End This Travesty

(620 words)

by Tom H Hastings

It was mid-day, in Baghdad. When Iraqi citizens—not soldiers, not police, not insurgents, not terrorists—approached Nisour Square on September 16 of this year, little did they know that an incident had occurred a few blocks away. They are people caught in a war zone, but they are simply trying to live, to run errands, to get to work if they are lucky enough to have any, or to bring their children someplace.

Those mothers, daughters, fathers and sons were also unaware that Blackwater USA mercenaries, hired by the Pentagon, were there with a massive arsenal that would rain hellfire and lethal explosions on them, killing 17 and wounding 24.

Meanwhile, Erik D. Prince, CEO of the Blackwater corporation, was enjoying his massive personal wealth and luxury. Prince, a heavy contributor to Bush’s ...

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Tom H. Hastings is director of PeaceVoice and a founder of Whitefeather Peace Community in Portland, Oregon. He is core faculty in the Portland State University Conflict Resolution masters program.