The Face of War

There is nothing but ugliness in war

- Vijay Prashad

IN the apartment of my friends in Baghdad (Iraq), they tell me about how each of them had been impacted by the ugliness of the US-imposed illegal war on their country that began in 2003. Yusuf and Anisa are unusual people, both members of the Federation of Journalists of Iraq and both with experience as 'stringers' for Western media companies that came to Baghdad amid the war. When I first went to their apartment for dinner in the well-positioned Waziriyah district, I was struck by the fact that Anisa-who I had known as a secular person-wore a veil on her face. "I wear this scarf," Anisa said to me later in the evening, "to hide the scar on my jaw and neck, the scar made by a bullet wound from a US soldier who panicked after an IED [improvised explosive device] went off beside his patrol."

Earlier in the day, Yusuf had taken me around New Baghdad City, where in 2007 an Apache helicopter had killed almost twenty civilians and injured two children. Among the dead were two journalists who worked for Reuters, Saeed Chmagh and Namir Noor Eldeen. "This is where they were killed," he tells me as he points to the square.

"And this is where Saleh [Matasher Tomal] parked his minivan to rescue Saeed, who had not yet died. And this is where the Apache shot at the minivan, grievously injuring Saleh's children-Sajad and Duah." I was interested in this place because the entire incident was captured on film by the US military and released by Wikileaks as Collateral Murder in 2010. Julian Assange was persecuted largely because he led the team that released this video. It presented direct evidence of a horrific war crime.