusted with the media - because they realize that stories of bombings and killings and kidnappings and beheadings get better ratings than stories of children being able to attend schools. Families getting help. Friendships being formed. They'd rather report that all of the police over there are corrupt (and quite a few of them are) and that people cannot even go to a café without fearing an attack. They're feeding the fires, and slanting the story in favor of what sells. Nobody ever gets to hear about all of the good stuff.
Good things happen over there every day. It's just that all the reporters are too busy covering the tragedies. There is nobody left to look around and see what good is going on and think to themselves, "Hey…that just might be newsworthy!"
I happened across one of the rare stories of good in today's Stars and Stripes newspaper. For those of you that might not know what that is, it's the newspaper that is put out to the military members serving overseas. I read it almost every day when we lived in Germany. It covers stories in the States, as well as what is happening locally for those of us that are in different locales. Of course, since it is put out for the military, there will be views in its pages that differ from what you might find in another paper. C'mon…even Fox News claims to be "fair and balanced." Riiiiight.
What really appealed to me in this story is that it reports on the good. It also shows that the tribal leaders in areas of Iraq are finally waking up and looking around. They're seeing what is happening to their people and their villages, and they're getting sick of it. They're finally ready to take a stand against the bullies that terrorize them and keep them from living a normal life.
I genuinely hope that this attitude catches on among the citizens over there, and they all start doing something about the sad state of their lives.
Here is the link. There's some pictures there, too.
http://stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=42769
Battling violence in the heart of darkness
Tribal leaders in Jazeera join with U.S. forces to fight insurgents, form police station
By Megan McCloskey, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Sunday, January 14, 2007
HAMDIYAH, Iraq — His left arm in a sling as a result of being shot by insurgents a couple of weeks ago, Sheik Jabbar Al Fahad, dressed in a gray pinstripe suit and accompanied by the commander of U.S. forces in Ramadi, walks down a dirt road in his neighborhood.
U.S. soldiers and Iraqi police escort him, their Bradley fighting vehicles and armored Humvees left behind. Their steps rouse only the occasional baritone "moo" from one of the many cows grazing nearby, and for Anbar Province, the pace feels almost like strolling.
Local men come out from their homes and businesses to enthusiastically greet the sheik with kisses and hugs, and to shake the hands of the soldiers.
At one point, Lt. Col. John Tien stops and calls over a stone wall into the backyard of a house, waving a father and his young children to him. As the man lifts his kids one by one, Tien hands each a stuffed animal.
"A month ago we couldn't even come in this neighborhood," Tien, commanding officer of 2nd Battalion, 37th Armor Regiment out of Friedberg, Germany, said after giving out the toys.
"Then the local men said they were ready to take responsibility. Now we can walk this entire road."
Hamdiyah is one of eight tribal neighborhoods in Jazeera, a sweeping area just north of Ramadi city that soldiers refer to in part as the heart of darkness — one of the outposts there is named OP Forsaken. Before al-Qaida leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed, Jazeera was his playground, a place where he moved freely and preached violence.
Running along the northern side of the Euphrates, Jazeera stretches beyond Ramadi's western border, and to the east abuts the outskirts of Habbaniyah, which has been transferred from coalition forces to the Iraqi army.
Until recently, Hamdiyah was "in the enemy's hands, and they were clearly intimidating the population," Tien said.
But in early November, the tribes' leader, Sheik Jabbar Al Fahad, reached out to Tien's Task Force 2-37. He said he had a list of volunteers and was ready to stand up a police station and needed support, according to Maj. Michael Wawrzyniak, operations officer for the task force.
Within a week there was a large-scale clearing operation, and shortly thereafter Iraqi police were patrolling the area.
That has been the pattern in the heart of darkness over the last four to five months. Much like how dominoes fall, tribes from west to east have turned in rapid succession from hostile to friendly and joined coalition forces in the fight against the insurgency.
Much of the fighting has shifted to the insurgents' home bases where they once thought they were safe, said Col. Sean MacFarland, the top commander in Ramadi and in charge of the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Armored Division.
Though much of the surrounding province remains insecure and an insurgent stronghold, things started changing in Jazeera in late August when the insurgents killed a revered and influential sheik. His followers couldn't find the body for four days.
"That's really where the insurgents went wrong," Wawrzyniak said.
Murder intimidation was a regular part of the insurgents' repertoire, but "al-Qaida overplayed their hand," MacFarland added.
The sheiks, who according to Tien "had been to some extent neutered by insurgents," banded together, forming a group called the Anbar Awakening. They decided they had had enough and essentially started to switch sides.
The locals followed their lead.
"The people are tired of al-Qaida. They want another way out," Iraqi border police Col. Yousef Tariq, who introduced Sheik Jabbar to the task force, said through an interpreter.
"This is what al-Qaida has done for the community: They've created widows, stopped colleges and education, stopped the normal machine of life. [The police] are trying to start that engine again."
Tribal borders are as defined in Anbar as state boundaries are in the United States, so when one sheik would come forward to work with coalition forces, any security developed would literally stop at the line of the next tribe.
But success begets success, Tien said. Once sheiks saw security improving to their west, they extended their hands. When Wawrzyniak went to meet with Sheik Jabbar, he was introduced to Sheik Mohammed, Jabbar's neighbor to the east in Albu Obaid.
"Sheik Mohammed was staring from the other side, standing on the outside looking in and saying 'I want some of that too,' " Tien said of the security that was rapidly growing in Hamdiyah.
The first Iraqi police station opened in Albu Obaid on Jan. 6 in an abandoned house across from a U.S. patrol base. Until that day, there had been zero Iraqi police presence in the area.
As Tien toured the outside of the station the day it opened, he excitedly whipped out his digital camera to take a photo of two Iraqi police trucks pulling up with their telltale blue doors on an otherwise white pickup.
"This is a first," he said, grinning.
Police officers from Hamdiyah, barely experienced themselves, came to help out the newest startup station, handing out weapons. They fastidiously recorded the serial number of each AK-47 before turning it over to its new owner, who was also given a blue button-down shirt as a uniform.
Tien met with some of the new officers, giving them what amounted to a pep talk.
"This is the last day terrorists ever come to Albu Obaid, right?" he said to about seven officers lined up across from him. They nodded in stoic agreement.
The officers will be backed by coalition forces as at the other stations in Jazeera, but Tien, like many commanders, stresses the importance of Iraqis providing security for Iraqis.
"There's a saying that all politics is local. Well, I have a saying here that all security is local," he said.
Back in Hamdiyah, as the visit between Sheik Jabbar and MacFarland winded down and the soldiers headed back to their Bradleys and Humvees, a siren wailed.
To an American ear it's a signal that something is going down, but in Iraq — in Anbar, in Jazeera — it's a comforting symbol.
"That's a good sound, police sirens," said MacFarland, turning to the sheik. "It means law and order is returning."
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