I’m Sorry I Destroyed Your Country

In life, there are some situations that beg for an apology, but there is no easy way to do it. For example, suppose you are a senior citizen attending a funeral for a friend of the family. You lean over the open casket and your false teeth plop out and clamp on the nose of the deceased. You panic. You don’t think many people saw it happen, so you pluck the teeth off the stiff’s nose and shove them back in your mouth as discreetly as possible. Unbeknownst to you, someone caught the whole thing on video and it becomes a worldwide sensation on Youtube before the deceased is in the ground.

My point is there’s no way to apologize for that situation. For one thing, the guy who most needs the apology is dead. And his widow probably isn’t in the mood for it.

I was thinking about this apology problem in respect to Iraq. Whatever you think about the reasons for invading, everyone seems to agree that we botched the occupation, and the results have been a disaster for the Iraqi civilian population. I feel like I owe them an apology for letting my idiot government screw them so thoroughly.

Your first reaction might be to explain all the rationalizations, and how war is messy, and it was really Saddam’s fault, and blah, blah, blah. But apologies don’t work that way. I could be wrong, but I think the Iraqi people who were minding their own business would like to hear an apology.

But how? My idiot government won’t apologize on my behalf. And if I fire them and get a new idiot government, they won’t do it either, until fifty years are past. That seems too late.

So here’s my public apology to the Iraqi civilians who did nothing to deserve their current situation: I’m sorry I trusted my idiot government to handle things correctly. I should have been watching more closely. To be honest, I never once thought to even ask if there was a post-war plan. That was clearly a mistake on my part. For that, I am sorry.

We’re putting a lot of lives and money into making things right in Iraq, and that’s appropriate. But in addition, and for whatever small comfort it provides, I’m genuinely sorry for my part in allowing things to get this bad.

Comments

[Proud American]

I truly doubt that "most" agree with your distorted, bleeding heart liberal, gutless opinions. However, since the author reviews and approves all comments, I guess you can create any perception you want.

I used to buy your calendars, and read your strip, but that ended today after I read your disgusting opinions.

If you are dying to apologize to someone, please appologize to all of Sadam's victims, the troops that have given so selflessly, or to the victims of 9/11. If there were no reason for war, then who is it that is killing our troops left and right? You should apologize to them for not offering your support to their sacrifices.

You are a coward, and I am afraid that this country is being overcome by your clueless type of thought process.

Wake up and study history, you fool.

You will not see another cent of mine, and I'll make sure that all of the people I know, the true patriotic Americans know about your warped sense of right and wrong.

We owe nobody an apology. There are Iraqis that are more than grateful for the many sacrifices that our fine fighting men and women have made for them.

You should be ashamed.

[Bruce]

I also apologize to all the fine people in Iraq. Of course, the only fine people I know in Iraq are U.S. troops.

I always laugh when I read Scott post about things like this. How can you apologize, Mr. Adams, for something over which you had no control? You have no free will, so there's no way you could have done anything but what you did.

[Ari]

Yeah, our bad for digging up those mass graves. We wouldn't like it if your government came over here and started cutting up our lawn. Sorry for interrupting your way of life.

[Z]

Great post Scott,

You remind a lot of us that not all Americans are assholes. And I am really heartened to see that the majority of comments agree with you.

And to the relatively few people who still think the war was justified and are still shouting their viewpoints belligerently, I'd just like to say that your arguments sound tired and your patriotic shouts are now very boring. If you had any facts to back up your arguments I suspect you wouldn't have to shout as loud or rely on emotive but tenuous arguments.

Z

[mo]

I find apologies meaningless. Saying "sorry" is a cop out of the worst sort because it's just words. Words without action are worthless.
Americans always believe a "sorry" is good enough.
How about an apology and a settlement.
a simple one for Iraq. You get your idiot, racist, torturing, raping asses out of the country and leave the oil alone.
You pay each Iraqi harmed by YOUR actions money to rebuild their lives. Then you stay the hell out of the middle east.

American arrogance..why do you people think you have a right to invade a sovereign country that is no threat to you? Even if Iraq did have WMD so what? If that is a real trigger for invasion half the countries of the world should be in flames..
It is not the responsibility of AMerica to roam the world murdering at will any one that refuses to conform to what America wants.
How about you idiots stay home?
Stick to selling Ipods and Iphones and the rest of the world will continue to sell you the FOOD you need to survive.
Keep up your war mongering ways and you may wake up to food shortages that will equal your current water shortages.

Any country that outsources it's FOOD should be a little more careful about murdering the people that supply it.

[Jim in Sai Gon]

Dear Scott-

I live and work in what was Sai Gon, Viet Nam (Now known as Ho Chi Minh CIty." Americans owe the southern Vietnamese big-time apologies for abandoning them and allowing them to be subjected to a life of death (at worst) and misery and hopelessness (at best.)

From my vantage point, I can see that Americans did not learn one blasted thing from our shameful betrayal of an ally.

Not one of you rummies who gripe about Iraq having "political stability" under Saddam Hussein know what "political stability" really implies: a one-party state,operated by tyrants and their dim-witted and thuggish relatives,whose purpose is solely to uphold their own regime. The needs of the people are not even a consideration (Unless an NGO comes to visit.)You would never want it for yourself. Why would you wish it for anyone else?

I am truly ashamed of all of you lard-assed, selfish Americans. I will always be an American. But I will never live among you. Living in another country reminds me of how great the US is and each day I see the lines of folks lined up outside the US Consular Office (Not the French, Swedish or Camadian offices) to apply for a visa.

WIllian Tecumseh Sherman, the US Civil War general said it best when he said "War is Hell," Yes, there have been terrible consequences, loss of life and limb.And the financial costs have been horrendous. But the US freed Iraq of the scourge of Hussein, his two psychotic sons and his Bathist regime.Unless we allow it to happen, the Persian Gulf will not be shut down by some Islamic lunatics. Now it's up for the Iraqi's to decide if they want to live free or as slaves. The US under Bush is the only nation that had the heart (and the stones) to make this possible. Got a problem with that, Scott? I don't. You want to apologize? Start with the folks in southern Vitenam (Not the ones in Mercedes-Benz's - those are the "socialists" and their toadies.) Apologize to the armless and legless soldiers who are treated as "non-persons - non-citizens." Apologize to the young women who have to whore themselves to provide enough money to support their families. And apologize to the old ladies who lost their husbands and sons, and have no means of financial support. Apologise to the dead soldiers whose graves have been bull-dozed and desecrated. They are the folks you and your supporters on this blog have abandoned. Shame on the lot of you!

[pierre]

Good on you Scott.

[Joe]

I protested against the invasion, along with tens of thousands of other Australians. The little (and hopefully soon to be desposed - Saturday to be precise) duechebag who runs our country ignored the lot of us.

Funny when people say in this post "we meant no harm to the fine people of Iraq." Hmmm, without experience it is hard to say, but I think if people drop one of the largest aerial bombardments in history on my country, then invade it with tanks and guns, I wouldn't be assuming that they were coming to have a nice chat, a cup of tea and perhaps a picnic later if everything is going well.

Also read in this blog about "Islamic Fasists" for the first time. That is a new one. I presume that is the term for all Arabic people who aren't terrorists - that is around four people I think, and one of them is already dead.

[Tom]

"Action springs not from thought, but from a readiness for responsibility."

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945)
German theologian

[The Internet Perv]

Hey TallDave - I would like photos of that, purlease...!

You said 'diggleberrys', I hope you meant dangleberries?!?!??!

[Mekki]

A good friend of mine once said:

"It takes a big man to apologise. But, it takes an even bigger man to make fun of that man."

But in all seriousness, for what it's worth, Scott, cudo's to you for saying it.

[Nick]

It does occur that the person who should apologise is probably General H. Norman Schwarzkopf for his decision to let the Iraqis use helicopters after 1991 in the no fly zones. This single decision (although admittedly he didn't realise it at the time) lead to the uprising that happened being put down as they could use their helicopter gunships. Its the small things that turn the World. If this one decision had gone the other way then Sadam would have been overthrown by his own people and we would never have had to go in and a lot of people would still be alive now.

[Luke]

Scott,

I'm intrigued, given your stance on voting, in what way do you feel you should have changed things? Clearly you're happy to allow other idiots to vote for weasels. Are you saying that you should have influenced the vote or the government in some other way?

Campaigning? Terrorism?

In what way do you feel responsible and is there anything you will change to try and ensure the same mistakes (if you believe they are mistakes, if not why apologise?) aren't made again?

Explain yourself young man.

[chuckleberry]

Here is my 2 pence info for all cynical.. please try and wake your dead brain up and remember the reasons given to American people for starting the war were "Iraq = AQ pal", "AQ pal = 9/11", "Iraq = WMD (to be used against US)".. well tell me in all honesty that after soooo many days of occupation and killings from both sides (Islamic Fasists and US soliders).. has any of the above mentioned reasons been proved beyond DOUBT.. if there is a doubt then i'll take iraq to be innocent untill proven otherwise. Also to all brain dead cynical people please tell me how come the killings in "Darfur" which are statistically much much more heinous both in numbers and the method hasn't invited any talks of US invasion but Iraq did.. let me tell you the reason ... OIL WELLS .. THIS WAR IS FOR OIL AND MONEY NOT FOR GIVING IRAQI'S BETTER LIFE

[Andreas Toscano]

To all who said not voting is enough reason not to complain: he DOES pay taxes.
And my bet is he pays a lot more than you.

Congrats, Scott.

Cheers,

A

[Radiohe4d]

For those ill-educated people making comments about Saddam's preference for raping every woman in his country and kidnapping family members every night, how about you do some reading and stop being "Bush Puppets:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_hussein

Was he a bad person. He sure was, but the claims you people make are absolutely ridiculous. He was inhuman to people who opposed him, yes, and for that he needed to be removed and punished, but trying to base your support for an invasion on some of the rubbish you people are spewing out is laughable. There are dictators out there who don't discriminate between whether or not they punish their enemies or the general population, so until you're government starts threatening them as well, shut your filthy mouths. For your information, Saddam was actually the first in that country to bring major reforms for the female population and was actually a big fan of western culture. The muslim fanatics hated this, so yeah, he had a lot of enemies in that region and the way in which he retaliated was sickening, but get some perspective people. Yes, he was unhinged and yes i hated him, but his acts have been overshadowed several times, so don't go preaching your "Iraq was a disaster before we got there" BS to anyone educated, because you just come off sounded like tools.

[Nicki Lagrange]

as an aussie - whose own idiot government has its collective head so far up Bushes arse they can almost see daylight - i would would also like to apologise to the million plus Iraqies who would still be alive (albeit living iunder a dictarorship) but are now dead because of our actions - sorry

[nikki]

Why does everyone feel compelled to mention where they are from or their nationality before they agree or disagree with Scott’s apology? As if that really had anything to do with you agreeing or disagreeing with his apology?

I think that begs to question how would you feel if you were living in Iraq? Even worse, you almost can't honestly answer that question because unless you have visited and seen Iraq first-hand, you can't really fathom the tragic life one lives in a war zone. For most Americans, it’s not anywhere close to their everyday existence.

So people I guess we should all be thankful that we are not living that tragic life and also take a moment to say a heartfelt apology for the people in Iraq and pass on condolences to those who have lost loved ones in this war on both sides of the enemy line.

[Know One]

> My point is there’s no way to apologize for that situation. For one thing, the guy who most needs the apology is dead.

Maybe not. Some guys love any kind of attention.

[Eric]

I don't know if anyone has mentioned this (too many comments to read them all). But there is a logical fallacy in this approach. You basically assume that a "good" post war strategy would have prevented all the problems that you're apologizing for. What if that was an impossibility, given our resources? It's painfully obvious we didn't have a good plan, but that doesn't mean that one existed that would have prevented the problems in the wake of ousting Saddam.

[Just]

All the self-righteous airheads who think what the US did wasn't worth apologizing for, and more along the lines of "doing Iraqi people a favor by ridding them of a dictatorship".
Well guess what, your government is fucked up too, and I can't wait for the day someone returns the "favor"
I hope you lose a family member in an airstrike too, that will really help you relate to Iraqi people.

[vishalrix]

Scott, this is a slippery slope you have taken here ( slipped on?). If as a citizen you feel obligated to express regret for faults/crimes of your government, would you extend the logic and agree that you are liable to be tried for war crimes that your troops/government may have committed in Iraq/elsewhere?

If you do, I am glad you have slipped here. If not then you must consider yourself to be the citizen of the world first and an American later.

[CDriK]

How about attacking Iran now that you apologized ?

[CDriK]

Please Please Please Please Please Please Scott,

Apologize on behalft of the US governement for their PR campaign against France using major media sources.

All the freedom fries, and wine/cheese bashing and freedom=cowards things... Please...

[Mon Jackin]

From a European idiot...

Let's face it - pretty much everyone has to trust their idiot governments, in the same way that the idiot electorate must also be trusted. I barely trust myself to vote for a good leader, let alone the gap-toothed moron next door