Robert Jensen
Department of Journalism
University of Texas
Austin, TX 78712
work: (512) 471-1990
fax:  (512) 471-7979
rjensen@uts.cc.utexas.edu

copyright Robert Jensen 1999

an edited version of this ran in the Dallas Morning News, August27, 1999, p. 29A.

By Robert Jensen

If only all the world had the conscience of a 7-year-old.

For the past two years I have been organizing and speaking out againstthe war on Iraq that the United States is waging through bombing and economicsanctions. One recent Sunday morning, a colleague and I spoke to a localgroup
and appeared on cable access television about the issue. My 7-year-oldson, Luke, sat through both appearances, seemingly more interested in histoys than in three hours of talk about the viciousness of U.S. foreignpolicy.

But over dinner that night, he started quizzing me about the issue,and it was clear he had been listening.

In the talk, we had explained that nine years of sanctions had crippledthe Iraqi economy and were directly responsible for as many as 1 millioncivilian deaths from malnutrition and disease. On the heels of the devastationof
Iraq’s health, sanitation and education infrastructure in the 1991Gulf War, the sanctions were inducing deep poverty and preventing the rebuildingof the country.

Although the U.S. government contends the brutal embargo is in placeto force Iraq to comply with weapons inspections, with perhaps the addedgoal of forcing the Iraqi people to overthrow the Hussein regime, the sanctions’
main mission is to send a message to the rest of the world: This iswhat happens when a country defies the United Stateswe will destroy you.The U.S. right to dominate the resources of the Middle East, and the restof the
world, cannot be challenged.

In 1996 when interviewed on “60 Minutes,” Madeline Albright  thenambassador to the United Nations and now secretary of state  was askedif the deaths of a half-million children in Iraq were an acceptable priceto
pay for a policy. “I think this is a very hard choice,” Albright acknowledged, “but the price -- we think the price is worth it.”

It is difficult to imagine any policy that is worth the deaths of ahalf-million children. That those children have died simply to shore upU.S. power is a crime against humanity that is impossible to justify.

If only government officials had the conscience of a 7-year-old.

At dinner, Luke asked questions. He’s going to a “normal” public school,where kids are trained to think the U.S. government doesn’t kill innocentpeople. He wants to believe what he is being taught about U.S. benevolencearound the world, but he is willing to reject the mythology in light ofthe facts.

Is the leader of Iraq good? he asked. No, I explained, he is a bad guywho sometimes even hurts his own people, but that doesn’t mean the peopleshould suffer even more under sanctions. Why don’t the Iraqis get rid ofhim? he
asked. That’s complicated, I said, but right now the people of Iraqspend most of their time trying to stay alive and aren’t in a very goodposition to overthrow a government.

How do sanctions work? Why don’t other countries just sell Iraq thingsthat they need? I explained that most of the world would like to see thesanctions lifted, but that the United States has more guns and power thananyone else,
and so the United States generally gets what it wants.

Why don’t the people in Iraq just come and live here? he asked. WhenI told him that wasn’t possible, he asked if we could send some food andtoys to Iraq. I said that the postal service wouldn’t let us mail anythingof value
to Iraq, but that a group in Chicago called Voices in the Wildernessmade trips to Iraq and delivered medicine. It would be better to send Voicesa donation, I said.

“That’s it,” Luke said. He ran to get his wallet and emptied out a 10-dollarbill and some coins. “I want to send it all to those people who are helping,”he said. I told Luke that he didn’t have to donate all his money, thatit
would be OK to give just some of what he had. But his mind was madeup. He gathered together a few small toys to include in the package withthe donation, dictated a letter, and drew a picture of himself so thatthe Voices
folks would know who sent it.

I hesitated for a moment: Because Voices in the Wilderness has not soughta license from the U.S. government to take humanitarian supplies to Iraq,the group has been threatened with $163,000 in fines. Technically, Lukecould be
liable for contributing to that “crime,” though I expect the Clintonadministration is not so vindictive that they would prosecute elementary-schoolkids.

Luke’s unprompted offer to help was particularly uplifting for me. Atprotests and talks for the past two years I have been listening to adultswho tell me that they don’t care about the fate of Iraqis and that theyhope that the
sanctions squeeze them until Hussein is out, no matter how many innocentpeople die. Once while at a political event holding up a banner that read,“1 million dead from sanctions -- how many will be enough?” a man walkedby
me, smirked, and said, “I don’t know -- how about 2 million?”

If only all Americans had the conscience of a 7-year-old.
 

Robert Jensen is a professor of journalism at the University of Texasand a member of the Nowar Collective. He can be reached at rjensen@uts.cc.utexas.edu.