WHERE HAVE ALL THE PROTESTORS GONE?
A year ago to the day the bombs started falling in Baghdad. I was in Northern Iraq, my two feet intact, waiting for the fall of Kirkuk and blissly ignorant of what would happen to me less than a fortnight later.
I never got to see the Kirkuk fall. By then I was in hospital in the UK, facing an uncertain future -- which thankfully has turned out to be far brighter than I could have possibly hoped for.
Journalists love anniversaries -- and the first birthday of the War In Iraq is no exception. We've sent special teams to Baghdad and Basra and every news outlet is examining the state of the country one year on. In fact, I've been asked to write my own "one year on" piece for BBC News Online.
For me, though, the fact that the invasion of Iraq began 365 days ago is of little importance.
Today's demonstration in London looked like something of a damp squib -- around 25,000 protestors compared with the hundreds of thousands who turned out a year ago.
In February 2003, opposition to the war here in Britain was so strong that it prompted the country's biggest ever turnout. Has the world moved on so quickly that the public has forgotten the deep anger it felt last year? Have people changed their minds about the validity of the war? Or have they simply accepted that they lost the argument and moved on?
If hundreds of thousands of people were angry enough to take to the streets a year ago, they should be absolutely furious now -- but strangely it seems they aren't.
Discuss
A year ago to the day the bombs started falling in Baghdad. I was in Northern Iraq, my two feet intact, waiting for the fall of Kirkuk and blissly ignorant of what would happen to me less than a fortnight later.
I never got to see the Kirkuk fall. By then I was in hospital in the UK, facing an uncertain future -- which thankfully has turned out to be far brighter than I could have possibly hoped for.
Journalists love anniversaries -- and the first birthday of the War In Iraq is no exception. We've sent special teams to Baghdad and Basra and every news outlet is examining the state of the country one year on. In fact, I've been asked to write my own "one year on" piece for BBC News Online.
For me, though, the fact that the invasion of Iraq began 365 days ago is of little importance.
Today's demonstration in London looked like something of a damp squib -- around 25,000 protestors compared with the hundreds of thousands who turned out a year ago.
In February 2003, opposition to the war here in Britain was so strong that it prompted the country's biggest ever turnout. Has the world moved on so quickly that the public has forgotten the deep anger it felt last year? Have people changed their minds about the validity of the war? Or have they simply accepted that they lost the argument and moved on?
If hundreds of thousands of people were angry enough to take to the streets a year ago, they should be absolutely furious now -- but strangely it seems they aren't.
Discuss
posted by Stuart at 19:28
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