Yesterday, the "leader of the free world" threw the opening pitch at the Cardinals/Brewers game in St. Louis (he even made a strike) and attended at fundraiser that added $1.5 million to his reelection coffers.

All he had to say about the harrowing violence in Iraq is that "we're now marching to peace."

He must not be getting his daily digest anymore. It must just be too depressing for him to read that U.S. forces are striking poor Iraqi neighborhoods- and not the kind of strikes Cardinal fans cheered in St. Louis. It must be too much for him to contemplate Iraq's (and our) worst nightmare: a two front war in Iraq against both Sunni and Shia militants. Better to don a Cardinals jacket and glad hand big donors.

There is no march to peace in Iraq. There is widening, gapping war. Since April 1st, 23 American soldiers have been killed, and four (that we know of) U.S. mercenaries were attacked, killed and brutally dismembered. An average of more than four Americans are being killed a day in Iraq now. Last month the average was less than half that.

As U.S. soldiers sought to reassert control over Sadr City, a slum of more than 2 million Shiites, eight were killed- one of the worst single losses in any confrontation since last year. Scores of Iraqis were also killed- but no break down of how many were armed militiamen loyal to the cleric Moktada al-Sadr, and how many were civilians. The firefight took place in a Shiite enclave that welcomed U.S. troops with flowers and called them liberators a year ago.

Democracy Now reports today:

"In the face of two resistance fronts the U.S. has opted for a high-risk strategy of attempting to crush both of them simultaneously.

"U.S. forces yesterday used Apache gunships to attack targets in Baghdad for the first time since the fall of the Saddam Hussein regime, opening fire over the Shia neighborhood of Shulla.

"Meanwhile, a force of some 1,300 US marines and Iraqi troops began moving into the Sunni-dominated town of Fallujah. The town has been sealed off but witnesses speak of shelling and blasts and the use of helicopter gunships. This according to the BBC. The US has vowed to "pacify" Fallujah, after four US mercenaries were killed, torched and dismembered last week."

President Bush is not listening to Democracy Now. And he is certainly not reading Naomi Klein's dispatches from Iraq. No time between fundraisers and empty promises about the economy.

Klein offers an important reminder to us who are watching from far away. Do not believe the lies. This is not a civil war. This was not inevitable. This is no march on the road to Bush's "peace." She says, "Make no mistake: this is not the "civil war" that Washington has been predicting will break out between Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds. Rather, it is a war provoked by the U.S. occupation authority."

Freedom Fires, IndyBay, April 5 2004

Let's Make Enemies, The Nation, April 1, 2004

All her dispatches from Iraq -- www.nologo.org

Reports   |  Recent News Coverage   |  Updates