Outraged by Baghdad Museum looting – published in the Peoria Journal Star

As somebody who has lived in the Middle East, has visited the historical sites and museums of Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia and has been astonished and moved by the history of that region, I cannot help but be deeply outraged over the failure of the coalition forces to prevent the looting of the Baghdad Museum and Iraq’s main library, the House of Wisdom. I grieve over what to me is nothing less than a feeling of violation and a sense of personal loss.

Article on article has heaped criticism on the administration for letting these incidents happen, despite having adequate warnings as to their possibility and the priceless nature of the museum’s and library’s contents. I saw a television interview of a historian who had been one of the many scholars and researchers who had written to people in power, including to some on the front lines, about what might happen. It was sad to see the controlled hysteria of the scholar as she described the guarding of the Oil Ministry, the organized execution of the thievery by alleged professionals, the recovery of only a handful of artifacts from the 4000 odd stolen during the 1991 uprising. The New York Times quotes a scholar stating “you would have to go back centuries, to the Mongol invasion of Baghdad in 1258, to find looting on this scale”.

There was also a media report that in one of the other museums, when the thieves could not carry an entire statue, they chopped off the head and took it. How can we blame such louts for not knowing the irreplaceable value of these items, if educated, learned people of wisdom and power do not? Every museum has signs that warn people against touching those ancient fragile works, on pain of punishment. Unfortunately, there is no accountability for standing mute as others befoul them. The history of an entire civilization hangs on the shrug of someone’s shoulder.

In moments of utter despair, I desperately hope that all those magnificent pieces of history, those glorious annals of mankind’s past have been stolen, not by thugs who would sell them for the price of a drink, but by collectors or by traders who deal in such artifacts. They, at least, would place electronic locks and gadgets outside their private galleries and guards outside the storage facilities for hot items. They, at least, would know the value of such pieces and protect them with their lives.

I am astounded to read about priorities and lack of personnel. I wonder which of the forty nine supporting countries would have gone bankrupt if four armed soldiers had stood at the entrance of the museum and library for two or three days. I wonder which part of the sky would have fallen if three or four soldiers were temporarily taken out of the war against a defeated, demoralized, hopeless enemy desperately trying to disappear into the alleyways of an already fallen capital.

I was happy that the reign of a cruel dictator has come to an end at last. I was ecstatic that I would be able to visit Iraq without fear and be touched by that emotion called history in the land where civilization was born. That happiness has been greatly tempered today, to say the least. For, without its history, Iraq is just desert. And ruins of museums and libraries.

I am sad that the children of Iraq will not know that emotion and will not feel that enormous pride over their nation’s heritage when they see a visitor sighing over their country’s history. I am sad that when I visit Baghdad nobody will want to take me to a museum that once housed artifacts from five thousand years ago. I am sad that the children of the world will not be touched by that emotion either, at least not in Baghdad. They will be all the poorer for it.

Last year, I visited the museums of Washington DC and was shocked by the casual security in all of them, despite the world having changed after September 11, 2001. Why, then, should I be surprised now at what has happened, after all, in a foreign country? I should not be. I cannot help but be disappointed, disillusioned and infinitely sorrowful though.