Invisible War: The United States and the Iraq Sanctions
By Joy Gordon
Harvard University Press, 2010, 376 pages (cloth), $39.95
Reviewed by Christopher J. Doucot
If killing at least 500,000 civilians in order to execute a dictator is unintentional and thus not genocide, what is it? Joy Gordon’s illuminating Invisible War, closes with an exploration of this challenging question.
Invisible War explains how the “nonviolent” weapon of sanctions ultimately killed hundreds of thousands of civilians. For example, the near elimination of electricity prevented Iraq from “maintaining a cold chain”; that is, without uninterrupted electricity, and lacking a fleet of refrigerated trucks, Iraq was unable to import, produce, or distribute perishable foods, child or livestock vaccines, or medicines. In response to criticisms that the sanctions were taking too severe a toll on civilians, the U.S. consented to the creation of the “Oil for Food” program, which was intended to provide relief by allowing Iraq to recommence importing food, medicines, and the equipment necessary to deliver these goods.
In chapter 4, “The Problem of Holds,” Gordon meticulously documents the ways in which the United States undermined the Oil for Food program by preventing Iraq from importing everything from eggs to the components required to restore electricity. The justification was that these were “dual use” items. Theoretically, vaccines along with a restored cold chain could enable Iraq to manufacture biological weapons; sick children, spoiled medicine, and rotted food were an unfortunate but unavoidable, and purportedly unintended, side effect of “keeping America safe.”
In January 1999, I apologized to a grieving Iraqi father whose son had been killed by a U.S. missile one week earlier. He asked, “Why does America bomb us? We are not criminals.” In chapter 10, “Inside the U.S. Policy,” Gordon concludes that “civilian suffering literally counted for zero” because “[a]mong U.S. policymakers, ”˜Saddam Hussein’ and the people of Iraq were entirely conflated; denial of goods to the civilian population was seen as ”˜denying Saddam Hussein’.” With three administrations framing U.S. policy as containment of Hussein, and most media hewing closely to this narrative, the true impact of 20 years of war on the people of Iraq is largely unknown in the United States.
In July 2000, I again found myself apologizing to an Iraqi. This woman sat at the bedside of her six-year-old son whose right arm had been blown off by a U.S. cluster bomb. The mother said to me: “You don’t need to apologize, I don’t hold you responsible for the actions of your government.” Her generosity was both ironic and undeserved. I am responsible for my government; ours is a free society with free elections, our tax dollars purchased the weapon that maimed her son. This child was in no way responsible for the invasion of Kuwait or any of Hussein’s dictatorial policies, and yet it was he and a half million other children whom we held accountable.
If we embrace the notion that ours is a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people,” are “we the people” complicit in the deaths of innocent Iraqi children?
Invisible War fills a gap in the historical record. Gordon’s writing is clear, follows a logical progression, and exhaustively documented. Considering the ongoing tensions between the United States and Iran are unfolding in ways that parallel our earlier relationship with Iraq, we need to know this history so as not to repeat it.
Christopher J. Doucot is a founder of the Hartford Catholic Worker. He holds a M.A. in religion from Yale Divinity School.
