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Recent
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April
21, 2003
Elaine
Cassel
An Administration in Contempt
Edward
Said
Give Us Back Our Democracy
Gary
Leupp
Easter Thoughts on Liberation, Jesus
and Kanaka WaiWai
Roger
Witherspoon
Why Michigan Needs Affirmative Action
Uri Avnery
At Midnight, a Knock on the Door
Steve
Perry
Bush's War Web Log 4/19
April
19, 2003
Gary
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The Rape of History
Saul
Landau
Shop, Go to Church, Support Bush's
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J. Fellows
Off With Their Heads: the Constitution According to Scalia
Pablo
Mukherjee
Roadmap to Resistance
Omar
Barghouti
Sharon's Bloody Beat
Anthony
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Tony Blair: the Most Powerful Man in the World
Mickey
Z.
Animals: the Other Collateral Damage
Will
Potter
When Police Attack Journalists
William
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America's In-Bedded Journalism
Neve
Gordon
Haunted by History
Adam
Engel
Wal-Mart and Peace
Dr.
Susan Block
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Poets'
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Albert, Buono, Guthrie
Steve
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War Web Log 4/19
Song of
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Baghdad to Basra
April
18, 2003
Uri
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Operation "Syrian Freedom":
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Jorge
Mariscal
"They Died Trying to Become
Students": the Future of Latinos in an Era of War and Occupation
Mickey
Z:
Coalition of the Unindicted: Only Losers Get Tried for War Crimes
Hussein
Ibish
Syria and the Road to World War IV
Reza Ladjevardian
Tarqeting Iran? Do It With TV, Not Cruise Missiles
Matania
Ben-Artzi
You Are Not Protecting My Son's Rights: a Letter to the President
of Israel's Supreme Court
Bruce Jackson
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Joe
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My Lai Revisited
Carl Estabrook
Support Our Euphemism
Steve
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War Web Log 4/18
Website
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April
17, 2003
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Mariner
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Issam
Nashashibi
Zalmay Khalilzad: the Neocon's Bagman
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Wayne Madsen
Another Sign of the "End Times" for American Journalism
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Fisk
The Army of Occupation
Boris
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Virtual Saddam Takes Aim
Biljana
Vankovska
A Personal View of Iraq: Where
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Dan Brook
Oil War: Fueling the Empire
Stanley
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Bomb and Steal: This is What Privatization Looks Like
Tim Robbins
A Chill Wind is Blowing Through This Nation
Harold
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Iraq After the War
Steve
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April 23,
2003
Why Lori Ann Piestewa Died
When
Young Mothers Die in Combat
By
ANTHONY GANCARSKI
When Americans die in foreign wars, we're told
never to forget those singular losses by cable networks like
Fox News and MSNBC.
Let's take those grave admonitions at
face value, and never forget exactly why Pfc. Lori Ann Piestewa
died. Piestewa, one of the very few Hopi women in the military,
was the 23 year old mother of a 4-year-old boy and a 3-year-old
girl. The mother of two was with Pfc. Jessica Lynch [who joined
the military, according to her father, because McDonald's wasn't
hiring] when their unit was ambushed on March 23rd near Nasiriyah.
The Pride of Palestine, WV survived to see her trials sanitized
by cable television; Piestewa won't be so lucky.
What kind of nation have we become, to
send mothers in the primes of their lives to die like dogs on
foreign battlefields? Piestewa hailed from an indigenous people,
yet her life was so blighted that she had to sign up with the
US military -- in spite of having two children -- to avoid the
vise of poverty that has crushed what's left of the Hopis and
other tribal nations. She did what she could for her kids every
bit as much as that flag our conquering heroes covered the face
of Saddam Hussein's statue with, but her kids will be left orphaned,
with only fleeting memories of the woman who brought them into
the world.
The War on Terror [the omnibus name for
the Bush policy of perpetual war against foreign and domestic
enemies] has given us a number of journalistic casualties. There
are some whose deaths receive great play, like Daniel Pearl,
Michael Kelly, and David Bloom. All of these men were lionized
in death, the honors they'd attained during their lives only
augmented by dying while performing journalistic tasks for the
elite media.
Their deaths are tragic to many who knew
them, as well as fans of their work. That much said, their deaths
were ultimately voluntary. Pearl chose to trust his source and
descend into the bowels of Karachi. Kelly and Bloom likewise
chose to follow the war as and where it went; they would've lost
nothing if they hadn't, but they did anyway, to build a legacy.
Lori Ann Piestewa likely didn't carry
an American gun to boost her legacy. She served because food
and electricity and gasoline are expensive things, and because
there aren't enough jobs in reservations or anywhere else but
the armed forces anymore. She reckoned that she could provide
for her family by fighting enemies of the state. It wasn't for
her to understand the merits of partitioning Iraq versus maintaining
its geographical integrity. Likewise, she probably had no useful
opinion on whether Chalabi will fill Hussein's old shoes as Our
Man In Baghdad. Lori Ann was willing to kill for her country
as the surest means of providing for herself and her family.
She died half a world away from her babies, choking on desert
sand.
Many elements in the American media advance
the idea that any criticism of US military operations is prima
facie unpatriotic. But whose money is expended for a war on Iraq,
or for the bombs that strafe Colombia to protect us from drugs?
Whose sons, brothers, cousins, sisters, and even mothers are
fighting and dying for cunning schemes sold with the most simplistic
language?
Iraq never threatened Americans, but
its corpse will provide ample feasting opportunities for well-connected
companies in the US and the UK, already using the coalition military
victory to muscle the companies of France, Russia, and China
out of their contracts with Hussein's regime. Will these nations
see their national interest as threatened? Unless their leaders
are eunuchs, that is very likely.
How will our erstwhile allies indicate
their disapproval? Harsh words in the media, of the sort that
our pundits laugh at? Or by funding resistance movements in Iraq
and elsewhere, funding fresh bodies to fight and kill Lori Ann
Piestewa and others who only signed up because there was no other
option. God bless America -- we certainly need it.
Anthony Gancarski is a regular CounterPunch columnist. He can be
reached at: ANTHONY.GANCARSKI@ATTBI.COM
Yesterday's
Features
Uri
Avnery
Operation "Syrian Freedom":
This One's Not About Oil
Jorge
Mariscal
"They Died Trying to Become
Students": the Future of Latinos in an Era of War and Occupation
Mickey
Z:
Coalition of the Unindicted: Only Losers Get Tried for War Crimes
Hussein
Ibish
Syria and the Road to World War IV
Reza Ladjevardian
Tarqeting Iran? Do It With TV, Not Cruise Missiles
Matania
Ben-Artzi
You Are Not Protecting My Son's Rights: a Letter to the President
of Israel's Supreme Court
Bruce Jackson
Jews Like Us
Joe
Allen
My Lai Revisited
Carl Estabrook
Support Our Euphemism
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/18
Website
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Meet the Victims of War
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