Posts in "iraq"

aheram's picture
By Jayel Aheram at 12:32PM
Nov 28, 2011

What is War without Limbless Children?

Cluster bomb child victim.Britain unites with smaller countries to block the United States' bid to legalize civilian-maiming cluster bombs:

A coalition of countries including Britain on Friday defeated an attempt by the US, Russia, China and Israel to get an international agreement approving the continued use of cluster bombs. The weapons, which have been used in Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon scatter “bomblets” over a wide area, maiming and killing civilians, notably children, long after they have been dropped and are banned under a 2008 convention which was adopted by the UK and in more than 100 countries.

I am glad the White House is sending diplomats to defeat this existential threat to the United States. But war is brutal, right?

The unexploded bomblets have the appearance of yellow drink containers and are attractive, often picked up by children who mistake them for toys. However, the consequences are lethal, often resulting in maiming or even fatalities.

What is a war without limbless children anyway?

How effective are these munitions? “98 percent of victims of cluster bombs over the past three decades have been civilians, a third of them children.”

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Kells's picture
By Brad Kells at 8:12AM
Mar 28, 2011

Anti-War Protest at Michigan State University

On March 21st 2011, the day after the 8th year anniversary of the Iraq War and the interestingly coincidental beginning of U.S. involvement in Libya, the Michigan State University Chapter of Young Americans for Liberty hosted a protest of U.S. foreign interventionism.  We read the names of all those killed in the U.S. invasion of Iraq (over 4,700 soldiers), handed out anti-war and libertarian literature, and collected 225 signatures on a petition opposing U.S. foreign intervention, specifically in Libya, Iraq, and Afghanistan.

A collection of interviews with local students.  Warning: some language.

Student reaction held two interesting elements. 


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Jihan Huq's picture
By Jihan Huq at 3:30PM
Sep 20, 2010

The Persecution of Iraqi Christians

This is a bit off topic amid all the blogs about student activism; however, I feel as if many people in our media underestimate the magnitude of this problem.

 

Since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the Christian population has significantly decreased. Before the invasion, there were 1.5 million Iraqi Christians, and now the number has decreased to just 500,000. This is a disturbing trend. Many of these Christians have moved to neighboring countries as a result from the rise of terrorism and local Islamic extremists, gangs and thugs who find joy by targeting these helpless, unrepresented people. Iraq's new and improved “democratic” government isn't doing much about this problem either.

 

The persecution of Iraqi Christians is a new trend. Under Saddam Hussein, much of the country was still religiously united and sectarian conflict was not nearly as visible. Indeed, our government has underestimated the serious damage the occupying forces have done when it comes to sectarian and religious division (not to mention the violence, the threat of terrorism, Iraq's economy, and the country's political/social stability).


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Seth Mann's picture
By Seth Mann at 4:44PM
Jun 13, 2010

How do we know when WikiLeaks has it wrong?

EDIT: This post is not calling into question the video discussed elsewhere on the YALiberty blog.

How do we know when WikiLeaks has it wrong?

Bonnie's post has me thinking of the circumstances around which I first learned of WikiLeaks.

Sometime after I was initiated into a fraternity, I learned that its Ritual had been posted at WikiLeaks.  This was interesting for a time, but after perusing an official copy of the Ritual in person and comparing it to the document posted at WikiLeaks, there were glaring discrepancies.  Neither I nor any other member of my fraternity would feel especially threatened by an outsider reading our Ritual because it must be experienced to be understood and the Ritual as written leaves certain words, phrases, and descriptions blanked out so that they can only be passed on via word of mouth.

WikiLeaks has uncovered scandal and stores raw information that might otherwise be removed from the internet.  For those fighting for transparency it is indeed a valuable resource.  If I were to speculate, I would guess that public trust in the information released via Wikileaks is much higher than public trust in the nightly news reports.  But, as in the case of my fraternity's Ritual, how do we know when WikiLeaks has it wrong?

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William Stewart's picture
By William Stewart-starks at 2:38PM
May 4, 2010

Cost of War Exhibit, University of Kansas YAL

flag display

YAL members at the University of Kansas wanted to do something big to speak out against the continued occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan and present a non-interventionist foreign policy to the student body.  An idea from the past is slowly turning into a traveling display across the state of Kansas where YAL chapters are teaming up with local activist groups to present a flag memorial for service-members lost and a forum to discuss the cost of maintaining the US Empire.  Groups involved include:

  • Ambassadors for Peace (K-State)
  • Amnesty International (K-State)
  • Iraq Veterans Against the War/Afghanistan Veterans Against the War
  • Manhattan Alliance for Peace and Justice (Manhattan, KS)
  • Young Americans for Liberty (KU, K-State, Wichita State)
We also got some press coverage:  University Daily Kansan (article) and Lawrence Journal World (video). Other media in attendance were KUJH and the University of Kansas Alumni Magazine.

 

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Sam Swedberg's picture
By Sam Swedberg at 6:51PM
Mar 29, 2010

Petition to End the Wars Month: Wichita State

Wichita State held a Petition to End the Wars event this past Wednesday and Thursday.  They were able to interact with a number of students; Wichita State YAL's president, Andrew Cranmer, wrote an account of the event here.

Here are some highlights:

Obama's War

 Open Poster

File Attachments
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Wichita_State_Report.pdf
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Sam Swedberg's picture
By Sam Swedberg at 10:27AM
Mar 28, 2010

Petition to End the Wars Month: Middle Tennessee State's War Memorial

On Wednesday, March 24th, Middle Tennessee State YAL held a memorial for the Tennessean troop lives lost in the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars.  They also held a memorial for the civilian lives lost in the Iraq War.


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Jackie Silseth's picture
By Jackie Silseth at 6:14AM
Mar 26, 2010

St. Cloud Chapter Hosts Successful Anti-War Event!

On Wednesday the St. Cloud State University YAL chapter hosted an event to petition against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan barely twelve hours after making an appearance at the College Republicans' event "Why Am I Conservative?" making an effort to outeach to both the fiscal and social conservative movements.

While the anti-war protest was politicized by some less classically-liberal students and the administration tried to shut us down, claiming that we had not followed procedure to secure our location, they eventually admitted that they had a reservation for the group. "Student groups aren't allowed to post things to the building," said a man from the programming office, "But those cement walls over there are fine."

Despite the red tape and some student-group politics, our chapter managed to collect more than 250 signatures in support of H.R. 248 - to present to our Representative, Michele Bachmann - while increasing our group size 50% in a single day.

The Crew Setting Up at Locale #1


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Preston Mui's picture
By Preston Mui at 7:33AM
Mar 20, 2010

Blast from the Past

7 years ago today:

Bush warned the nation that the conflict "could be longer and more difficult than some predict."

But he assured Americans that "this will not be a campaign of half-measures, and we will accept no outcome except victory.

We have no ambition in Iraq, except to remove a threat and restore control of that country to its own people," he said.

Bush also told Americans that "helping Iraqis achieve a united, stable and free country will require our sustained commitment."

To celebrate, I caught a late-night showing of Green Zone, which centers around an American soldier searching for WMDs and the truth behind the bad intelligence leading up to the invasion. Near the end, one of the Iraqis tells him, "It is not up to you to decide what happens here."

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Bonnie Kristian's picture
By Bonnie Kristian at 12:37PM
Mar 16, 2010

"Bad things may happen in Iraq if we pull out. And they will happen anyway if we stay."

Indeed, they will.  Ron Paul's simple argument that "we just walked in; we can just walk out" of our foolish involvements in the Middle East continue to ring true -- and the fact that we can just pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan is well argued by Tom Englehardt at the American Conservative:

We’ve now been at war with, or in, Iraq for almost 20 years, and intermittently at war in Afghanistan for 30 years. Think of it as nearly half a century of experience, all bad.

And yet, despite claims from the administration that the war is on its decline (claims which may or may not prove reliable and, even at best, will not result in a complete withdrawal of American involvement from Iraq), we still have a large military presence in Iraq, and many still contend that we need to continue it:

The Iraqis, so the argument goes, need us.... In the year to come, based on what we’re seeing now, such arguments may intensify. Terrible prophecies about Iraq’s future without us may multiply. And make no mistake, terrible things could indeed happen in Iraq.


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