Between my excellent housewife-like exploits of the past few days, I've been reading Generation Kill by Evan Wright and One Bullet Away: The Making of a Marine Officer by Nathaniel Fick. Both books have hammered home how little I actually know about Afghanistan and Iraq. I consider myself to be fairly well up on things. I read the newspaper. I watch the news. I discuss political situations with people. But, seriously, I have giant glaring holes in my knowledge. Reading Fick's book especially made me realise that I didn't actually remember the chain of events that happened after the September 11th attacks in America. I don't remember the retaliatory events in Afghanistan directly afterwards. I just remember the move into Iraq and the massive protests here and Hans Blix completely failing to find weapons of mass destruction. The whole bit between September 11th and the invasion of Iraq is oddly blank in my memory.
In a way, I'd like to blame this on the fact that I was on a dig in Hungary on September 11, 2001. I had spent my day excavating a Neolithic shell midden in the blazing sun on the edge of the great Hungarian plain. Back at the hunting lodge we were staying at, we were all looking forward to showers and cold beer only to be told by the people who'd stayed behind for finds processing that someone had flown a plane into the twin towers. Which we thought was a joke. I remember genuinely not believing what they were saying until I followed them into the common room and saw the images on the TV. It was like a demented sci-fi movie. Now, the problem was we were in the middle of nowhere in Hungary and the only news we could get was German and I was the only person with any German at all and school-level German doesn't really cover death and destruction. So, I'd like to say that it was this remoteness from my usual surroundings that led to my absolute lack of memory of what happened afterwards. For me, what happened afterwards is that we all eventually dragged ourselves away from the TV, had showers and went about our business as usual the next day. A week or two later flying back to the UK was extremely complicated and involved armed soldiers which was in direct contrast to our flight into Hungary which had involved a member of our party making it through passport control with an out of date passport. Then, protests and Iraq. Nothing in between.
What I worry about is that I don't remember the bit in between because it didn't seem important and so it floated right out of my brain just as soon as it entered. I had some personal stuff going on around that time but you would I think I would have retained some information relating to America and various coalition forces bombing the shit out of Afghanistan. Of course, all of this has helped clear up the burning question of why, exactly, British forces were first sent to Afghanistan, which is something I've never really been sure of despite the huge coverage that war is getting at the moment.
In a way, I'd like to blame this on the fact that I was on a dig in Hungary on September 11, 2001. I had spent my day excavating a Neolithic shell midden in the blazing sun on the edge of the great Hungarian plain. Back at the hunting lodge we were staying at, we were all looking forward to showers and cold beer only to be told by the people who'd stayed behind for finds processing that someone had flown a plane into the twin towers. Which we thought was a joke. I remember genuinely not believing what they were saying until I followed them into the common room and saw the images on the TV. It was like a demented sci-fi movie. Now, the problem was we were in the middle of nowhere in Hungary and the only news we could get was German and I was the only person with any German at all and school-level German doesn't really cover death and destruction. So, I'd like to say that it was this remoteness from my usual surroundings that led to my absolute lack of memory of what happened afterwards. For me, what happened afterwards is that we all eventually dragged ourselves away from the TV, had showers and went about our business as usual the next day. A week or two later flying back to the UK was extremely complicated and involved armed soldiers which was in direct contrast to our flight into Hungary which had involved a member of our party making it through passport control with an out of date passport. Then, protests and Iraq. Nothing in between.
What I worry about is that I don't remember the bit in between because it didn't seem important and so it floated right out of my brain just as soon as it entered. I had some personal stuff going on around that time but you would I think I would have retained some information relating to America and various coalition forces bombing the shit out of Afghanistan. Of course, all of this has helped clear up the burning question of why, exactly, British forces were first sent to Afghanistan, which is something I've never really been sure of despite the huge coverage that war is getting at the moment.
 | Current Mood: contemplative Current Music: Alexi Murdoch - Dream of Flying |
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