Deaths mounting, as is indifference

[Guest guest]

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6695.htm

 

Information Clearing House

 

NEWS YOU WON'T FIND ON CNN

 

Deaths mounting, as is indifference

 

By John Aloysius Farrell

Denver Post Washington Bureau Chief

 

Sunday, August 08, 2004 - " Denver Post " -- Washington

- We didn't hear about the lives of Spec. Justin

Onwordi or Pfc. Harry Shondee Jr. at the Democratic

convention.

 

And I doubt we'll hear much about their deaths when

the Republicans gather in New York this month.

 

Onwordi, 28, a Nigerian immigrant, and Shondee, a

19-year-old Navajo, were on duty with the 1st Cavalry

Division in Iraq when, early last week, they gave

their lives for their country.

 

The Pentagon did not have much to say about their

deaths. In a terse news release of some 100 words, the

government announced that the two Arizonans had been

killed " when an improvised explosive device detonated

near the vehicle they were traveling in. "

 

The attack took place in Baghdad on Monday. Onwordi

died that day. Shondee fought for life, then succumbed

Tuesday. Their deaths came with news that four other

American soldiers were also killed in Iraq in the same

24-hour cycle.

 

Sgt. Juan Calderon, a Texan with the 1st Marine

Division, was killed with an as-yet-unidentified

comrade in fighting near Fallujah. Army Sgt. Tommy

Gray of New Mexico died in a motor pool accident.

Capt. Gregory Ratzlaff, a Marine from Oregon, died

from a " nonhostile " gunshot wound.

 

Six dead in 24 hours. A few weeks back - before the

" transfer of power " in Iraq - it might have been a

front page headline. But The New York Times ran the

news at the bottom of Page 8; The Washington Post on

Page 15. Here at The Denver Post, we put the story on

Page 16. The TV news networks mentioned the deaths

parenthetically.

 

The political parties are no more forthcoming; each

has determined that it is not in its interest to talk

about the dead and wounded in Iraq.

 

I don't understand. We pulled Ambassador Paul Bremer

out and replaced him with Ambassador John Negroponte.

Why should that make our guys and gals, and their

deaths and wounds, invisible?

 

The dying and maiming has gone on unabated since we

transferred authority in June. In terms understood by

dozens of grieving American families, July ranks

fourth in the number of soldiers killed (54) and fifth

in the number wounded (404) since President Bush

declared an end to major combat operations in May

2003.

 

All told, we've now lost more than 920 uniformed

Americans and dozens of U.S. contractors, some of whom

fought for us like mercenaries and kept the official

body count down. Now August has gotten off to a bloody

start.

 

And for Iraqis, it has been more of the same, with

hundreds dying at the hands of assassins and suicide

bombers in recent weeks. The estimated number of

insurgents has jumped from 5,000 to 20,000, while

production of crude oil and electric power linger at

or below prewar levels.

 

Maybe we'll go on a binge of regret when the number of

American deaths hits 1,000. In the meantime, I hope

the Onwordi and Shondee families know that we value

their loss and are trying to ensure their loss is

worthwhile.

 

I have resisted comparisons of Iraq and Vietnam. But

in the way we are obliviously adding names to some

future Iraq memorial wall, I'm having flashbacks to

those terrible years when we put our faith in Richard

Nixon's secret plan to " Vietnamize " the war and paid

dearly, and in vain, for the ever-elusive " peace with

honor. "

 

It was a scary, surreal time, marked by anger,

despair, protest and backlash. Something dies in a

society when it fights a war on the cheap, without a

universal call for sacrifice, putting off the

reckoning for having run up tens of billions of

dollars of debt and ignoring the incessant toll in

lives.

 

The obituaries tell us a little bit more about Justin

Onwordi and Harry Shondee.

 

Shondee lived on the Navajo reservation. He was a

member of the National Honor Society at Ganado High

School and a good golfer.

 

Onwordi, who came here from Nigeria, leaves behind a

wife, Monique, and a new son, Jonathan, who was born

July 7.

 

Onwordi had been home on leave for the birth. He at

least got to hold a son who now will never know him.

 

John Aloysius Farrell's column appears each Sunday.

Contact him at jfarrell