April 29, 2003
Taken in 1934 by British travel writer Robert Byron.
A few years ago, the world watched in horror and disgust and contempt as the Taliban, those freaky arch-victorians of the Islamic imperium of Afghanistan, destroyed the massive sandstone carvings of Buddha in the side of a mountain in Bamiyan.
The statues were not remarkable artistically, but they were deeply significant for historical and cultural reasons. (Sorry if you do think they're beautiful-- I don't. They look like something a bunch of monks without great artistic talent would create.) In the seventh century AD, there were over 5,000 Buddhist monks living in the caves around the statues. Islamic Arab tribes drove the Buddhists out by the ninth century-- they didn't destroy the statues, though.
That would be barbaric.
The destruction of them by the Taliban was an act of mindless, philistine thuggery that astounded the world. If one was not, until then, convinced of the barbarity of the Taliban, this one act did it.
The Taliban repressed women, of course, and was famously intolerant of freedom of expression, diversity, freedom of conscience, freedom of speech, or any kind of fun whatsoever. But those statues were just sitting there, harmlessly, impressively (175 metres high). It takes a peculiarly vindictive and petty and malicious mindset to destroy something like that.
In 2003, the Americans invaded Iraq. The marines that arrived first in Baghdad immediately secured the oil ministry buildings and guarded them diligently during the first weeks of the occupation. Down the road, the Baghdad Museum featuring an absolutely priceless collection of some of the world's most important antiquities sat there, unguarded.
The Americans stood by as Iraqis of unknown affiliation or devotion destroyed and looted the museum. The marines did nothing. They didn't even seem to care.
It is not that the Americans were unaware of the significance of the collection. Well, maybe they were. But they certainly knew that cultured and educated people in the U.S. and elsewhere regarded the collection as invaluable and irreplaceable. Experts from around the world had made efforts to ensure that the Americans didn't bomb it by mistake, and had taken measures to protect the collection once they occupied Baghdad. The Americans said, "yeah, yeah, fine, we'll take care of it." Then they didn't.
The Washington Times uncovered a March 26 memo that showed that the Pentagon had communicated, to the coalition commanders, a list of important sites to be protected during the war. The Baghdad museum was number 2 on the list. Somebody in the Pentagon had a brain.
The world should never forget or forgive Donald Rumsveld for sloughing off the destruction of the Baghdad museum as just "so many vases". It was a wonderful moment, if you think shocking revelations of the deep-seated idiocy are "wonderful". He really didn't care. He really didn't grasp the significance of the collection. He really could not imagine why anyone would worry about the loss of these absolutely unique examples of the art and expression of mankind's earliest civilizations.
That's fine, really. Nobody cares if some asshole called Donald Rumsveld sits in his cave somewhere picking his teeth while contemplating the eternal symmetry and beauty of plum pit.
But George Bush, during his election campaign, never once informed the voters that, given the opportunity, he'd appoint people who would happily stand by and do nothing while priceless antiquities are looted and destroyed. Donald Rumsveld surprised us.
Jack Valenti, the head of the Motion Pictures Association of America (MPAA), goes around the world berating governments for supporting local film industries at the expense of Hollywood productions. He wonders why anyone would bother with indigenous film, when they can have as many copies of "Ernest Saves Christmas" and "Dumb and Dumber" as they want.
Bush should hire him. He belongs in this White House working with Mr. Rumsveld. They can both be put in charge of the world's priceless antiquities.
Do you think any of these leaders of the free world care about the beauty of the rain forest, or a pristine wilderness area, or coastal wetlands, or a medieval cathedral, or a rare endangered species, or live theatre or the ballet, or opera, or Mozart's birthplace, or humpbacked whales, or snowy owls, or Dostoevsky's manuscripts, or Shakespeare's original theatre, or a Scottish castle, or the Great Wall of China, or mummies, or cuneiform tablets, or anything at all, other than the stock market and McDonalds and Disneyland?
Think again. When they come to your neighborhood promising the delights of democracy and free enterprise, get ready for drive-thru's and golden arches.
If you never knew it before, you know now that George Bush and Rumsveld and Perle and Cheney are to culture and history and civilization what McDonald's is to gourmet cooking.