"Swarming…the specter in broad daylight accosts the passerby.
-- T.S. Eliot, "The Wasteland"
"We have now awakened to the barbarians...Retribution has been visited on the barbarians,
and more will follow."
-- Naval War College Review
"Waste the motherfuckers!" screamed across the screen in the outrageous and hateful film "Rules of Engagement" (2000), and into the streets and neighborhoods of Fallujah in November 2004. The film is a Samuel L. Jackson military vehicle that celebrates US war crimes from Vietnam to the Middle East, the US slaughter of Muslim civilians, young children included, and Arab bloodletting in general. It is, of course, one film, among many, that prepares US audiences for real manifestations of US aggression and war crimes: torture, slaughter of civilians, children included, and Iraqi bloodletting, as was the case in the "wasting" of Fallujah.The ease with which the US has, for more than 2 ½ years "wasted" Iraqis, the ease with which culturally we participate in acts of wanton cruelty, demonizing of Iraqis, savage acts of inhumanity and barbarism, brutish violations of international conventions and laws, and our willingness to look the other way in the face of monstrous US induced misery, suffering and death, is symbolized graphically in the haunting specter of the US "wasting" of Fallujah one year ago: "Operation Phantom Fury."
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Please allow a closing sonnet from G. Last:
AH, FREEDOM COMES TO IRAQ
Ah, the freedom to be fucked in the ass,
Ah, the freedom to be tied to a leash,
Ah, the freedom to be hooded and chained,
To shit in your pants, and rip out your hair,
To shiver and sweat, squirm naked in piss,
To know the agony will never pass;
The freedom to scream, the freedom to screech...
To know the torturers will not be rained
In by law, reason, or moral despair
Provides one the hateful freedom to kiss
Goodbye the life vomited on the floor
Amidst broken teeth and bloodied bile
Leaking from your holes. Freedom is the whore
And death the pimp with the "'merican" smile.
g.last - '05
