FROLITICKS

It’s April 15, 2013, and Forbes is reporting that bombs hit several cities across Iraq, killing at least 20 people. In a recent survey (Washington Post, March 18, 2013), Iraqis said they felt better about their security but worse about economic and political stability since the U.S. military left in late 2011. The Iraq decade-long war is reported to have cost the U.S. the loss of 4,400 U.S. service personnel and 32,000 wounded, as well as a couple of trillion dollars of taxpayers money. Not to mention the deaths of an estimated 120,000 Iraqi civilians over the same period. Today, religious and ethic divisions continue to pervade much of Iraq, threatening to set the country back again. Current Shi’ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s political muscle will be severely tested against Shi’ite and Sunni rivals in a scheduled parliamentary election in 2014. While the U.S. continues to pour millions into the strengthening of security forces and the restoration of the country’s infrastructure, the mainstream American media have for the most part chosen to virtually ignore recent developments in Iraq. Perhaps this is because all the attention is being given to Syria and the rise of terrorists’ factions in Africa. Indeed, the Iraqi government very likely prefers it this way. Whatever the reason, one can only hope that more media attention will be paid to the seriousness of the Iraqi situation — even though some Americans may rather choose to forget the unfortunate history and outcomes surrounding this decade-old conflict.