My moral cesspit
This goes back about 20 years, but it's something that's really been bothering me of late, to the point where I have nightmares.
It's 1991, right after the Gulf War. I'm 19. A Marine in Northern Iraq. We are on an operation called Provide Comfort. We were sent in after the US backed out of a deal with the Kurds in which the US would provide air support if the Kurds would rebel against Saddam. The Kurds get thrashed badly, and flee their homes for the mountains. They are dying at some ridiculous rate of exposure and famine. We are supposed to establish a security triangle in Northern Iraq to prevent the Iraqis from slinging out some more genocide on these poor bastards.
It's about the 4th or 5th day of the operation and my platoon gets sent to secure a hospital. It's one of the 3 or 4 buildings left standing in this town. Everything else is rubble, and there is no power or water. We set up in the courtyard of the hospital, and then try to figure out exactly what it is we are there to secure. Turns out that every morning, a crowd forms at the gate, mostly women and children. They, of course, seek medical attention. There is only one Iraqi doctor for this hospital, and he only comes in for 3 hours a day, if at all. There's a Dutch medical team, 5 Canadian doctors, a handfull of US doctors (both civilian and military) and a bunch of medics and corpsman. The Kurds are only allowed to enter the hospital during the hours that the doctor is there. The coalition doctors and medics are forbidden from treating or rendering any assistance to any persons without the Iraqi doctor there.
Blackhawks start flying in every few hours, bringing in extreme cases of the elderly and children who have succumbed to exposure to the elements and starvation. Mostly we take them off the helicopter, find a place in the halls for the ones still alive, and put the dead in the morgue. I was a radio operator, so every few hours I went to the roof to tend to the antenna. I had to walk passed the dead and the dying, hoping they wouldn't put their hands out. Mostly they didn't.
On the second day, we had to put a detail on the gate. 5 or 6 guys had to stand at the gate and keep these people outside. They weren't loud. They weren't disorderly. Mostly they just stood there. Every once in a while, a kid would cry, or a woman would say something. We took turns.
My turn at the gate. I get the middle, right where the two halves of the gate meet. About 30 minutes after sunup, the crowd just kind of appears. Right in front of me is a young mother. She has a baby on her hip. Her baby has a tumor on his forehead that's about the size of both my fists. You can see all the blue blood vessels around it through the skin. He shakes every once in a while, like he's having fits. He drools a lot, and has a hard time focusing on anything. He rarely cries. You can see he's badly underfed, like the rest of them.
The mother just stands there, all day. She's dressed in robes, but no burqa. She just stands there, looking at me. The doctor shows up, and lets 3 people in, then we have to close the gates. The first sign of emotion from her, she cries for a minute. Then she stops crying, and goes back to staring at me. About midday, the crowd heads for the shade for lunch, but not her. I get a meal break, and when I go back to the gate, I try to get a different spot. But the guy who relieved me is senior, and makes me swap. So now I'm face to face with her again. For the rest of the day, until sundown. She's the last one to leave. When she walks away, she makes the kind of face a person makes when they are telling you it's ok, they forgive you. She came back every morning we were there, and stayed until dark. When we left, she still hadn't gotten inside the hospital.
How does a person who believes in life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness reconcile what he believes with an action like that. How do I drive her eyes out of my friggin brain. How do you reconcile denying the most basic of human needs to those who are most needy?
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by xcorps
humanitarian policy is that
