Comments on: Murder in Baghdad

By: Barry

Barry — Thu, 02 Dec 2004 19:22:44 +0000

Ragout, there is this section in that article: “But the staff also remember when hundreds of victims of mass execution were dumped by the Baathist authorities at the mortuary and relatives were too frightened to collect them. “.

By: Ragout

Ragout — Wed, 01 Dec 2004 07:07:08 +0000

Kevin, The London Times article Chris links to seems to imply that those executed by Saddam weren’t counted in the morgue’s figures.

By: Kevin Donoghue

Kevin Donoghue — Tue, 30 Nov 2004 16:28:00 +0000

Interesting comment, Ragout. Is it plausible that Baghdad pre-war was exceptionally prone to suspicious deaths, since many of Saddam’s victims were probably killed there? If so then the Lancet increase for Baghdad would be suspect, but not the increase for the country as a whole. I’m just throwing out the suggestion – from your exchanges with D-squared I judge that you have a pretty good feel for the data.

By: Ragout

Ragout — Tue, 30 Nov 2004 15:57:42 +0000

As I discuss on my blog, the Baghdad morgue figures are supportive of the Lancet study’s post-war estimate of the rate of violent death. But they also suggest that the Lancet’s pre-war estimate was grossly understated. So this article is another piece of evidence that tends to undermine the claim of 100,000 excess deaths from the Iraq war. At the same time, the level of violent crime in Baghdad is certainly appalling.

By: Robin Green

Robin Green — Tue, 30 Nov 2004 04:19:12 +0000

It’s interesting that when it comes to corporations, pretty much everyone agrees that in point of fact, corporations are legally bound to pursue profit, and moral concerns are irreleevant except insofar as responding to them makes a corporation more profitable. But in debates about wars, the idea that states do not spend billions of dollars on “humanitarian interventions” in other countries – and if they claim to be doing so, they are lying – is considered a fantastical conspiracy theory by some on the right, it seems. There are no theories of “free markets in state violence” which attempt to explain why the elite-directed self-interest of states are a benevolent and wonderful thing, in the same way as there are theories apologising for the capitalist system. No-one proposes an “invisible hand of the warring states”, by analogy to the invisible hand of the free markets. This would of course be absurd and impossible to carry through. Even libertarians (most of them, anyway) don’t try to include war in the legitimate sphere of market activity. Rather, we are fed the frankly incredible claims that we are staying there and “finishing the job” out of some sense of moral responsibility, and “we have no long term ambitions in Iraq” (John Kerry). Often added to the claim that, after being “Machiavellian” under Kissinger et al, US planners have finally seen the happy light of democracy after all these years. (What? We’ve been lied to for all these years about putatively noble reasons for war and now they’re finally telling the truth? Do I smell something fishy here?) I suppose the reason why some see it as conspiratorial is because of where a more realistic view of the situation takes you. What is our geostrategic interest in “not cutting and running”? (Never mind all that “humanitarian” bullshit, as I said, it really can be discounted as a credible motive.) War-on-turrr can also be discredited as a motive (see Chomsky). No, one of the main reasons is roughly “to exert greater control on Iraq and the region”, i.e., to put it bluntly, because of oil. Given that we are occupying to safeguard oil supplies, and we have flown in Negroponte, and we are using / have used incendiary weaons and cluster bombs, and we have not done much reconstruction yet – what reason is there to trust the claim that we are there to do reconstruction, support human rights and institute liberal democracy with free speech and a free press? Yes, there will be great anger in Iraq if the promise of democracy is not delivered. But there is great anger already in Iraq, and that hasn’t stopped the US so far.

By: james

james — Mon, 29 Nov 2004 23:46:31 +0000

Matt Weiner – One of the best arguements I heard against the war in Iraq was: “There are little Hilters all over. Why this one? Why now?” Sudan, Zambawe, Cambodia, Ivory Coast all could have been delt with for the price of dealing with Iraq. You are correct in saying the humanitarian benifit would be greater.

By: Thomas

Thomas — Mon, 29 Nov 2004 16:32:33 +0000

Matt, you say that “there’s a difference between recognizing that you have no satisfactory way to stop some bad things and causing some bad thing as the foieseeable consequence of a policy you choose to pursue.” It seems to me that you’re just relying on an action/omission distinction, and that’s not a distinction I’d expect you to find persuasive in any other context. (Unless your “no satisfactory way” test is meant to suggest impossibility—but I don’t think that’s what you mean.)

By: Matt Weiner

Matt Weiner — Mon, 29 Nov 2004 16:29:05 +0000

James—You are correct that Bush has been the first president to accomplish anything in Sudan. But it’s not good enough. If people get to accuse me of having blood on my hands because I realize that the United States can’t solve all the world’s problems, then I get to respond in kind. But the fact is that this war was not prosecuted in order to help Iraqis, nor was it marketed as such. The retrospective focus on Iraqi human rights (except for some advocates, like Geras, who were concerned with that all along) has come only as all other rationales have been shown to be completely fraudulent. And people who focus on human rights ought to admit that human rights would have been better served by doing something about Darfur.

By: ren

ren — Mon, 29 Nov 2004 12:35:59 +0000

“city’s descent into a Hobbesian world of crime and brutality” It does not seem correct to refer to this as a Hobbesian world. The famous quote “Life in an unregulated state of nature is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish,and short.” is Hobbes’s description of the state of nature not the world that he was suggesting – in fact pre-invasion one could argue that Iraq was Hobbsian as there was a single leader, a leviathan, that stood outside morality, so the place has moved has moved away from a Hobbsian state not towards one.

By: james

james — Mon, 29 Nov 2004 08:00:15 +0000

Matt Weiner – Dont bother bringing Darfur into the arguement. If Sudan was actually important to the World or the US something would have been done in the early 80’s. Bush is the first world leader to have an actual success restraining the Sudanese leadership. It may only be over southern Sudan. It may fall appart. Its more than anyone else has acheived.

By: marsh arab

marsh arab — Mon, 29 Nov 2004 06:19:22 +0000

Well, that is all very predictable stuff, using Iraqis to pursue your own little political vendettas against American politicians. Unable to take your eyes away from manufacturing self-righteous “evidence” for your ideological attacks, you haven’t bothered to find out what might be happening in the southern Marshes (though bird-watchers have, and they have been good enough to thank Japan for the efforts being made by them), and the last thing you want to do is have to face what the Kurds in the North might say (though I don’t underestimate your ability to slant a story about either to suit your own ends). Let me say it clearly – the southern marshes might now survive, be a home agains to their people and to wonderfully diverse wildlife. One more year of Saddam would have been the end. No war was waged for this, but it is an outcome, and a very fine one.

By: marsh arab

marsh arab — Mon, 29 Nov 2004 06:17:56 +0000

By: Matt Weiner

Matt Weiner — Mon, 29 Nov 2004 05:25:59 +0000

Thomas wrote: Don’t we have the same level of culpability for these deaths in Baghdad as we did for the deaths that occurred under Saddam’s regime? We could stop both, after all. Well—we could have stopped the genocide in Darfur, couldn’t we, at least if we hadn’t tied up our whole army in Iraq? So by this standard, we’re responsible for the genocide in Darfur—specifically, you warmongers who called for the invasion of Iraq and are now trying to justify it on humanitarian grounds, while throwing up your hands at a much worse crisis elsewhere, are responsible for the genocide in Darfur. I think this is a nonsensical way to assign responsibility myself—there’s a difference between recognizing that you have no satisfactory way to stop some bad things and causing some bad thing as the foieseeable consequence of a policy you choose to pursue—but if you’re going to use the warblogger’s standard, you have to convict yourself of genocide.

By: Barry

Barry — Sun, 28 Nov 2004 21:45:52 +0000

Brett: “The administration didn’t seize power, Barry. They won an election. If you have trouble grasping that rather obvious fact, why should I take you seriously on anything else?” My point was that the skills of the top members of this administration is the acquisition and use of power (is that better?). Which was in reply to your objection to my choosing malice over incompetancy in Iraq. You, if you would please remember, pointed out that your die-extrusion engineering skills didn’t imply your ability to gain a seat in the Senate. I pointed out the lack of applicability of your example to this administration. Are you willing to accept that?

By: Antoni Jaume

Antoni Jaume — Sun, 28 Nov 2004 20:35:06 +0000

brett bellmore, yeah they won one election, and more than one, but in fact their power is not restricted to those defined in laws. You are forgetting that they had more power before any election than many elected, or not, governments in the world. And, btw, “seize the power” is perfectly applicable to describe what an election winner does. http://www.yourdictionary.com/ahd/s/s0221800.html DSW