Matthew Lee, Associated Press Writer, published a short piece yesterday about how few Iraqi refugees the United States has taken in. According to Lee (and other sources I've read), approximately 50,000 Iraqis are fleeing their country every month, yet the United States has "only taken in 190 refugees since last year." Because we started this war, we owe something to the Iraqi people, especially to those who helped us and continue to help us there. This news report reminded me of an in-depth article I read some months ago, written by George Packer and published in The New Yorker. The title of the article is "Betrayed", and in the article, Packer describes in horrifying detail the ways in which the United States failed--and continues to fail--the Iraqis who serve as interpreters and staff and thus risk their lives and the lives of their friends and relatives.
Another writer has written more recently of an Iraqi friend who served as an interpreter for four years for the U. S. Army. The interpreter's house was bombed, his wife and young children threatened, and relatives (his father and brother) kidnapped and murdered. The American officers and soldiers who have worked with this Iraqi have written letters attesting to the young man's faithfulness and trustworthiness and of the need to get him out of Iraq before his family is murdered in retaliation for that very friendliness to Americans. But "Andy" has not been successful in acquiring immigration status. Read and weep over Maura Stephens' description of American bureaucratic incompetency and her follow-up to Andy's story.
George Packer describes how this failure to help our friends foreshadows our defeat: "America’s failure to understand, trust, and protect its closest friends in Iraq is a small drama that contains the larger history of defeat."
No comments:
Post a Comment