Urban Warfare 2008

The satellite pictures above show the densely populated Sadr City district of Baghdad, home to some 2.5 million Shi'a men, women and children. It is rapidly becoming a second version of Gaza as battles rage in its narrow and crowded streets. Currently it is largely controlled by the Mahdi Army, a militia that is at least 60,000 strong and apparently prepared to go up against the mighty American military. In the sectarian bloodbath that has become Baghdad under US rule, the Mahdi Army patrols and protects this sprawling slum in a time when no one else dares. As brutal and unsavory as they may seem to Americans, if you were living in this cauldron of chaos you'd probably be glad to have any security you can get, regardless of its source. Given it's close proximity to the locus of American power in the region, the Green Zone, it is a huge security risk that has consistently been able to undermine or facilitate the various initiatives the US tries to stabilize the city and country. The real problem that the US is having is that they can't use the sort of firepower in Sadr City that they traditionally like to use when engaging hostile forces. The US Army's usual strategy of overwhelming firepower is simply not viable in an area with a population density of 67,000 people per square mile. Unless of course the purpose is genocide, which is something that Central Command would rather not get involved in, just yet at least. In the past month all hell has broken loose in Sadr City as Moqtada al-Sadr ordered his followers to resist Nuri al-Maliki's push to take control of the Shi'a districts loyal to the Mahdi Army. Sometimes I really get the feeling that the US military just goes tear assing around the world looking for the shit, and Lord Almighty do they seem to find it.
a dispatch from that front- NYT May 4th 2008

The missiles that hit close to the Sadr General Hospital were American. After a night of clashes in the neighborhood, the Americans fired at least three “precision-guided munitions” at the small building next door to the hospital. Neighbors said the building was used as a place of prayer for pilgrims, hospital employees and neighborhood residents, but the military identified it as a command center for the Shiite militias that it is battling.
Responsibility for the other strike is in dispute. The Americans said claims that they had attacked the children were “preposterous.” The area where the hit occurred is near heavily contested ground. Shiite militias trying to hit nearby Iraqi Army and American forces have sometimes misfired, hitting areas near there in recent fighting.
Both instances underline sad truths about urban warfare. The daily horror for families and children living near the front line area of Sadr City is that who is a friend and who a foe is no longer a meaningful question. Heavy weapons do not discriminate. The militias use rocket-propelled grenades, sniper rifles and mounted machine guns as well as AK-47 rifles while the Americans shoot Hellfire missiles, tank rounds, satellite-guided missiles and rounds from machine guns.

honest Bush

See, the truth is in there somewhere, you just have to edit it-

Hungry Hungry Humans

As this glorious globe keeps pace in the infinite expanse of space strange things are happening on the surface of this place. The great diversity that once defined this phenomenal organism we call earth is falling before the unrelenting arrival of more humans and our never ending quest to consume. In the past few weeks the price of rice has more than doubled, threatening the many millions that will no longer be able to purchase this grain to stave off starvation. Is the goal to change the world so much that we no longer have to feel humbled by our place in it, or do we just breed like bunnies and then make the earth give us more food? More likely still is that we are just rapacious apes devouring everything we can in some misled melodramatic madness that will cause us to burn ourselves up in a funeral pyre of passion and confusion. Or maybe that is but the fire from which the phoenix is destined to rise from, eternal and unscathed. We anthropoids love our answers, but the sublimely sad truth is that we are merely chasing shadows in our ephemeral minds that always vanish when the light shines upon them. So how serious do you want to make it, that's the question. You can revel in the sun and radiate delight, you can cower in fear and fright, or spend your life thinking that you are right; regardless of the path you know it cannot last. What is now will always slid effortlessly into the past. Children of the universe, sharing molecules with everything, we would do well to dance and sing. In our world of material abundance the soul starves and the mind is molded into a cage the bars of which most will never see, and thus think they are free. Probably best to remember that this show was going on long before you arrived and the curtain probably won't fall during your performance. We're a wild bunch, seemingly unique in the orderly universe, so we got that going for us, which is pretty special.Listen to the sages of the ages-
"The world is not as it seems, nor is it otherwise"-Buddha
"No human thing is of serious importance" -Plato
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free" -Goethe
"Obsession with self... is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life." Romans 8:6

Conflict

Many people view history as some sort of collective consensus that just happened to end up with the industrialization of earth and the prevalence of the Market Economy... such is not the case. The course of history is dominated by conflict, and all that our modern world is evolved from that cauldron of chaos. Thus is our modern world so rent with political, racial, religious, gender and cultural conflicts. It is the means by which humans decide what will come to pass. Anyone who aspires to a world in which we can live in peace fails to understand that any such world would necessarily exclude all progress. The presence of peace has never been a guarantee of the presence of justice, and as a result is useless as a means to measure our changing society. This presents a rather insurmountable problem for those determined and progressively minded citizens that will do anything to further their noble cause; except anything outside the accepted channels of behavior. So how are you going to change a social construction if you insist on operating within its parameters? To turn the question on its head, can you effect change from without? I think the bottom line is that people can only change so much in a lifespan. We are born into an already established system that in all likely hood will dominate our thoughts and feelings for the duration of our stay on earth. The pressure to conform is incessant and omnipotent, schools and prisons bear testament to that reality. Fortunately for the maintenance of my particular culture, people generally seem more concerned with making their existence as easy as possible rather than taking any responsibility for what takes place during that lifespan. My country is a past master at helping its citizens absolve themselves of any responsibility for anything other than their financial concerns. I guess the point I'm trying to make here is that the primary reason the USA seems to be caught in a sort of psychological stasis is because we have become cowards, afraid to hold any truly personal opinions for fear that it won't be accepted by the rest of our contemporaries. In a world that is one gigantic struggle, the need to feel at home in your native land has long caused otherwise decent people to commit incalculable atrocities. And so it comes to pass that most Americans just download their thoughts from various media sources, completely bypassing the use of their own mental facilities. The more my nation speaks of freedom, democracy and liberty the more I think we are becoming the most enslaved people in history. Right before they loose all meaning, words are usually used with such profusion that their meanings become blurred, then disappear entirely. I can't help but thinking of Orwell's brilliantly succinct comment on this: War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength. I really hope that the rest of the world doesn't fall for this insidious trap. Perhaps our example will provide such a horrific example that we may yet serve some great purpose in the development of humanity.