Share
×
Inspirational Quotes
Authors
Professions
Topics
Tags
Quote
I think in Baghdad, any westerner, journalist or not, has a big dollar sign on his or her forehead. So, first and foremost, you are a ticket to unimaginable wealth. And that makes any trips out of the safe zones very risky.
Yaroslav Trofimov
Share
Change background
T
T
T
Change font
Original
TAGS & TOPICS
Yaroslav Trofimov
Age: 55
Born: 1969
Born: January 1
Journalist
Kiev
Thinking
Dollars
Unimaginable
Westerner
Safe
Ticket
Westerners
Wealth
Foremost
Zones
Bigs
Tickets
Baghdad
Makes
Dollar
Trips
Firsts
Journalist
Forehead
First
Zone
Risky
Think
Sign
Foreheads
More quotes by Yaroslav Trofimov
And if you look at the experience of Turkey, for example, where the modern Islamists are in power and are doing fine - this is very good. Because democracy is not possible in the Muslim world without bringing in the Islamists or part of the Islamists who hate us now into these governments.
Yaroslav Trofimov
Long before 9/11 and the war in Iraq, a lot of people hated the United States and the West. But what the Iraqi war seems to have done, at least in... I mean, I'm just reporting what I see from the people on the ground, is that it has silenced many pro-American forces in the Muslim world.
Yaroslav Trofimov
Even if you look at Iran, those campaigners for human rights there, they don't want to have anything to do with America, because they are afraid that having American support will be the kiss of death for their movement. And that's really tragic.
Yaroslav Trofimov
But in Afghanistan, the general rule was that since you were fighting the Taliban, which was not a lawful government force, the Geneva Conventions did not apply. And that led to a lot of excesses in Afghanistan, excesses like Abu Ghraib that were already well-publicized.
Yaroslav Trofimov
The rules of engagement are so lax that soldiers are shooting and killing Iraqis under mere suspicion, and tragedies are everyday. There are road killings, killings on the road when someone is trying to pass a convoy and they get shot. Or if a roadside bomb goes off, the soldiers just start shooting in all directions.
Yaroslav Trofimov
Because no matter how much money we spend there [in Iraq], as long as the people there see this money as... as assistance that is unwelcome, as long as they continue to be humiliated in their own country by us... I mean, the future looked bleak, and the future after that was in fact very bleak.
Yaroslav Trofimov
What I found most ironic is that the safest part for us as journalists was during the actual war. Back then, during that stage of fighting, we were not targets. After the war itself, during the first month or two, it was extremely safe. We could go anywhere in Iraq, talk to anyone, and didn't have to worry about anything.
Yaroslav Trofimov
Well, it's a problem in general with the American military. If you are the biggest and the strongest military power in the world, you have this natural reluctance to learn the quirky ways of the natives in faraway lands.
Yaroslav Trofimov
I think the behavior of the troops has been a huge factor in the rise of the insurgency and in the rise of the anti-American feelings there[in Iraq].
Yaroslav Trofimov
The American official was trying to talk about aid and development projects and finally a local tribal chief got up and said, Even if you turn our country into heaven, we don't want it from you. Just leave us.
Yaroslav Trofimov
The other problem is that the priority of many soldiers in Iraq or Afghanistan is operational security: not getting killed. Now that is a very valid priority, but it has to be balanced against many other priorities, especially not killing too many locals in the process.
Yaroslav Trofimov
Even if you are a liberal in the Muslim world, when you see Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, and you see all the other reports of abuses by American forces, it's very hard to get up and say, We should simulate the American ways, because this is the face of America now in the Muslim world, for many Muslims.
Yaroslav Trofimov
If you are an eighteen or nineteen-year-old with little education, as is often the case, and you're put in charge of many, many people on the other end of the world, you have absolute power and you're not prepared for it.
Yaroslav Trofimov
Now as to the behavior of the soldiers: occupations always corrupt the occupiers.
Yaroslav Trofimov
In the occupation in Afghanistan, there are tragedies as well. It's not as bad as in Iraq because there are fewer American troops. But, as I describe in the book, going out on patrol and coming into a village, the soldiers found a stash of documents and decided this was Taliban propaganda.
Yaroslav Trofimov