| Submit your comments on this article |
| Iraq |
| Bush Sr. a Doormat No More |
| 2003-04-11 |
| Edit for brevity. There was a bit of unfinished business left over in Baghdad from the 1991 Gulf War. The U.S. Army has taken care of it. At the Al-Rashid Hotel, President Bush the elder â father of the current American chief executive who ordered this year's invasion of Iraq â is a doormat no more. U.S. soldiers visited the battered Al-Rashid on Thursday night wielding hammers and chisels, and dug out the intricate tile mosaic of the former president that was used for years as a state-sponsored insult. In its place, they laid a portrait of Saddam Hussein. "Everybody walked over it and wiped their feet on it," Lt. Col. Rick Schwartz, the battalion commander said. He left the Saddam portrait behind, on the ground for future use. Taking shoes to the face is not exactly a compliment in any culture, but in the Arab world it's a particular slam. Pointing the soles of one's feet at someone is a grave insult. So the notion of thousands of Iraqi feet trudging over the patrician features of George Herbert Walker Bush was particularly appealing to Saddam's regime, humiliated by Bush during the 1991 Gulf War to free Kuwait from Iraqi invaders. On Thursday night, the Army forces destroying the mosaic chipped away until it was unrecognizable. They left behind thousands of little pieces in the concrete of the floor â as ravaged as the hotel itself, which is now uninhabitable. "We did some remodeling," Schwartz said, referring to a battle that took place there when Iraqi snipers used the building to fire on U.S. forces. Now, as people in Baghdad rush through the streets yelling "Bush! Bush!" and thrusting thumbs in the air, at the al-Rashid Hotel a decade-long insult has been removed â by a military commanded by a son who waged a second war on Iraq and insisted it wasn't personal. |
| Posted by:Dar |
| #4 Oldspook, having not been there I can't say I suffered anywhere nearly the same impacts as you by any means, however, it wasn't invisible to the American public what we had done to those people, and I think it lead to a rather bland support among Republicans for Bush 1. Bush 2 seems to have a lot of his mother's spine and atitude, and for that I'm grateful. He says what he means, and finishes what he started, I like/respect that |
| Posted by: Frank G 2003-04-11 18:54:02 |
| #3 The Truth is: the reticence of the Iraqi people to rebel quickly is attributable to Bush Sr, and his abandonment of the rebels in 91. Some of my most graphic frustrating memories were from after the war, when we were enforcing the truce lines. The ROE didnât allow us to engage Iraqis unless they were pointing the weapons in our direction. So, consequently, we watched their troops shooting women and children and there wasnât a damn thing we could do. We were cursing (in Arabic), yelling all kinds of things just to get Saddam's thugs to point the weapons at us so we could take them down hard. But they didnât take the bait. I still remember seeing a woman die while coming across the bridge to us from wounds she received, and our OP, despite orders to the contrary, went out and pulled her body the rest of the way, and then treating the 6 year old son she was carrying (soaked in her blood), for gunshot wounds to his legs from the bullets that had passed thru his mother. Didnât hear about it in the papers did you? Nope - the friggen reporters left when they thought things were "over" - didnât want to tell the story of how that evil bastard was killing his own people, and we were forced by our own politicians to stand there and do nothing from only a mile away. And not a damn thing we could do because Bush Sr was too damn timid to do the right thing - he was worried about "image" instead due to the killing of the bandits on the âhighway of deathâ. We had preparatory orders to march on Baghdad at the end of the war - and the Marines would have moved into Basra. But Bush Sr stopped things 24 hours too soon, and allowed that cursed regime to live and kill more of its people over the past decade. I had nightmares about this one for a few years after coming home, and despite my "rough and tough" image, I'd wake up with tears on my face at times. Call it PTSD, or whatever, this dream started coming back when this war started. I will never forgive Bush Sr for not letting us do what we knew was right, when we had the time and tools there to do it. In case you couldn't tell, Iâm not a big fan of Bush Sr. I voted for him, but only as a lesser of 2 evils. So yeah, it is OK that they got his face off the floor, but there are those non-Saddamites in Basra that might deservedly miss it. Thank God that "Dubya" seems to have the moral backbone to stand up, and courage to do whatâs right, even if it is unpopular with the rest of the world (unlike his father). |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2003-04-11 15:02:50 |
| #2 True story: I was a salesman at a community music-instrument store, and every Christmas season we'd get out a giant Santa Claus doormat. My boss was not amused when I told customers that it was an opportunity for them to get back at the bastard whose mythical existence obliged them to be buying soon-to-be-ignored guitars and drum sets in the first place. So I can understand the soles-of-the-shoes thing. |
| Posted by: FormerLIberal 2003-04-11 09:41:36 |
| #1 what a classic! while war is truly a serious and tragic thing, there have been some most amusing and gratifying moments. This is one of them. |
| Posted by: anon1 2003-04-11 09:25:18 |