Return to Iraq

(Originally Published in the New Haven Advocate)

Dwindling Possibilities

  "In brief and in clear words, don't come to Iraq at this specific time.
The way to Baghdad from the north is too dangerous.
They can easily chase you and hurt you.
Roads are extremely danger even for Iraqi people."

               --Excerpt from an E-mail from an Iraqi friend in Baghdad, just before my trip

I've crossed the Turkish border into Iraq earlier in the day, and am now in the city of Dohuk, in an internet café. I'm following up on some research on which cities might be possible to travel to. It's clear that I can't take a taxi from north Iraq into Baghdad, as I did in the summer. People thought I was crazy to do it then, but the situation has worsened to the extent that trying to pass on roads near the capital in a mere taxi is absolutely out of the question.

One place I intend to nervously pass through is the northern city of Mosul, where 22 people on an American base were recently killed in a single explosion, and Iraqi policemen are often found murdered by the dozens. The leveling of Falluja has sent its once high concentration of insurgents sprinkled across central and northern Iraq, and many of them have reportedly found a new home in Mosul.

It's located just below Dohuk, and is a likely next stop, but even I have sense enough to do a little checking before I blunder in. Someone at a military base in Mosul is kind enough to pass on some information.

"Now there are no police at all. Whole sections of the city are essentially the province of the insurgents, and Iraqis are terrified. If you want to meet insurgents, Mosul is the place. The trouble, as you know, is that they want to meet you, too."

I wouldn't mind meeting certain insurgents, as I did this summer in Najaf, but these are an entirely different group. These are the beheading guys. I speak to a few people who've fled Mosul, and they tell of cars driving into the city being sprayed with machine-gun fire, just because they are from another region. The extent of lawlessness is to the point where, on the main bazaar street, there are televisions set up outside, where films of insurgent military operations and executions are shown right after they happen, and there are big banners which read in Arabic, "If you're going to vote in the election, vote for who you don't like, because the winners will be killed." It seems that Mosul, too, is out.

Some things seem to be progressing in Iraq, but there's a growing strangle hold on the whole country. Power, fuel, trade, medical supplies, all the things that make a society run, are difficult to get from point-A to point-B. Even if both points aren't particularly dangerous, there's no telling what may be on the road between. Drivers are kidnapped or killed and goods lost routinely. Logistics are so difficult, shipping prices and danger levels have risen so high that companies and aid organizations simply stop trying.

The monumental task of holding elections may well prove to be more difficult still.