Eight Thousand Years of Civilization ...gone

[DRoseDARs]

Originally posted by Agathon


Agreed. If the US thinks that the Iraqis might get mean, wait until hordes of angry archaeologists and historians come after them.

God, if only that WOULD happen...

Too bad they're all going to be too busy scrambling to find new artifacts to replace all that's been lost.

At least the doctors and teachers have supplies to look forward to in the immediate future, as soon as the coalitions gives the green light to aid workers signifying it's safe (enough) to venture in and get to work...

[DRoseDARs]

Originally posted by gsmoove23
I was against the war too, but I feel the fact that the US doesn't have enough troops to police the city is a serious design flaw in our strategy. People have been saying all along that we needed more troops and we may have rushed ahead too quickly in the hopes of keeping this war palatable to the public. Certainly not enough thought was put into how to administer captured territory beforehand.

And Rumsfeld has been taking A LOT of heat for under-manning the ground forces from many military experts and others. Let us hope he gets in trouble for it now...

The coalition DID have enough forces to protect these few vital sites. If they can defend the Oil, Agricultural, and Health and Public Service Ministries with dozens (hundreds?) of troops and vehicles out of tens of thousands outside of the city and hundreds of thousands in the region, they could have spared a few hundred more warm bodies (in dozen-man teams at each site) to protect those other vital locations.

EDIT: Moved the second paragraph BELOW the first quote, since that is what it was responding to

Talking about the importance of cultural heritage is admirable but ultimately pointless to the Iraqi living on the edge of poverty who might have lost his livelihood or his most valuable possessions. He will undoubtedly not be thinking of the cutural or spiritual significance of the loss of such priceless artefacts.

Let me try putting it this way:

Hospitals serve the IMMEDIATE needs of Iraqis currently living.
Schools serve the NEAR-FUTURE needs of Iraqis currently living and soon-to-be born.
Museums serve the FUTURE needs of Iraqis yet born in a (fingers crossed) stable Iraq...

The 3 sites that WERE protected serve the needs of the immediate, near, and more distant future, so at least they got that part planned right.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by gsmoove23

Talking about the importance of cultural heritage is admirable but ultimately pointless to the Iraqi living on the edge of poverty who might have lost his livelihood or his most valuable possessions. He will undoubtedly not be thinking of the cutural or spiritual significance of the loss of such priceless artefacts.

We should have been thinking about it.

[cinch]

We should have been thinking about it.

Definitely.

They wasted no time in securing the oil fields; I would have expected them to show the same level of respect for the history of humanity.

[Daz]

Way to go, liberators...

[Static Universe]

If the responsibility for policing Iraq hadn't been given to a corrupt civilian subcontractor, these control problems wouldn't be happening.

Scandal-hit US firm wins key contracts

DynCorp, which has donated more than £100,000 to the Republican Party, began recruiting for a private police force in Iraq last week on behalf of the US State Department.

Shouldn't the military commanders play this role? Haven't they always done so? The local police have always been under the control of the occupying general at the time of conquest, then handed back to the new government after its establishment.

Bush is making a big mistake trying to outsource this function. I mean seriously, where has this type of thing ever been attempted by private companies? This was a huge risk, and the commercial bent of the web of protection being thrown up is going to brand the new police even more as tool of Western business, thus undermining civilian control in Iraq.

Also, I think Bush made a big tactical mistake not to defend cultural artifacts more closely. These items are of great significance in the ME right now, and museums an important Arab cultural symbol since the Isrealis seized the Palestine Archaeological Museum and the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Six Day War.

And surely some of these looted items while ultimately wind up in Western museums some day, or so the Iraqi's will fear after things settle down. They won't blame the looters, they'll blame the Americans.

[Herzog]

If some other country was liberating us from a dictator, I'd forgive them for destroying the Lincoln Memorial, not even mentioning looting done by Americans of the Smithsonian (which is less 'valuable' to the Lincoln).

if you compare the lincoln memorial with the babylonian museum, you simply cannot make any opinion in matters of art, im sorry

pd, cool avatar that one of the wizard of final fantasy 1!!! weredid you take it!!!

[Herzog]

well, i finished reading this thread (the last post was posted after 3 pages of reading) and its obvious that here we see a discusion between people who know, make and understand art and people who think titanic is a good movie.

[DRoseDARs]

Ok, at least one more post tonight, then bed...

Static:
The contracted police would not have helped in this instance simply because the coalition forces were still encountering resistance from the last of Saddam's forces. They wouldn't have put civilian workers in harm's way. So really, it was the military's responsibility to protect those sites and the leadership's to order it done.

Second, doesn't look like I'm going to like this contracted police force idea...

Herzog:
This isn't a matter of the "artistic value" of one artifact over another. The Lincoln Memorial is just as valuable as any Summerian text. This is a matter of them both contributing to Humanity's collective culture; they are both part of each and every one of us. The loss of either is a loss to all of us. The only difference is that the Lincoln Memorial and other recent "artifacts" can be repaired or rebuild since they are so young: we know what they are supposed to look like and what they mean. On the other hand, I know that a lot of the bigger history museums have a large number of ancient artifacts in storage that haven't been looked at beyond cataloging, simply because the curators haven't gotten to them yet. I fear that many pieces in Baghdad may have slipped into the abyss, never to be understood because the curators were unable to study them more properly.

They can never be "rebuilt" nor "replaced" because they were never studied in full. A photograph probably will never be adequet for study. Of course, then again, the looters stole and destroyed thousands of documents and records, so even that route may be f*cked in most cases...



And you're right. Titanic sucked.

[Guest]

Eight thousand years of civilization ... gone

What a load of rubbish.

[Traianvs]

GODDAMNIT

I'm pissed off. As an archaeologist, reading this event in the paper infuriated me especially because Mesopotamia is my key interest ....

Simply placing a tank and 10 soldiers would have prevented the looting, just now they moved up a few tanks there, but guess what, .... it's too late!! they frikking have 300k troops swarming all over Iraq, they must have a few spare troops I would think, no?

Oh well, next to the countless ancient sites that have been destroyed by bombings in the Gulf wars, now the national museum has to go as well. A fecking great job, you should really be proud of it!

And to all those people who justify the destruction of a few (about 170k was the lates number I heard) antiquities because after all it's because we have to remove Saddam: y-o-u a-r-e a-l-l s-t-u-p-i-d m-o-f-o-s

Imagine the destruction of your nice shiny office building, including all your documents and data... now wouldn't you be pissed off??

And to everyone with a simple mind like Jaguar Warrior here

Oh no! Millenium old plates are going to actually have people eating from them! US troops should be tried for war crimes!

Hehe goddamn I really do wonder how you graduated from kindergarten... maybe poppa passed on a few diamonds on to the school director? you fool, I have no words to describe my anger, bah!

[Sloth]

The destruction of Alexandria's library is still mourned today...this will be mourned 1.000 years from now.
I'm very sad that someone can shrug this off. It was clealry avoidable. It should have been avoided



BTW: yes I do think that anyone that shrug this off is an ignorant idiot. Sorry, I have never insulted anyone here. It will be my first and last time. But this time I must.

[Bereta_Eder]

Allegendly, the director of the museum said she has lost all of her family, killed by the bombs and now she has lost the history of her land too.

[Frogman]

I was very disappointed that the US didn't guard the hospitals and the museum from looters. Instead they hole up in the palace. It was a disgusting disregard for human life and Iraqi history. Hell, they didn't even protect the information ministry. How many important documents were left to burn. Just stupid, there is no excuse. They had the manpower to defend whatever they wanted and they just didn't care. Who sets their priorities?

[Drake Tungsten]

Simply placing a tank and 10 soldiers would have prevented the looting

It also would've made that tank and those 10 soldiers easy targets for any hostile Iraqi forces still in the area. I hate to see a museum get looted, but I would also hate to see American troops get slaughtered because they're spread out all over the city protecting buildings while a war is still going on.